When I look back on the things I have been subjected to, from Barbies to advertisements and now from diet pills to hardcore drugs even, I am shocked I don’t have an eating disorder myself. This Dove clip highlights the intense overload of advertising we are subjected to. Even watching the short clip makes me feel anxious, like I need to go OD on diet pills and exercise until I collapse.
Considering my friends and I started measuring our thighs by the 5th grade and skipping meals to lose weight by the 7th, it is not surprising that one of us has an eating disorder, only surprising that more of us do not. This leads me to my next point—anorexia and bulimia often fall under the radar. For example, my best friend has been clinically diagnosed with anorexia, meaning she has doctors and psychologists confirming the fact that she has an eating disorder.
There are, however, hundreds of thousands of individuals who are not clinically diagnosed. There are hundreds of thousands of individuals who look emaciated and whose minds are distorted, leading them to live unhealthy and sad lives, but they are not being helped by a doctor nor are they ‘noticed’ by a professional for their closet disease. There are even more who do not look like they have an eating disorder. There are individuals who look like they are healthy, perhaps even overweight, who purge after meals or consume inadequate calories.
With this in mind, think about how many people are logging onto these websites for support. Yes, the first thing that comes to mind are the extremists, those who are skeletal figures that encourage each other to keep their skin clinging tightly to their bone, but there are also others. There are people who are temporarily dieting, there are young girls and maybe boys who are finding these and participating. This is the INTERNET and you do not know who is taking part!
No comments:
Post a Comment