Author: Chand Murad TW: Eating Disorders
Perfection, grace, beauty—society’s infatuation with these concepts is fatal to the future of our adolescents. Even as bones protrude through thin skin and veins threaten to pop, many see a goal—a goal so delectable and seemingly attainable that it has found a permanent home in the growing realm of social media, particularly within pro-ana communities.
The term “Pro-Ana” is derived from the term pro-anorexia, but it doesn’t solely glorify anorexia nervosa. Rather, it serves as an umbrella term that encompasses a range of pro-eating disorder communities that idolize Western beauty standards. Eating disorders are characterized by severe and persistent disturbances in eating habits, accompanied by negative thought patterns [1]. With the rise of screens, encountering images of idealized bodies has become an increasingly frequent part of life; what may start as a small thought or insecurity can swell with every post or video. Consequently, increased exposure to social media heavily influences individual perceptions and overall societal opinions, as those deemed “unbeautiful” are constantly devalued. While many believe we are progressing towards a body-positive society, these prominent online communities reveal a starkly different reality.
The first Tiktok I ever saw with the hashtag “#proana” was a teenage girl with sharp cheekbones and hollowed-out eyes doing a “What I Eat In a Day.” Her plates consisted of a diet coke, a handful of berries, and a lone piece of white chicken. Expecting to find concern for her health in the comments, I was instead met with shocking praise for her self-control and their love for her food aestheticism. They interrogated each other on how they could look like her, be reborn as smaller and fresher, and gain whatever beauty she embodied through self-starvation. These communities not only indulge in this deleterious admiration, but they also represent anorexia nervosa and other restrictive eating disorders as a real lifestyle [2].
Within Pro-Ana online groups, there is worrying personification of anorexia as a real deity called “Ana,” some even going as far as to claim they could hear “Ana” speak to them [2]. In addition, members regularly share information about the calorie count in various foods, weight loss challenges, and sometimes commandments that they must respect [2].Collectively, these groups create a new reality for themselves, offering the appeal of social distinction, and validating restrictive eating disorder-related identities through mental reframing [2]. This mental reframing occurs through implementing health and appearance as markers of individual success [2].
When I saw that post, I was just about to enter high school, and like those around me yearning to be the very image of an attractive grown-up. The glorification of the body and diet I was seeing on my social media was enough to make me feel lesser than. Once I had seen one video, the algorithm supplied more and more and more, until my feed had been consumed by the very culture that sought to “improve themselves” through diet. This culture was not only dangerous, it was competitive, thriving from the addictingly bittersweet gratification of being “sicker” than someone else. This relentless competition is a direct reflection of society’s capitalist structure, where individuals constantly strive to outdo one another in order to achieve an ever-elusive ideal. Professor Mark Edmundson from the University of Virginia observed, “We seem to have settled instead for the enviable life. Out with the good life, in with the life others can wish they had—painfully wish they had. When we incite envy, we at least show that our life has some meaning, meaning that comes from our ability to evoke the jealousy of others: I wish I had that! I wish I were going there! I wish I had achieved such heights!” [3]. In this case, the enviable life is a fruitless lie, one that is impossible to reach for most people but is held up and constantly promoted through Westernized beauty standards.
At the height of illness, symptoms such as severe hair loss, infertility, brain damage, osteoporosis, and death are quite common, yet competition is still rampant among those suffering [4].This relentless competition is not an isolated event; it is deeply instilled in a societal structure where individuals are alienated from themselves and others, as theorized in Marxist Alienation Theory. This theory states that we live in a society where each individual must see in every other, not the possibility of liberty but limitation–every other becomes an obstacle [3]. By viewing other sick individuals as competition, there is an increase in drastic disordered behaviour in order to “win’’, which causes those in Pro-Ana communities to never feel satisfied with how sick they are.
Let’s examine the root cause of this harmful mindset. Why does self-improvement correlate so heavily with actively experiencing an eating disorder? Those who constantly seek self-change and minimalism tend to obsess over perfectionism, which is recognized as a significant risk factor and maintainer of eating disorders [5]. It should be noted that capitalistic societies like ours survive by creating an unattainable standard, fostering a culture of perfectionism. Historically, thinner and frailer women have been idealized as the “perfect” embodiment of femininity in Western society. Men are expected to be lean but muscular—large but not too bulky. We see that this beauty is recognized as a necessary value, as those with it can use it to increase monetary value, love, and attention. Moreover, when we equate thinness/being lean with perfection, we also link it to a sense of belonging. Those who do not fit into these harmful beauty standards feel alienated and ostracized. For example, marginalized groups–including people of colour, adolescents, queer individuals, and women– often face greater challenges in feeling a sense of belonging, making them particularly vulnerable to this Pro-Ana ethos [6]. The idea that you cannot be a valid member of society without belonging in every way imaginable is a capitalistic approach that works to commodify our complex identities.
Furthermore, in recent years, the exponential amount of aestheticization of the human body has led to the perception that thinner bodies are inherently more “clean looking,” expressing established issues between racism and accepted beauty. On average, body type and shape differentiate greatly between races, and having a single standard of thinness is impractical. For instance, many women of South Asian descent have higher body fat percentages due to genetic disposition, originating from the frequent famines during British Colonial rule [7]. This leads to a naturally curvier shape, making it so that achieving a thin body type is infeasible for many, even with the same diet and fitness schedule as white women [7].
What’s more, with the emergence of the online Coquette subculture, its obsession with Americana and small, conventionally pretty, white girls has heavily affected the revitalization of this “being skinny is everything” mindset that was very present in the 90s and early 2000s. This ties into our generation’s preoccupation with individualism where we constantly seek out being different by trying to be the same. There is always a new niche to conform to, and with the constant pressure to “glow up,” it traps us in a never-ending paradox of surface-level change.
To me, this is our greatest plague; we cannot truly be ourselves when we seek to harm and mould the one thing that keeps us here: our bodies. There is no us without them. To be alive is perfection. The capitalist notion that “we must only live for ourselves, for our beauty, for our goals” ultimately undermines our sense of worth and regard for others. Even though I believe in self-love and devotion, we must focus on maintaining neutrality with our bodies when needed. Furthermore, eating disorders are medical conditions that require professional intervention; they cannot be healed through mindset shifts alone. Yet remembering that life is more than physical appearance is a crucial step towards recovery and prevention.
If you or someone you know is struggling with an eating disorder, talk with someone you trust or call the National Eating Disorders Association Helpline at 866-633-4220.
References
Guarda A. What Are Eating Disorders? [Internet]. Psychiatry.org. American Psychiatric Association; 2023. Available from: https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/eating-disorders/what-are-eating-disorders
Riley S, Rodham K, Gavin J. Doing weight: Pro-ana and recovery identities in cyberspace. Journal of Community & Applied Social Psychology. 2009 Sep;19(5):348–59.
Horowitz A. Marx’s Theory of Alienation [Internet]. www.yorku.ca. 2011. Available from: https://www.yorku.ca/horowitz/courses/lectures/35_marx_alienation.html
National Institute of Mental Health. Eating disorders: about More than Food [Internet]. National Institute of Mental Health. 2024. Available from: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/eating-disorders
Stackpole R, Greene D, Bills E, Egan SJ. The association between eating disorders and perfectionism in adults: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Eating Behaviors [Internet]. 2023 Aug 1;50:101769. Available from: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1471015323000697
Rainey K, Dancy M, Mickelson R, Stearns E, Moller S. Race and gender differences in how sense of belonging influences decisions to major in STEM. International Journal of STEM Education [Internet]. 2018 Apr 10 [cited 2019 Oct 18];5(1). Available from: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6310405/
Mubin S. researchopenworld.com [Internet]. Research Open. 2022. Available from: https://researchopenworld.com/the-susceptibility-of-south-asians-to-cardiometabolic-disease-as-a-result-of-starvation-adaptation-exacerbated-during-the-colonial-famines/
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