Recently, a story made news because of an interesting racial implications in the case of a Florida-based plastic surgeon who practiced surgery on a woman who claimed to be 7 feet tall and was found to be in fact shorter than that: Lisa Bilyeu. In this plastic surgery case, the trial court found that the term “unedited,” which is used in the operative language to describe an operation where the patient’s height has been surgically altered, when used in conjunction with the word “physical” to describe Bilyeu’s work, was not legally appropriate, and thus should have no bearing whatsoever on the results of the operation. But what exactly is “unedified”? According to the Florida Bar Association, it is a phraseology that describes, in broad terms, an aesthetic change to one or more physical characteristics, which can be done without changing the primary characteristics of a person, but which has some effect upon those characteristics so as to affect how they see, think, act, or feel.
For example, in this case, the term “unedified” would be defined as “a cosmetic change that alters the racial makeup of a body part.” This is a pretty broad definition. However, the Florida Bar Association further notes that “racial” and “acial” are not synonyms. So even if one uses “racial” to describe a result obtained through Bilyeu’s work, that description could apply to any situation where physical features differ from or interfere with, the perceived norms of that race.
In this instance, it seems the term “unedified” would not have any bearing on the outcome of the case. It is a legal terminology and while having a legal standing may have some meaning in the context of Florida courts, and while the term might apply in that setting, it would have no bearing on the actual outcome of the surgery. Similarly, in a case where the term “legal” was used, it would not have any relevance, legally speaking, on the result of a breast augmentation for an African American patient. The Court does not need to rule on this point, because the Florida Supreme Court has clearly indicated that it lacks the power to make such a determination.