Eating Disorder ProAna Blogger Focused on Body Image and Self Esteem

Ever wonder why Fashion is so totally f-cked?

I know, I know, I rarely drop f-bombs but this dude gets under my skin. It you may recall he is the one who pranced a size 24 model down the Paris runways after Luisel Ramos dropped dead walking off the runway. Just hilarious.

How is it possible to get this far out of reality? Real the entire Jezebel article, if you can stomach it.

Sneak peak “I hate all children. Let’s focus on the fat ones. I try to avoid charity. I am the most selfish person in the world. Love is only an interesting subject when it is beyond.”

How screwed up are we as a society when this loser is on the cover of “Prestige” Magazine?

-mamaV

Girls live and breathe fashion. It’s part of our chemistry. We love to decorate ourselves, pose in the mirror, chat endlessly about the latest style of clothes, handbags, shoes, accessories, you name it. We couldn’t look away from fashion if we tried. We are a captive audience for fashion designers.

Fashion designers demand models resemble “human clothes hangers.” This stick thin look is deemed the only one worthy of showcasing their art.  To achieve this ultimate draping effect for their designs, designers have deliberately shaved the size of clothing down, inch by inch, to a size that never existed before. Size zero. Then double zero.

Size 0 is the average waist size of an 8 year old girl. 

An average fashion model stands 5’9 and weighs in around 100 lbs. 

Four fashion models have dropped dead in the past year and a half.  

Dead not from anorexia, but emaciation. A condition the World Health Organization (WHO) classifies as two levels beyond anorexia. A malnourished body state that is incomprehensible, one generally reserved for impoverished, desperate human beings suffering in Third World Countries. This unfortunate population is sadly susceptible to the horror of starvation, so why are young, wealthy, once vibrant women of the fashion industry succumbing to such a fate?

Luisel Ramos

Struck by a heart attack as she stepped off runway, Luisel Ramos was the first to die in the hands of the fashion industry. Lettuce and Diet Coke were the only foods Luisel was willing to consume for three months prior to her death, since she was told she needed to trim her slim frame in order to stay in the runway game. [1]

Dead: August 2, 2006
Age: 22
Height: 5’9
Weight: 98lbs.

Anna Carolina Reston
Discovered at 14, dead at 21. When this grown woman reached 88 pounds her body gave up. Friends and family recall Ana’s two year slide into the eating disordered world clearly started after being called “fat” when auditioning for a modeling job in China. According to Journalist Laura Ancona, Reston’s health condition was common knowledge. “Everyone knew she was ill,” she says. “the other girls, the agencies, everyone. Don’t believe it when they say they didn’t.”[2] After 21 days fighting for her life in ICU with her dear family at hear side, Ana died from multiple organ failure, hair in patches, a tube down her throat, and tears in her eyes since she was unable to even speak.

Dead: November 15, 2006
Age: 21
Height:5’8”
Weight: 88lbs 

Eliana Ramos
Eliana starved herself to death, just as her sister Luisel did six months earlier. She too suffered a heart attack, at age 18. She was buried with minimal fanfare from the fashion industry, or anyone else for that matter.

Dead: February 13, 2007

Age: 18

Height: 5’9”

Weight: not reported

Hila Elmalich

Perhaps most disturbing, is the drawn out death of Hila Elmalich. Long time friend, fashion photographer Adi Barkan, video recorded Emma’s disturbing life and eventual death. The still images of Emma collapsed in Ade Barkan’s arms are a bit to real to bear. After years of struggling to beat her anorexia, Hila passed away on her 34^th birthday.

Dead: November 14, 2007

Age: 34

Height: 5’6

Weight: 60lbs.

You are cordially invited to call, email, and generally piss off the royal Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) as we count down the days to New York Fashion Week starting February 1st, 2008

Logo and Image from the new CFDA website, nice skeleton.

These are the morons that launched the lamest “health initiative” to date. This was your basic cover their ass strategy devised after four, count em’ 4, models died in the past year and a half.

Not from anorexia, but emaciation (that’s two levels PAST anorexia) according to the World Health Organization.

Deceased models from left: Hila, Luisel & Eliana Ramos (yes they are sisters), and Ana.

I’ve had a great time calling over the past year, paying them an undercover visit back in May, and most recently actually getting a hold of a live person on the phone which knocked me off my chair (although she was quite snippy).

Director of Public Relations, Karen Petersen, took the time to speak to me only to quickly rush me off the phone. She was unwilling to provide any update on their year old iniative (my guess is because there is none), and then briskly assured me I would hear back from her PR Manager Danielle Billingkoff.

No word yet and not holding my breath. Not good PR ladies.

I don’t want you to have to google their number, since they conveniently left it off their web site, so here it is:

Phone number 212-302-1821

Oh, and in order to contact the CFDA you have to hunt their web site, it’s buried in the damn site map, nice:

Email form here

Feel free to ask them to call me back, they have my number. Or, simply ask them questions of your own, like “what the hell have you done in the year since you launched your CYA strategy?”

Here’s me doing some stalking of my own.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VsDBlhqMUHM]

(Team Rust in action)

Check out this cool film made by three sisters, shot, edited and created in in less than 24 hours! These high school girls submitted their entry into the Insomnia Film Festival sponsored by Apple.

A Waist of Life shows how fashion influences eating disorders, a point I continually reinforce and support.

(Read the covers closely)

Click here to view A Waist of Life and cast your vote to support the film.

Bravo Rust Sisters,

-mamaV

Tyra Banks is off her rocker. After being stalked and humilated by the paparazzi for her weight, she turns around and redefines “plus size” as a skinny mini size 8.

We are all now “plus-sized” thanks to America’s Next Top Model show and the model of the moment Sarah Hartshorne!

Sarah leads the plus sized parade prancing in at:

Height: 5’10

Weight: 150 pounds

Size : 8

Hang on, that’s me, that’s my size. I’m confused.

As most of you know, when I was modeling the size requirement was size 8. I am a size 8 now, but I am 30 pounds heavier. Hmm…..

Have I been duped?

Did the sizes change?

Did the scale change?

Did I fry too many brain cells starvation dieting?

(Let’s not even go into the image in the mirror…oh the horror of aging!)

Sarah is no plus size and this is a load of crap. Why the hell did she accept the title “plus size” when she knows she doesn’t fit the bill? I guess she was not willing to miss her 15 minutes of fame.

Girls, this is bullshit. Don’t buy into it.

If you do, you’ll be sunk like the rest of the pro anorexia suckers that paste on their smile as they die inside from starvation and self hatred. They will quickly reel you into their misery filled existence because they need company, reassurance, and purpose to keep their hope alive. Their heads filled with nothing but desire to become someone else.

(Ugly, Ugly, and Ugly)

It’s a dead end. Pro ana’s don’t care about you- they care about themselves. This is simply about one thing, and one thing only only - self esteem. Starving yourself will not grow it. Let’s be real already.

Bones are not attractive.

Bones are not sexy.

Bones are not cool.

Vanity. Damn ugly.

-mamaV

————————————————————————-

Thanks to Tipster Laura for this story.

Yes Vanessa, I had to drag Pro Ana’s into this story.

*All photos complements of the World Wide PUBLIC Web! 

I am often asked my views on the obesity epidemic in this country, and up until now my response has been “different problem, different solution.”

But then, I started thinking how obesity is not a totally different problem – it’s just another form of disordered eating.

We are country full of disordered eaters. Marketers are pumping out new diets to masses, and we gladly fork over $$$ in a pathetic, desperate search for happiness. We accept any and all side effects in order to lose weight, such as the risk of shitting in your pants with a beauty of a drug called Alli.

Why are we at war with our bodies? 

What is an eating disorder anyway?

How much of our desire to be thin is driven by what others think of us?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9JXxOoxH-o]

Holidays are food fests, and Sunday football games are just another reason to fill our faces. When I think of an obese person and a person with an eating disorder sitting through a family event, I visualize the similar thoughts spinning in their heads; 

Should I eat? I will not eat that. Screw it! I’m fat and a loser. Who cares? I’ll eat it, but then fast tomorrow. Or run an extra mile. Or purge. Or….

(All the while the little girl’s ears are keenly tuned into their oblivious Aunts, Grandmas, and even their own Mother gab on and on about their fat asses….the little ones finger rolls of skin underneath their t-shirts and stare at their pie as their new arch enemy).

Sad state of affairs. But do you know what is even more depressing? We don’t support each other. We mock each other, look each other up and down and judge, judge, judge.

C’mon ladies. Women are caddy as hell. We make this situation worse. We revel in a friend or celebrity gaining weight (ie. the slaughter of Britney Spears) and we are green eyed monsters when a friend is looking good.

Why? Is gossip fun? Well, it’s not. Its cruel, and frankly it’s evil. Strong word but necessary.

I’ve had enough of fat jokes. They are not funny. Even the word “fat” is offensive. I prefer overweight, and I have taught my children the same. I have compassion for obese individuals, just as I do for those with eating disorders.

And you should too. Listen to this quite popular blogger talk about fat people and look at the pure satisfaction in her eyes. Why does she get such pleasure from other people’s pain? What have obese individuals done to her?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NllpNPoHTI0]

She states the “skinny” are oppressed. Her argument is a stretch, but ok, she has a right to her opinion. The main reason I point to this young woman is because she reflects the passion behind the divide between the underweight and overweight in this country

And finally, I feel that unless a person’s health is being affected by their weight, so be it. Let ’em be already. I like those with some meat on their bones (lord knows all I do is look at twigs all day for this blog, it gets quite sickening). I say, as long you are happy with yourself inside, awesome, be you. Let’s live LIFE….and everyone get off the FAT attacks.

To quote a phrase from good ole’ Rodney King “can’t we all just get along?”

-mamaV 

*Delibrate Title. Mean spirited stories draw in readers. God forbid someone calls you a fat ass, but when someone else suffers this insult it’s like bring it on!