“A medium fries, or the gap between your thighs?”
“Fat people can’t fit everywhere.”
“Starving is an example of excellent will power.”
I’ll admit, I started laughing when I stumbled upon these sayings on blogs, after all, they couldn’t be serious, right? However, after a few clicks on links marked “Tips on Fasting” and a list of “Excuses to Avoid Eating,” I stopped laughing. The people behind the words meant everything.
These bloggers are part of an alarmingly growing web community, dubbed “Pro-ana” and “Pro-mia,” where personal sites promote, even glorify, anorexia and bulimia as lifestyle choices. Some have even gone to the point of personifying the eating disorders, “Ana” and “Mia,” as their best friends while others have likened them to a religion. Highly defensive and self-critical, the anonymous faces behind these blogs (most with over a hundred followers) are usually young girls around 16 and 18.
“I feel like a complete fatass after Ive just given into eating an orange. An orange. I really didnt want to go over 500 calories today, dammit,” one writes.
Typically, pro-ana and pro-mia sites are run by the girls who document their personal journeys to being stick-thin. Many have start weights at merely 125lbs and goals of getting to 80lbs. They weigh themselves daily, share their nearly nonexistent calorie intakes, and promote “helpful” tips (one including a disturbingly detailed “how to purge.”)
The sites also serve as platforms for all pro-ana and pro-mia followers to find each other, feeding into an ongoing conversation of bashing food like its the devil and praising the feeling of hunger.
“I am your best friend, and if you eat, you are failing me and letting me down. If you eat, it shows how little self control you have. That pain in your stomach right now, that is me, and that is your fat melting away”–from a popular pro-ana mantra.
Another crop of the pro-ana, pro-mia movement are images marked as “Thinspo” or “Thinspiration” pictures. They can range from runway images and editorials featuring famous size 0 models to regular girls taking faceless before and after photos, usually leaving little more than skin spread thinly over ribcages. More powerful than the girls’ personal narratives, these pictures evoke a profound pro-ana/mia impact on their own. Bloggers fill pages with these emaciated idols, enamored with the idealistic body-type. It’s inescapable even on Facebook, where afacebook page dedicated to the gap between thighs alone currently has over 330 fans, men and women alike.
Obviously, anorexia and bulimia aren’t new issues at all. What is new, however, is the startling power granted by Social Media. We’re no strangers to this either; after all, our favorite fashion bloggers all have their success stories, but its critical to know that just as quickly as Jane Aldridge‘s cute outfit garners one thousand views, pro-mia and pro-ana attitudes spread with equal, viral power. Seeing dozens of blogs dedicated to anorexia and bulimia make the attitude acceptable, normal, even, as the severity of the disorders themselves get masekd.
It’s human to have body image issues, especially as a teen, when change is most drastic: blemishes, breast size, hip width every shift is magnified a hundredfold in adolescence. Pro-ana and pro-mia girls, however, are consumed in self-esteem poison, and by putting themselves out there on blogs, they’re especially vulnerable. Imagine being sixteen and reading somewhere that guys find that “gap” hot? Or interpreting a hundred followers and liked posts on your pro-ana blog as a sense of friendship? Or seeing a blog quote Kate Moss, who may very well be your fashion idol, say “Nothing tastes as good as thin feels.” When you’re that fragile, its too easy to get sucked in while reading a “motivational” list citing,”Fat people are so huge, yet people look away from them as if they dont exist.”
But who is to blame? The fashion industry’s proud display of skinny, teenage models? Social media for giving it means to become a pandemic? Everyone reading and dismissing it as satire, like I did? Or perhaps there’s no use in blame. Maybe all we can do is make known this is frighteningly real issue murmuring beneath the glamour of idealism that fashion promotes.
Ladies, if you really want slim bodies: excercise, eat healthy, look to each other for support (and not the kind that condemns you for eating). It’s not a sin to eat more than 500 calories a day. It’s not ok to relish in nausea from hunger. And if someone asks you again, “a medium fries or the gap between your thighs?” it’s not wrong to still feel beautiful even when you sometimes take the fries.
This is definitely an important topic. However, coming from a site that promotes thin-ness by talking about models all the time, it can only be taken as not very serious.
OK, as I guy, I can tell you that you will be dumped in a hurry if you look anything like a third-world starving woman! If you can’t figure out a normal, healthy weight, you’re probably crazy, and I want nothing at all to do with you. Here’s a suggestion. Stay on a 50-calories per day diet for three months, so that you finally drop dead, since that clearly is what you seem to be after!
Beauty is subjective but health is NOT!
It’s unfortunate we tend to glamorize the look and the perception of beauty more than the actual flesh of beauty itself. http://www.primazaria.com
View my blog bjornwriter.wordpress.com
Bjornwriter.wordpress.com
‘”I feel like a complete ###### after I’ve just given into eating an orange. An orange. I really didn’t want to go over 500 calories today, dammit,” one writes.’
I wrote almost these very words in my diary back in 1982, though it was a 4 oz can of unsweetened orange juice I’d ingested. Unlike many of these girls, I actually had started out obese. I lost 135 lbs in six months through starvation. My periods stopped, my hair thinned, my gums bled, and my teeth loosened. But who cared about all that? Suddenly, I was “human” (according to classmates). Yay, me. I’m 45 now, and who knows what I did to my body? My life has been one big ping-pong game, weight-wise, and my “ana” years twisted up my relationship with food and messed up my body beyond description.
This is so saddening. My heart cries for all the beautiful young girls out there who feel as if they are the ugliest things on earth. Our bodies are meant to be taken care of. And I’m sorry for the ones who believe that this is all real.
this article is bs. the best feeling is the feeling of hunger because then you know. you know you have the strength to do what you have to do. and purging is good! and the fact that it hurts a little is just like the hunger pains. as long as you have control i don’t see the problem. and you can have control of this it’s a myth to say you don’t. i’ve been anorexic since i was 11 and now at 18 i can say truthfully that i’ve always been in control. no one ever helped me stop when i had to, my parents didn’t care. it was always me so i obvi had control. i suggest starving/purging to everyone.
The quest is never ending @2e2f47ce658d6f3620352620f493dae2:disqus . It is not control but the illusion of control. if it is control than there is no seesawing your relationship with food, no incredibly will powered starvation followed by huge binges of thousands of calories. Food is not the issue. it is emotions and the lack of willingness of consider them as part of life.
why don’t you just put a gun to your head, you’ll die faster! You obviously need help, you say your’re fine now. Eating is not a problem..god didn’t put you here to starve yourself to death. You are the only one who has an issue with the way you look….you don’t need to look like you’re fresh out of a concentration camp to get attention. Be healthy and let your personality shine, not the fact that you are nothing but LITERALLY skin and bones. Find another hobby like trying to build your muscles, not over the top or anything, but HEALTHY! Another problem you have is that you are not educated on the proper way to take care of yourself and you are ignorant to the reality that you will probably die before you reach the age of 25. And when you pass away do you really think anyone is going to care about how much you weighed??? People will remember you for your personality and how you treated others…NOTHING MORE!
hey my names is angel. i lost 10 pounds i 7 days. im so fight and im sick of it. im 5 ’9″ and i weigh 137 pounds. im so a shamed im so sick of being a fat ass. i only eat 300 calories a day. i hate the way i look. im so ugly…food is my enemy..im fighting the cause not to eat. i will win. i will be skinny if it has to kill me i will be little
I’m Brittany…and even though I’ve never met you I think you’re beautiful the way you are; as is every other girl out there. I was looking at this site because I need to be in control of something but honestly I love my body. I suggest to you listen to the lyrics of ‘What Makes You Beautiful’ (by One Direction) and know that you ARE beautiful. Love Brittany xoxo
No! Listen I was wrong when I said that I’m so sorry! It’s not ok what we do. Please stop, you CAN beat this! Its not always easy but it’s do able! And for anyone who is thinking of doing this please, please don’t! It has led me to cutting and attempted suicide. Everyone is soo beautiful and worthy of love, no matter what size you are! My twitter is dedicated to helping ppl with these kinds of problems. I offer inspiration and advice. Follow me and I will do everything I can to help you! @sbuckley12.
Who or what is in control? you have control and yet your idea of control is to hurt your self? easy to say your in control until ask your self to stop and you can’t then you understand what control you do not have.
When we hurt on the in side we express in some way or other, this way is not helping you do any thing but find more pain.
Ask your self what hurts and why and seek help
http://www.onlinetherapysupport.com
i am a veteren anarexic women in my late 30′s.i first started restricting at 9y.old.it progressted to not just restricting but to excessive exercise.im 5ft tall and my lowest was 90 at 18y old.after one child and a 4y break from the compulsion im back to just being a mia again.i cant say i enjoy the lifestyle or the pain i inflict on myself.i can only c the end resaults to a thinner in control women that i am today.i hope to b one of the normal people some day.the serenity prayer helps me at times….i beat this some day.9
creepy
I think Skinny people should not remain that way. They have the chance to gain weight and look better. Some say it’s unhealthy to be too fat but hey, being too skinny can also be something serious. All of us should take care of our body. It may mean a bit of sacrifice but with eating the right foods (even if you dont like them) and proper workout will all be worth it. Just be determined to do so and you’ll see the result over time. you will reap what you sow remember?
I have been anorexic / bulimic since the age of 11 as well (I’m 18 too) and I would NEVER suggest starving/purging.. I just purged, like 5 min. ago, and it absolutely hurts and destroys your body.