I dont want to say how i came across this.. i didnt write it.
I just want to repost it cause its very true/interesting...
"As I write this I am watching a commercial for Bally Total Fitness. Men and women pinching their bodies (which, though not overly thin, are normal and natural) and complaining about how unattractive they are. How their lives aren't fabulous because their bodies aren't perfect.
A few weeks ago, I was watching an episode of the Tyra Banks Show (don't laugh, it's a good show!) on anorexia and bulimia. Tyra brought on Reba star Scarlett Pomers, who has recently undergone treatment for eating disorders; she brought on several sufferers and offered them help; she was actually rather insightful and provacative. But I almost stopped watching during the first commercial break, which featured no less than 4 advertisements for diet pills and programs like Weight Watchers.
I see these commercials every day. Fitness clubs, diet pills, diet books, diet foods. Diet society. I see teen and adult fashion magazines, skinny models with beaming Photoshop smiles... and no food in sight... "tone your tummy" and "fit for summer / school / spring break" articles.
Now, I know that the creators of these products aren't directly encouraging eating disorders. However, it seems that dieting and hating your body have become the new norm. We are selling ourselves a thin-obsessed society, buying it at the cost of our lives and sanity. In cultures that embrace body acceptance, where a little extra weight is considered beautiful, desirable, and a sign of prosperity, eating disorders are practically unknown.
However, growing up in this society, I picked up my first issue of Seventeen at age 12 and promptly started working out. It felt like I had to, that I was the only one who wasn't working on her body and getting "hot and in shape." I started drinking SlimFast in 7th grade. A 7th-grader shouldn't even know what SlimFast is, but since they were advertising during my afternoon cartoons, I thought it was normal. Whiten your smile, lose that tummy, tone those thighs, smile bigger, wear these shoes... just be perfect and you'll be happy.
If society is so concerned about the growing number of eating disorder sufferers, then maybe (just maybe) it should turn the mirror on itself and take some responsibility. I never see advertisements for being happy with yourself; I never see normal-sized girls modeling in magazines, girls who aren't 5'11 and 105 lbs; I never see anything that encourages young girls and boys to learn how to have a healthy, natural body. All I see is the star-of-the-moment flauting her skeletal arms on the covers of every magazine being praise for her "new, slimmer look!"
Sure, praise celebrities for losing weight (and looking like Holocaust survivors). Cram models down our throats. Sell us new Diet Coke with Splenda and "new improved" Hydroxycut. Tell us that we won't be happy 'til we're skinny. But don't be so shocked that people like me learn to hate ourselves so much that we'd rather be dead than have one drop of fat on our bodies. Don't be so surprised that...
47% of 6-year-old girls said they wanted to be slimmer, because it would make them more popular.
[Dohnt, Hayley K.; Tiggemann, Marika. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, Volume 23, Number 1, March 2005, pp. 103-116(14). British Psychological Society]
Eating disorders are now the third most common chronic illness in adolescent girls.
[Adolescent Medicine Committee, Canadian Paediatric Society. Eating Disorders in adolescents: principles of diagnosis and treatment. Paediatrics and Child Health 1998; 3(3) 189-92. Reaffirmed January 2001.]
37% of Canadian females age 11, 42% of Canadian females age 13 and 48% of Canadian females age 15 say they need to lose weight.
[Health and Welfare Canada. The health of Canada's youth, views and behaviours of 11-, 13- and 15-year-olds from 11 countries. (1992). Anonymous. Ottawa ON: Minister of Supply and Services. H39-239/1993.]
81% of 10-year-olds restrict eating (diet). At least 46% of 9-year-olds restricted eating.
[Mellin, Scully and Irwin, Paper presented at American Dietetic Assoc. Annual Meeting, October 1986. (Berkley study) ]
52% of girls begin dieting before age 14.
[Johnson, et al, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 1984, 13.]
71% of adolescent girls want to be thinner despite only a small proportion being over a healthy weight.
[Paxton et al (1991). Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 20, 361-379.]
The fear of being fat is so overwhelming that young girls have indicated in surveys that they are more afraid of becoming fat than they are of cancer, nuclear war or losing their parents.
[Lisa Berzins, Dying to be thin: the prevention of eating disorders and the role of federal policy. APA co-sponsored congressional briefing. USA. 11/1997. ]
Health Canada found that almost one in every two girls and almost one in every five boys of grade 10 either were on a diet or wanted to lose weight.
[Trends in the Health of Canadian Youth. A report based on the data collected through the 1989/90, 1993/94 and 1997/98 survey cycles for the World Health Organization Cross-National Collaborative Study: Health Behaviours in School-Age Children (HBSC). The trend comparisons report on data collected from among 11-, 13- and 15-year-olds in Canada. This report includes data from a selection of other countries as well as data from grade 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 students in Canada. The report can be found at the following website: http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/dca-dea/7-18yrs-ans/index_e.html]
A survey of parents found that one in 10 would abort a child if they knew it had a genetic tendency to be fat.
[Fraser, Laura. (1997). Losing it: America's obsession with weight and the industry that feeds on it. Dutton Press. New York.]
70% of women are dieting and 40% are continually gaining and losing weight.
[A report on the behaviour and attitudes of Canadians with respect to weight consciousness and weight control. The Canadian Gallup Poll, Ltd. June 1984.]
80%-90% of women dislike the size and shape of their bodies.
[Hutchison, Marcia. (1985). Transforming Body Image. The Crossing Press, New York.]
Glamour magazine's 1983 Body Image survey showed that 76% of correspondents considered themselves "too fat", including 45% of those classified underweight according to 1959 weight tables.
[Wooley, S.C. & Wooley, O.W. (1985). Intensive outpatient and residential treatment for bulimia. In Handbook for Psychotherapy for Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia., eds. Garner, D.M. & Garfinkel, P.E. The Guilford Press, New York. p. 392.]
Of women between the ages of 24 and 54 who diet, 76% diet for cosmetic rather than health reasons.
[Thompson, D.M., et al. (1985). Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia: The Socio-cultural Context. International Journal of Eating Disorders, 1 (3), 20-36.]"
