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.
Such ridiculous attitudes go right back to ancient Athens, where none other than Plato fretted over the corrupting influence upon Athenian youth of theater and poetry. Throughout the ages the same theme appears over and over again. The explosion of 20th century mass communication media has though really thrown open the flood gates for this kind of pop culture blame-game.
The jaundiced eye of some social commentators regarded the swing music of the 1940s as a morally corrosive force, which ultimately would undermine the character of the soldiers necessary to carry out the war effort. (The same crazy swing dancing youth who, decades after the end of the war, would be celebrated as The Great Generation?) In the 40s and 50s comic books were accused of breeding an alleged epidemic of youth violence and juvenile delinquency. Television shows refused to show Elvis Presley's swiveling hips, for fear of feeding the frenzied libidinal blackness of his music: it suggested things dark and immoral. Meanwhile teenage girls continued to 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.
Throughout the 1980s and 90s we heard from the anguished voices of left-wing feminists lamenting that pornography created rapists and right-wing moralists warning that heavy metal music caused Satanism. Rap music supposedly caused criminality, raves were hotbeds of social decay and drug induced fatalities, while the recent World Wide Web was accused of turning young people into trance like computer zombies 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.
Each one of us is uniquely responsible for what we do, with our own lives, and in response to the choices of our loved ones. Turning others into our punching bags or scapegoats may provide some momentary relief from the burden of personal responsibility. It ultimately solves nothing, though. The celebrities of stage, screen and runway, are easy targets, but that can't (even if they wanted to) make anyone choose how to live.
It is up to us to take responsibility for their own choices and actions, including our interaction with and care for our loved ones. To blame popular culture is conjure dragons of the mind, in need of magical feats. If someone you love is suffering from an eating disorder better to squarely face reality than escape in to the magical thinking of blaming the media.
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.
Such ridiculous attitudes go right back to ancient Athens, where none other than Plato fretted over the corrupting influence upon Athenian youth of theater and poetry. Throughout the ages the same theme appears over and over again. The explosion of 20th century mass communication media has though really thrown open the flood gates for this kind of pop culture blame-game.
The jaundiced eye of some social commentators regarded the swing music of the 1940s as a morally corrosive force, which ultimately would undermine the character of the soldiers necessary to carry out the war effort. (The same crazy swing dancing youth who, decades after the end of the war, would be celebrated as The Great Generation?) In the 40s and 50s comic books were accused of breeding an alleged epidemic of youth violence and juvenile delinquency. Television shows refused to show Elvis Presley's swiveling hips, for fear of feeding the frenzied libidinal blackness of his music: it suggested things dark and immoral. Meanwhile teenage girls continued to 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.
Throughout the 1980s and 90s we heard from the anguished voices of left-wing feminists lamenting that pornography created rapists and right-wing moralists warning that heavy metal music caused Satanism. Rap music supposedly caused criminality, raves were hotbeds of social decay and drug induced fatalities, while the recent World Wide Web was accused of turning young people into trance like computer zombies 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.
Each one of us is uniquely responsible for what we do, with our own lives, and in response to the choices of our loved ones. Turning others into our punching bags or scapegoats may provide some momentary relief from the burden of personal responsibility. It ultimately solves nothing, though. The celebrities of stage, screen and runway, are easy targets, but that can't (even if they wanted to) make anyone choose how to live.
It is up to us to take responsibility for their own choices and actions, including our interaction with and care for our loved ones. To blame popular culture is conjure dragons of the mind, in need of magical feats. If someone you love is suffering from an eating disorder better to squarely face reality than escape in to the magical thinking of blaming the media.
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:
Keep tabs on us for all the scoop on all manner of controversies over Celebrities with Eating Disorders . Mickey Jhonny is a super source of thought provoking and stimulating writing on popular culture. If you're a fan of the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series, his post ripping off the cover of its dirty little secret is an absolute must read.
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