The saying “beauty is pain” holds true to the suffering that young girls and women had to endure in an effort to ensure their marriageability. A wife with bound feet was viewed as a status symbol in Chinese culture, or a “trophy wife” in modern terms. Footbinding is an example of extreme body modification and quintessential objectification that women have undergone to enhance their allure. Women with these lotus feet were seen as delicate, in need of male protection, and aristocratic. Although the practice of footbinding was banned in China in the mid-twentieth century, there are still women who are living testaments to this cruel custom. Footbinding was a way to subjugate women in order to ensure conformity to China’s cultural beauty standards,
