FROM looking at Rodrigo Alves, the man who has become known as “the human Ken doll”, it’s impossible to tell why he has pursued the course of 51 plastic surgeries and 103 cosmetic procedures that have resulted in him looking like a pouting, sculpted mannequin. It doesn’t seem unreasonable, though, to assume that he might have a body dysmorphic disorder. And that suspicion, surely, should make us wary of making a media freak show out of his physical transformations.

Yet, it appears not to. The appetite for goggle-eyed voyeurism around people like Alves seems to be inexhaustible. Even when we know that in 2015, Alves actually received treatment for body dysmorphic disorder (BDD).

In spite of this, we still see newspaper articles revel in the latest tales of how Alves, last month had to pull out of Celebrity Big Brother for “health reasons”, or how, on a recent Italian television show, he said he had altered everything in his body, except his genitalia, which he might change in the future, so he can become a “Barbie” rather than a Ken – as if transitioning were merely just another cosmetic procedure.

And why is this? Is it because we think that Alves is living a wonderful life and is testimony to the marvels of plastic surgery? Or because we admire him for being someone who goes the “extra mile”, as he calls it? No, I suspect it’s because we believe that he is a tormented soul and we can’t help but gloat.

Of course, it’s not necessarily the case that everyone who transforms or modifies their body has BDD. Alves himself recently said he does not believe he does. "I don't have a body dysmorphic disorder," he stated. “I was born in the wrong body: my mind and soul matches the new body I've created.” But even so, it does seem to me that in making celebrities out of these surgery obsessives, there’s a danger that we are turning what at least looks like mental illness into entertainment. How we treat Alves is a demonstration of how far we are from taking body dysmorphic disorder seriously.

Partly, we fail to recognise it, because we live in a culture in which it’s accepted as normal that people should relentlessly pursue physical perfection, and in which surgery and body modification is becoming commonplace. Alves’s attitude to his body is in tune with the zeitgeist. No longer can we get away with performing just enough basic grooming to avoid scaring the neighbours. Your body has to be a piece of art, a statement of who you are, an expression of your soul.

Yet, BDD is a recognised disorder, and half of those with it will be hospitalised; around a quarter take their own lives. Those afflicted by it are tormented by a hatred of some aspect or their physical appearance to the extent that it interferes with their whole lives. Researchers have linked the disorder to bullying in childhood, cultural factors, and also genetics.

All of which speaks of pain.

It also suggests to me that, even if we don’t know whether Alves has BDD, we should be wary of creating celebrity out of some tendency that just might indicate a psychological problem – even if in this case, it doesn’t.

SAY IF YOU'RE GLAD TO BE GLUM

Happiness. It’s exhausting, isn’t it? We live in a world that, according to Danish psychologist Svend Brinkman, can verge on being “totalitarian” when it comes to the emotions. We all know how we should be feeling, whether it’s in the workplace or at home, as a worn-down employee or a wearied parent, and it amounts to a kind of relentless cheerfulness. Almost whatever is going on in the world – nuclear threat, natural disaster, death of a loved one, redundancy, a burst pipe – we should be able to turn on a happy emoji-style smile, by means of positive-thinking. Earlier this month we even heard Donald Trump report of a visit to families displaced by Hurricane Harvey flooding: “We saw a lot of happiness.”

So, it’s a relief to find Svend Brinkmann, author of Stand Firm: Resisting The Self Improvement Craze, proposing that this kind of pressure amounts to “thought control”. Brinkmann’s revolutionary proposal is that our “thoughts and emotions should mirror the world”. Yes, real feelings. When something bad happens, he says, “we should be allowed to have negative thoughts and feelings about it because that’s how we understand the world”. So, go on, let it all out. The full emoji fest. And don’t let anyone tell you to “cheer up, it might never happen”.