Ilona Burton, at The Independent, published a post of interest recently. Though it wasn't perfect, in a sense she almost winds up contradicting herself, she does provide a refreshingly good finger wagging to the blame-game crowd for vilifying pro-ana websites. Indeed, she has the wisdom to provide a general criticism of those who find the source of all social ills in popular culture. It is a good point.
As I've argued at the site Celebrities with Eating Disorders, blaming celebrities in this manner is a ruse of self denial. Eating disorders, whether they're ours or those of our loved ones, are our responsibility, not that of some media conjured straw man. Whatever you think of pro-ana sites, it is baseless to accuse them as a direct cause. In fact, such sites are as much symptom as cause. A brief reminder of pop culture history reveals that this urge to blame some semi-anonymous "other" for the corruption of youth or the corrosion of society is a rather old cop-out.
Indeed, we can trace such attitudes all the way back to ancient Athens, were no less that Plato fretted over the corrupting influence of theater and poetry upon the city's youth. All through the ages examples of such attitudes pop up. In the 20th century, though, with the explosion of mass media and pop culture, opportunities to engage in such blame-game denial became unprecedented.
In the 1940s social critics condemned swing music as a morally eroding influence that would hinder the war effort. In the 40s and 50s comic books were supposedly the cause of an alleged youth violence epidemic and juvenile delinquency. Elvis Presley couldn't be shown on television form the hips down and there was deep anxiety about the libidinal blackness of the music with which he was making nice young girls swoon.
By the time we reach the 1960s it is the TV itself that becomes a purveyor of social decay, supposedly rotting the brains of the nation's youth. And worst of all were the Beatles, whose music was accused of promoting free love and the use of psychedelic drugs. A backlash against what came to be called Beatlemania came to a head with mass bonfires to burn their records, subsequent to an impious remark by John Lennon. By the 70s, it was the raw physicality and sensuousness of disco music which was accused of tearing at the fabric of sexual mores and undermining common decency.
The 1980s-90s brought still more of the same: left-wing feminists decried pornography as creating rapists while right-wing moralists decried heavy metal music as creating Satanists. Rap music was accused of promoting criminality, raves were drug infested death traps and the recent World Wide Web was turning young people into anti-social, entranced computer-heads wasting away in their parents' basements.
It's the same old story, over and over again. Mass media and pop culture get blamed for it all: apathy and violence, conformism and deviancy. Who could be surprised than that it is now widely blamed for both anorexia and obesity? Nothing new under the sun and all that!
One doesn't have to peer too closely behind the curtain of all this to see what's going on: a resolute refusal to accept responsibility for our own choices and actions. Whether those choices and actions are part of an eating disorder or our own response to the eating disorder of a loved one, it's easier, more comforting, to blame something else. After all, the alternative would be to have to face that our own choices and actions, or those of our loved ones, can be disturbing, despairing and even destructive. It is so much more comforting to conjure up dragons. At the end of the day, though, no amount of self denial removes the challenges which remain before us.
We each have our own responsibility to ourselves and our loved ones. Conjuring mythical dragons, even if in the apparently easy form of insulated and inured rich and famous celebrities of stage, screen and runway, only serves to deflect attention and efforts from what really needs to be done; what really can make a difference in our lives and those of our loved ones.
If people do not take responsibility for their own actions, their own families and their own communities, every problem will be a chimera, in need of some magical solution. Blaming mass media or popular culture celebrities with eating disorders for our own choices and those of our children is magical thinking.
Otherwise, we may indeed conjure up a straw man to beat out all that anger, disappointment and fear. No solution to the suffering of us or our loved ones though comes from conquering make-believe dragons. That requires confronting the real problems - and finding real solutions.
As I've argued at the site Celebrities with Eating Disorders, blaming celebrities in this manner is a ruse of self denial. Eating disorders, whether they're ours or those of our loved ones, are our responsibility, not that of some media conjured straw man. Whatever you think of pro-ana sites, it is baseless to accuse them as a direct cause. In fact, such sites are as much symptom as cause. A brief reminder of pop culture history reveals that this urge to blame some semi-anonymous "other" for the corruption of youth or the corrosion of society is a rather old cop-out.
Indeed, we can trace such attitudes all the way back to ancient Athens, were no less that Plato fretted over the corrupting influence of theater and poetry upon the city's youth. All through the ages examples of such attitudes pop up. In the 20th century, though, with the explosion of mass media and pop culture, opportunities to engage in such blame-game denial became unprecedented.
In the 1940s social critics condemned swing music as a morally eroding influence that would hinder the war effort. In the 40s and 50s comic books were supposedly the cause of an alleged youth violence epidemic and juvenile delinquency. Elvis Presley couldn't be shown on television form the hips down and there was deep anxiety about the libidinal blackness of the music with which he was making nice young girls swoon.
By the time we reach the 1960s it is the TV itself that becomes a purveyor of social decay, supposedly rotting the brains of the nation's youth. And worst of all were the Beatles, whose music was accused of promoting free love and the use of psychedelic drugs. A backlash against what came to be called Beatlemania came to a head with mass bonfires to burn their records, subsequent to an impious remark by John Lennon. By the 70s, it was the raw physicality and sensuousness of disco music which was accused of tearing at the fabric of sexual mores and undermining common decency.
The 1980s-90s brought still more of the same: left-wing feminists decried pornography as creating rapists while right-wing moralists decried heavy metal music as creating Satanists. Rap music was accused of promoting criminality, raves were drug infested death traps and the recent World Wide Web was turning young people into anti-social, entranced computer-heads wasting away in their parents' basements.
It's the same old story, over and over again. Mass media and pop culture get blamed for it all: apathy and violence, conformism and deviancy. Who could be surprised than that it is now widely blamed for both anorexia and obesity? Nothing new under the sun and all that!
One doesn't have to peer too closely behind the curtain of all this to see what's going on: a resolute refusal to accept responsibility for our own choices and actions. Whether those choices and actions are part of an eating disorder or our own response to the eating disorder of a loved one, it's easier, more comforting, to blame something else. After all, the alternative would be to have to face that our own choices and actions, or those of our loved ones, can be disturbing, despairing and even destructive. It is so much more comforting to conjure up dragons. At the end of the day, though, no amount of self denial removes the challenges which remain before us.
We each have our own responsibility to ourselves and our loved ones. Conjuring mythical dragons, even if in the apparently easy form of insulated and inured rich and famous celebrities of stage, screen and runway, only serves to deflect attention and efforts from what really needs to be done; what really can make a difference in our lives and those of our loved ones.
If people do not take responsibility for their own actions, their own families and their own communities, every problem will be a chimera, in need of some magical solution. Blaming mass media or popular culture celebrities with eating disorders for our own choices and those of our children is magical thinking.
Otherwise, we may indeed conjure up a straw man to beat out all that anger, disappointment and fear. No solution to the suffering of us or our loved ones though comes from conquering make-believe dragons. That requires confronting the real problems - and finding real solutions.
About the Author:
Follow us for all the scoop on all manner of controversies over Celebrities with Eating Disorders . Mickey Jhonny is a super source of insightful and provocative articles on popular culture. If you're a fan of the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series, his piece tearing off the cover of its dirty little secret is required reading.
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