Thin Image As The Desirable Image example essay topic

In the past 20 years, our society has been focusing mainly on women's beauty and weight. The great emphasis upon the importance and attractiveness of a slim, svelte figure is presented daily through the media and its various industries. Hence, today we have a growing number of girls who have become obsessed with weight, exercise, and dieting. For some, the compulsiveness shows through bulimia. Bulimia nervosa has become in recent years a major problem among young women and has been described as an "epidemic" affecting as many as 13% of the women on some college campuses.

Bulimia, therefore, is caused mainly by society's obsession with thinness, which is stressed on even more by the media, and as a result ends up harming women physically and mentally. Bulimia's literal translation is "ox hunger". Today we use bulimia to refer to a habitual eating of large amounts of food (bingeing), followed by purging (usually vomiting), and often alternated with periods of self-imposed starvation. The affected person feels a considerable loss of control during eating and feels that it is impossible to stop eating. The average patient induces vomiting at least once a day, more often during times of emotional stress. This activity is usually done late in the evening when it is not uncommon to vomit four to six times.

Prior to vomiting, and sometimes without vomiting at all, a patient may consume during a single session as much as 10,000-20,000 food calories (average: 3,000-6,000 calories). With bulimia, food becomes a source of comfort, sometimes the only source in coping with feelings of sadness, anxiety, stress, loneliness, insecurity, or self-loathing. Bulimics have a fear of fatness, preoccupation with body shape and weight, polarized attitudes towards thinness and fatness, and distortion of body image". The one consistent major finding of all studies of bulimics is that most of them feel fat all of the time, and most have an ideal desired weight of at least some 10% below their current weight" (Gilbert, 111).

Bulimia is typically characterized by secretiveness and strong feelings of shame. Bulimics will go to great lengths to conceal their behaviors from other people and would rather lie than admit what they are doing. The typical person that is vulnerable to developing bulimia is a female, in her late teens or early twenties, hides what she feels inside frequently and is a people pleaser. She tends to be more irrational and erratic with her emotions, which leads to problems controlling the impulse of her dieting and purging. Most bulimics are not severely overweight or obese.

Rather their weight varies. They have an intense fear of gaining weight and are willing to do almost anything to avoid gaining an extra kilo. Why do people overindulge in food only to force themselves to vomit? Bulimia, as you can see, may be the one island of mastery, and hope for an individual who otherwise is lost at sea, feeling less than adequate to engage life or other people. A bulimic has certain beliefs, and desires, centering on her body shape and weight. In a sense, these beliefs and desires do explain her behavior.

If you believe being fat is ugly, perhaps even wicked, you will want to be thin and do all you can to avoid becoming fat. She is either lonely, or struggling to find herself because her life experiences seem so confusing. Bulimia, therefore, may mask highly charged anger, frustration, sadness, emptiness, or pressure. She might be running away from achievement pressure, sexual conflicts, interpersonal conflicts, separation, or loss. As explained above, causes of bulimia are multi-factorial, but the most prominent cause seems to be that imposed upon women by society. It's the reflections of the enormous pressures on them to validate their self-worth, and please others, by controlling their appearance.

In our society today, thinness is a desired state; to be beautiful implies being thin. Fashion, entertainment, and advertising all center around slender models with hollow cheekbones. Since society has set a thin image as the desirable image, dieting has also become a cultural norm. As a result, and " to fit the given cultural stereotype of attractiveness, women may try to overcome a natural proclivity toward a fuller figure. It is apparently hard to 'just say no' to society" (Zerbe, 101).

Our society is one of mass produced images. The unrealistic beauty ideal for women, which is below a healthy weight, is one that constantly confronts them. We view exercise, control, and ascetic eating as virtues, while fat is associated with sloppiness, laziness, and failure. Thus, the values placed on women's looks, as well as their responsibility in regards to food, make them the likely victims in our society. The 20th century was the start to a society that idealizes slimness. Studies have compared shapes from 1950's to the 1970's, and it was clear how the weights and measurements were being lowered consistently.

It has only been over the past several decades that the cultural ideal has been focused on a slim, trim body. In the nineteenth century, in countries like France and England, fat and large women were considered beautiful, there were an object of beauty. But as we all know, being fat in this day and age is rarely considered in these ways. Studies have also looked at the rash of diets and dieting clinics, which proves how dissatisfied women are with their weight.

In 1968, the average fashion model was 8% thinner than average women. Today, models are 23% thinner, perpetrating unrealistic ideals of beauty and attractiveness. Society's idealization of thinness has been therefore said to have resulted in the epidemic of bulimia. Societal pressure concerning thinness can be mostly blamed on the media and the unrealistic images it presents to people through its various industries. Kate Moss, Cindy Crawford, and Tyra Banks, pictures of these women are plastered almost everywhere as they are upheld the world's most beautiful women.

Slim Fast, Weight Watchers, Slim 18, commercials of these diet industries are on television promising to help all to achieve the ultimate body"; the perfect body". Women and young girls are surrounded by images of thin women on television and magazines, not to forget the growing number of weight loss programs and clinics. Although most women will never be as thin as the images shown to them, it is an image that they want to capture so they can feel worthy or accepted in today's society. When women cannot capture this image, sadly they feel unacceptable or "less then" because they cannot have the weight or shape that is considered ideal or accepted in our society.

They, therefore, fail to love and accept themselves for whatever size and shape they are. Our self-perception is mainly based on the TV shows that we watch, and the magazines that we read. In many ways, we tend to feed off of what the media sends to us. The diet industry is just another industry in the media that focuses on shape, size and body image as a whole. Diets can be the starting point for any eating disorder and its why they can be so dangerous. In the past, users of diet products have been shown by advertisers as young, pretty, slim, and carefree women.

Any women seeing these advertisements may feel that being smaller will bring happiness acceptance and even success especially if she already feels badly about herself and her body image. The diet industry depends and relies on women believing what diets and diet products can do for them. In turn, many women will start to deprive themselves and use diet plans and products hoping to achieve the desired body. When and if the women leaves the diet she may turn to a binging cycle that can lead to the onset of bulimia.

Bulimia is an extreme way of which women relate to food. However, women are vulnerable and somewhat open to the ideas of diets and what they can bring. The Fashion industry plays a significant role when it comes to the topic of bulimia. Many of us have seen the extremely thin models used to sell jeans and other women products. Women down fashion runways and on the covers of magazines are often the picture of beauty and thinness. They are therefore shown what's the ideal way to look.

Role models were therefore created by the fashion industry to mislead girl into following their steps. The drive to have the desirable and accepted image is so great that we tend to confuse looking good with being good or feeling good. The brand name has nothing to do with the use or function of our clothes; it's just about image. When we wear designer clothes with fancy labels people notice and it gives us a sense of self-satisfaction and acceptance.

The magazine industry is another media industry that is commonly read by girls. Teen magazines feature a third of articles on dating and physical appearance, when just twelve percent focus on school and careers. In all of these magazines, there's always an article on dieting, and exercise. Beauty, fashion, and impressing men are also addressed constantly. Frequent vomiting, especially if habitually followed by severed restriction of food intake, can be very dangerous. Purging short -circuits the body's absorption of nutrients, and can cause serious health risks.

The most dangerous of these is low potassium (hypo) which can cause serious, sometimes fatal, heart problems. Other complications of bulimia include: hand and foot tingling, decay of tooth enamel (due to acidic vomit), swelling of salivary glands, chronic indigestion, and stomach pains. Bulimics often use laxatives and diuretics in large quantities on the false premise that they reduce calorie absorption. Instead, what laxatives really do is remove the remains of digested food and body water, leading to dehydration. Our preoccupation with our bodies and beauty itself has supplanted other psychiatric conditions. Some mental health professionals even go as far as to wonder if the eating disorders are one of the late 20th century's primary mental health issues.

Sometimes, some bulimics "experience episodes of dissociation of multiple personality disorder... One's bodily self thus becomes totally abrogated and denied". (Zerbe, 156) The constant concern of calories, diet, and figure become obsessive. For most bulimics, the worst part of the eating disorder is the anxiety and guilt feeling, which occur immediately after a binge. They feel guilt over lying to friends and family, guilt over food and money wasted, and guilt over their lack of control. They become depressed and often isolate themselves from social situations for fear of being embarrassed by their eating impulses.

This creates extreme feeling of loneliness and isolation from society itself. Because bulimia does not cause someone to lose an extraordinary amount of weight, it is generally an easy disorder to hide. The person with bulimia will often only purge at night or when they take showers so that no one can hear them vomiting or see them binge. With bulimia, much of the physical damage is done on the inside. Thus, it isn't uncommon for someone to live with this disorder for many years before being caught or finally asking for help.

One of the many reasons people that suffer from bulimia don't go for help is because they feel ashamed. They regard purging as gross and to keep people from thinking less of them, someone suffering will hide their problem. When someone is ready to come forward for help, usually group therapy is the first place to go. Because so many people with bulimia feel incredibly guilty and ashamed, it is usually a helpful experience to talk with others that also suffer. This way they would know that they " re not the only people with bulimia. Individual therapy is the key to fully recovering.

It is thought to deal with the issues that someone with bulimia has locked away inside all these years. Therapists, though, would help a person so that they wont have to constantly go back to purging as a way to comfort, and relief to internal pain. Certain diets would be given in order to make sure a body is receiving all the nutrients and vitamins needed to become healthier. Bulimics usually take a long period to recover but eventually become healthier mentally as well as physically. People should be notified of all the dangers that this disorders brings along. Through school education, programs, and campaigns, people will realize how dangerous it is to get involved into such a disease.

Bulimia can give a false sense of control over you for a little while, but eventually these feelings come back. It is a vicious cycle where you are at war with your own body, and you are the loser every time. But soon the desire grows out of control. What at first gave you a sense of control will now take control of you.

You are obsessed and addicted. You can never be thin enough, or pretty enough, or smart enough, or good enough for anything. This disease robs you of all those dreams you have so carefully hoarded throughout the years. It eats away at your brain, and spirit, and identity until all that remains is this body that keeps you enslaved. Somehow, you have become your worst enemy. The feelings of loneliness, uncertainty, unhappiness, confusion, anxiety, stresses, will remain.

From the beginning, we are bombarded with images of unattainable thinness, and told that we must look like that to be pretty, happy, and successful. We are taught that these are the goals we should strive for in life. It's irrelevant. These ideals of thinness are so deeply ingrained in our way of life that we can't even see them. They become invisible chains around women that wrap tighter and tighter each day, until finally, it has become impossible to breathe.

It isn't about losing a few kilos anymore; it's about losing your life.