Pick up any woman’s magazine and you’ll find an article promising you a diet that can’t fail. You’ll also find dozens of advertisements with photos of women whose body types represent maybe two percent of the population and half of those had cosmetic surgery on one or more party parts.
Have you ever watched TV early on week-ends. Dozens of channels advertising diet programs or exercising programs showing sculpted models with small hips and pronounced breasts all giving testimonials. And just in case you didn’t get the message, handsome males are shown smiling lovingly – or lustingly- at the models.
The message:
To be happy and successful in life and in love, you have to be thin.
A perfect background for eating disorders.
A major problem about all this is that the message is getting to the kids as well as to adults:
- ·In 1970, the average age of a girl starting to diet was 14. In 1990 the average age dropped to 8.
- One half of fourth grade girls are on a diet.
- 81% of ten-year-old girls are afraid of being fat.
- One out of 3 women and one out of 4 men are dieting at any given time.
- Diet and diet related products are a 33 billion dollar a year industry.
- A study found that adolescent girls were more fearful of gaining weight than getting cancer, nuclear war or losing their parents.
- In a Glamour magazine survey (December, 2005), 61% of respondents said they were ashamed of their hips, 64% were ashamed of their stomachs and 73% were ashamed of their thighs.
While the images of child-like women have certainly contributed to an increased obsession to be thin, the media obviously doesn’t cause everyone to develop anorexia or other eating disorders. The media certainly contributes a great deal to dieting and size discrimination but anorexia is not a diet. It’s a lot more complex than just blaming the media.
What do you think? Who’s to blame for the increase in anorexia and other eating disorders among older populations as well as kids.
Scroll down to "comments’ and let us know what you think.
To a healthy lifestyle,
Ruthan Brodsky
Marketing content for health professionals and business.
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