Writes Pamela Paul in "Girls Are Taking Their Pain Out on Themselves" (NYT)(discussing Hadley Freeman's memoir, "Good Girls: A Study and Story of Anorexia").
April 20, 2023
"But [Hadley] Freeman is eager to dispel the idea that anorexia is simply about the desire to be thin. Instead, she says, the goal..."
"... is to look ill, like a skeleton. It’s about courting death. Among psychiatric illnesses, anorexia is among the deadliest.... 'Anorexia is a way of telling people you’re unhappy without saying it because saying it looks entitled,' Freeman told me. 'It’s a highly visible outward expression of saying something is very wrong here.'... Nearly three in five teenage girls reported feeling 'persistent sadness' in 2021, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the highest ratio in a decade. Whichever susceptibilities they are born into and whatever pain they’re feeling in the world, girls clearly seem to be taking it out on themselves. We need to ask very seriously why."
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In the spirit of "let a hundred flowers bloom", I would love to see someone seriously develop the idea, "girls are unhappy because American society frustrates their natural desires as females." If you poke around the internet, you'll find some traditionalists saying it but they seem more mystical than scientific. A lot of assertions and nostalgia and simple correlations, arguments of the form: girls are more unhappy now; these two things are different now; therefore, these two things caused the unhappiness.
Now do male suicide rates.
Opps, forgot, no one gives a shit.
This was part of my field for 40 years, and the consistent trying to come up with societal explanations that make adults feel better is part of what is killing young women.
Most medications have an odd paradoxical reverse that affects a few. Think benadryl, or the contradictory calming/exciting effects of nicotine, alcohol, and marijuana. Different for different people. We have a gradual obesity increase from 1900-1980, and then it explodes. There are a half-dozen physical explanations why, but people prefer to think that it's because kids are lazy and sitting in front of screens. (It is true that diet and exercise are the only current solutions, but that's not the same as "how we got here.") Anorexia is the reverse side effect of whatever is causing the obesity. BTW, that is almost definitely more than one thing, and anorexia likely has multiple, possibly additive causes as well.
Stop trying to find psychological or sociological causes for physical/chemical problems, folks. It kills people.
Nobody wants to talk about the real solution to this and many other of our problems today: putting fathers back into the picture. The vast majority of the pathologies confronting boys and girls today is due to the lack of, and lack of respect for, fathers.
Moynihan warned us sixty years ago, we ignored him and the problem has gotten much worse.
Excuse me, but who are we to argue that anorexia is a mental illness. Shouldn't we encourage girls to be their skeletal selves that they think they are? Why shouldn't medical professionals work to help these girls lose as much weight as possible?
Anorexia is about managing fear with food. No one tries to look ill.
Ffs.
And everywhere we turn in society, the message is reinforced. Eat more leafy greens to be healthy. Cut out fatty foods to be healthy. Drink more (or less) wine to reduce the odds of cancer. All of America rides the guilt trip roller coaster.
Young women: Put down the cell phone. Put down the mirror. Focus on others and forget about yourself.
When will the Woke left admit that mental illness is real? It's currently on track to go extinct when this generation reaches menopause. Say "Hi" to the celibate Shakers in the afterlife.
A handmade tale of gender dysphoria and other psychiatric-born and induced conditions.
Their unhappiness is meant to be taken out on a husband, in the form of quests; which in turn, after each, enable her to show her husband that she's satisfied with him. That makes the marriage.
A modern shortcut: feminism. Show men in general that you're unhappy. There's then no opportunity to show men in general that you're satisfied with them, so it's pretty destructive to women's character in the end.
Maybe they should cut their breasts off to feel better about themselves./s
This isn't any different than young people wanting to change their bodies because they aren't happy with themselves. They are both mental health issues.
"whatever pain they’re feeling in the world, girls clearly seem to be taking it out on themselves. We need to ask very seriously why."
A lot of American women and girls are responsible for the pain they're feeling. A lot of them voted for this confusion. A lot of them utilized the state to get even with their husband or boyfriend. A lot of them married DC. Sometimes solving that problem means admitting you were wrong and that loud and obnoxious people suckered you into something that's bad for you.
Hadley is correct in the result but not the goal, in my opinion. Persons suffering from anorexia are trying to be thin, under the delusion that if they become thin they will be attractive, popular, etc. and this will solve all their problems. The reason why they end up so gaunt is either because they get a very corrupted idea of what "thin" is or because becoming traditionally thin did not fix their problems so obviously they are not thin enough. It is a mental illness, but a mental illness with a logic behind it. If you want to kill yourself, there are a lot simpler ways to do it.
"to look ill, like a skeleton."
So, how does that differ from looking ill, like an alien body?
"It’s about courting death"
So, how does that differ from courting torture and mutilation?
As the post hints, the puzzle is why more young people seem to suffer more of these issues than in the past. Hypothesis: progs want it. Mental illness increases dependence and malleability; the sick cannot act as free and rational citizens; they can be manipulated, they must be cared for. Prog power steps in.
Among psychiatric illnesses, anorexia is among the deadliest
this is called... Inventing statistics.. Know how you can tell? no citations*
Nearly three in five teenage girls reported feeling .. sad
There you go! Nearly three in five teenage girls DIED last month alone!! oh, wait; no they didn't
citations*
Fifty percent of people with schizophrenia attempt suicide. Nearly 15 percent of those who are clinically depressed take their own life.
But, to be fair.. Psychology Today does go on, to claim; that 100% of the people with eating disorders eventually die (usually later on, when they get old).
Here's other citations..
https://wellbeingport.com/what-are-the-deadliest-mental-illnesses/
Schizophrenia, which increases death risk 2.8-fold in males and 2.5-fold in females.
Bipolar disorder, which increases death risk 1.9-fold in males and 2.1-fold in females.
https://anad.org/eating-disorders-statistics/
10,200 deaths each year are the direct result of an eating disorder
No one actually DIES from schizophrenia or depression.. You see?
They die from suicide, or keep living in hell
These girls 'know who they are.'
Give them diet pills and lap band surgery and have the government pay for it.
"We need to ask very seriously why."
How seriously? What if the answer turns out to be, the death-cult assumptions underlying the "feminism" you and your "sisters" set so much store by? What if girls don't just wanna have fun, they wanna have husbands and babies?
Just wanna, they just wanna!
Just wanna, they just wanna!
Just wanna, they just wanna!
(fade)
It’s beyond me how it’s not 10 out of 10.
asceticism
The problem with anorexia prevention is that most writing about it flatters the patient. It's frequently described poetically; recovered anorexics describe wanting to look fragile, wanting to disappear, or, as in this instance, looking like you are "courting death". Alice Gregory has written the only worthwhile piece I've ever read about it: "Anorexia: The Impossible Subject".
https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/anorexia-the-impossible-subject
The way to actually discourage it is to describe it as as the boring, miserable disease it actually is: you do simple addition of calories over and over, you eat disgusting foods because they are "safe", and you look and feel terrible.
But people don't want to buy books or attend talks like that, so attempts to prevent it continue to encourage it.
I’ve taken care of many anorexics both male and female over my 25 years in pediatrics. It’s basically committing suicide slowly. It’s the toughest illness to treat because these patients consider us to be the enemy and fight everything we do.
I've become cynical enough to believe the very people now wanting us to focus more on mental health are the ones who championed the culture changes that created the crisis.
And I can't shake the suspicion that the increasing obsession with mental health is fueling the problem, and they know it.
"My therapist tells me" has long been a way to signal one's status. The kids were watching.
Sounds like 21st century version of "consumption".
We went through this with one of our children. It was awful. Fortunately she told us she realized there was a problem and got her some help. Several years later we have an idea what was causing the pain. It certainly had nothing to do with being thin.
The NY Times at its silliest.
". . . it is increasingly understood, as with other psychiatric disorders like schizophrenia and depression, to involve a neurological element."
It is difficult to find a disease or trauma or disorder that does not have a neurological element. Broke your arm from an accident while riding your bicycle? Why did you choose to ride a bicycle? Riding a bicycle is dangerous.
Isn't anorexia a disease of the bourgeois? How many poor and poverty stricken women starve themselves to death to send a message to their parents and peers.
Poor Karen Carpenter . . . she played the drums, which she could, significantly, hide behind. She had a fantastic voice so Richard Carpenter pushed her into being a singer, a role she was never comfortable with.
My daughter was diagnosed with anorexia six years and it has been brutal. We worry every day about her health and her ability to keep the concurrent depression at bay. Unfortunately, she will battle it for the rest of her life.
Rh- someday I hope to know who peed in your cheerios…
See what I mean? Everyone inserts their favorite reason, sans evidence, or criticises the social ideas of others, sans evidence.
It's physical. Get to know some of these girls instead of just making shit up.
Starvation was a reality through most of human history, and it still is in some parts of the world. Now where it's largely been eliminated, though, starvation continues as a psychological disorder.
"But [Hadley] Freeman is eager to dispel the idea that anorexia is simply about the desire to be thin... 'Anorexia is a way of telling people you’re unhappy without saying it because saying it looks entitled,' Freeman told me. 'It’s a highly visible outward expression of saying something is very wrong here.'"
Sounds oddly Victorian. Maybe they need a fainting couch, too.
Angst is comparing one's inside to others' outsides.
The preventive for that is recognizing this phenomenon, and learning to make appropriate adjustments.
50 years ago, the "others" that the typical person had to be concerned about numbered in the tens or hundreds at most. Now, one has to compare one's inside to those of essentially everyone in Western civilization.
The preventive for that is unchanged, but the available tools (via responsible parenting) has diminished so much that now an entire generation is at risk.
The preventive is unchanged, and will not change.
"Sounds like 21st century version of 'consumption'".
Well, no. "Consumption" was tuberculosis.
Sounds like they need more slender-affirming care.
rrsafety: I wish you peace and your daughter health.
"Well, no. "Consumption" was tuberculosis."
Oh, for fuck's sake, Robert- the commenter knew this- they were making a point that zoomed right over your thick skull.
let's Talk EATING Disorders...
Which eating disorder results in More Deaths, per year?
Anorexia?
Or Over Eating?
be honest
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