More Than A Magazine, A Movement
Eating disorders are psychological conditions that cause dangerous patterns of unhealthy eating that can be treated with medication or therapy. Anyone can develop an eating disorder, though they most commonly affect women.
This is the second part in a series about how girls and women can navigate a culture that treats them like sex objects. (Part 1 can be found here.) Sexual objectification is nothing new, but this latest era is characterized by greater exposure to advertising and increased sexual explicitness in advertising [PDF], magazines, television shows, movies [PDF], video games, music videos, […]
The cover of Vogue Italy’s September issue–timed to appear during the Sept. 21-28 Italian fashion week–featured Stella Tennant, the striking 40-year-old super model and mother of three. She’s wearing a posh dress and a nose ring. But it’s not her clothing or her accessories or her arresting expression that stand out. It’s her absurdly tiny […]
The children’s book Maggie Goes on a Diet hasn’t even been released yet, but it’s already been deemed problematic by many, and rightly so. Even without reading the book, much can be gathered from both the title and the cover, which shows Maggie, the book’s 14-year-old protagonist, holding a dress while looking in the mirror […]
Last week, the online retailer Zazzle–which “empowers” customers to create custom T-shirts, cards and other paraphernalia–ended sales of a kids’ T-shirt and onesie that featured a pro-eating-disorder message in a scribbled font. The decision came only after the U.K. Advertising Standards Authority banned ads of the shirts for encouraging “an unsafe practice that may result […]
This week, the American Medical Association denounced the use of digital manipulation and retouching on models and asked advertising agencies to consider imposing stricter guidelines for manipulating photos before they are sent to press. I, for one, say it’s about time. But should the U.S. go a step further? In England and France, lawmakers have […]
On the final day of Women’s History Month, let’ s take a moment to remember Miss A, the first woman medically diagnosed with anorexia, and the pioneering doctor who used her case to challenge the era’s prevailing presumption that eating disorders were simply a mark of an hysterical woman. On October 24, 1873, esteemed English […]
“It’s not you. You’re not an isolated case. It’s systematic and it’s called patriarchy,” said the radical 60-something woman at the front of the room with the “War is not good for children and other living creatures” medallion swinging from her neck. She wore a turtleneck encased in a neat blazer and put one leg […]
This week is National Eating Disorders Awareness Week. Take the opportunity to learn the truth about eating disorders, or to play an important role in fighting them. Here is one major truth about these pervasive illnesses: Eating disorders lie. They deceive us into believing that whatever and however much we eat is wrong. They insist that […]