Eating Disorders: How the Media Have Influenced Their Development In Adolescent Girls
The words "eat" and "boring" are usually never found in the same sentence, but leave it to a supermodel to accomplish this task. Bodies reminiscent of the Holocaust clad only in a bathing suit, underwear, or a skimpy tank top flood popular fashion magazines today. How many times have you flipped through the pages of your favorite magazine and spotted an article about how women should have a good perception of themselves and how they should "celebrate those curves," and then turned the page to find a centerfold makeover section complete with before and after pictures? Mass media serve as a type of "normative influence" to teens, and those who are high in susceptibility to the media’s influence are much less skeptical of advertisements (Mangleburg & Bristol 30). Therefore, it is much more difficult for them to realize that attaining a body like those of the women in the above advertisements is impossible without developing severely disordered eating habits. In the United States, the "conservative estimates" indicate that after puberty, 5-10% of girls and women are struggling with eating disorders. That translates to 5-10 million girls and women! Out of that 5-10 million, at least 50,000 will die, and that’s not including the number of cases not reported due to the shame and secretiveness associated with the disease (EDAP Handout- Basic Facts).
Sufferers of eating disorders have admitted that images of skinny models enflamed their condition. In an article titled, "War on Waifs," they agreed that they "would like to see the fashion industry present a range of sizes in magazines just like you see in the stores" (Jedeikin, sec. Responses). Susie Orbach, the therapist who treated the late Princess Diana for her bulimia, has similar thoughts on the controversy:
Eating problems are now at epidemic proportions. There is so much anguish felt by so many women and girls of all ages, even in childhood… We need to target the diet industry. If diets worked, we wouldn’t need so many of them… I will also suggest that it is in the fashion industry’s interest to glamourise girls and women in all sizes and shapes, as that is how we really are. I’d like to see model agencies and designers setting aside profits for fashion students to promote gorgeous clothes in all sizes" (Jedeikin, sec. Responses).
Until the industry can shift from encouraging people to be a shape which nature never intended them to be, however, the media will continue to form young people’s view of the world, a world that is apparently populated by only thin girls.
“It must be understood that we cannot feed the people” (Kinealy Calamity 75). The mid 1800s in Ireland were characterized by extreme poverty, death, and emigration. The Great Potato Famine, also known as “The Great Hunger,” first hit in 1845; however, its effects lasted into the 1850s and can still be seen today. Prior to the famine, Irish manufacture and trade was controlled and suppressed by British government, which made Ireland an extremely poor country. Farmers in Ireland were forced to export crops such as corn, wheat, and oats to Britain, which left the potato as the main dietary staple for the people, especially the poor. Therefore, when the fungus Phytophthora infestans caused some, and eventually all, of the crop to rot over the next couple of years, the reliance on the one crop made the people of Ireland extremely susceptible to the famine. The effects were devastating, and poverty spread across the nation causing a huge increase in homelessness, the death-rate, emigration, and a change in the Irish people and country overall.
As we have seen in this novel, book censorship has many disadvantages. A society that lacks freedom of thought, individuality and creativity is on a path to self-destruction. This futuristic society became victim to social control through forced conformity. In a way, Bradbury allows the reader to understand what could happen to a society if they let the government take control of their lives. In spite of the many fallen victims to book censorship, some characters still remained faithful to their conscience.
The Irish began immigrating to North America in the 1820s, when the lack of jobs and poverty forced them to seek better opportunities elsewhere after the end of the major European wars. When the Europeans could finally stop depending on the Irish for food during war, the investment in Irish agricultural products reduced and the boom was over. After an economic boom, there comes a bust and unemployment was the result. Two-thirds of the people of Ireland depended on potato harvests as a main source of income and, more importantly, food. Then between the years of 1845 and 1847, a terrible disease struck the potato crops. The plague left acre after acre of Irish farmland covered with black rot. The failure of the potato yields caused the prices of food to rise rapidly. With no income coming from potato harvests, families dependent on potato crops could not afford to pay rent to their dominantly British and Protestant landlords and were evicted only to be crowded into disease-infested workhouses. Peasants who were desperate for food found themselves eating the rotten potatoes only to develop and spread horrible diseases. ¡§Entire villages were quickly homeless, starving, and diagnosed with either cholera or typhus.¡¨(Interpreting¡K,online) The lack of food and increased incidents of death forced incredible numbers of people to leave Ireland for some place which offered more suitable living conditions. Some landlords paid for the emigration of their tenants because it made more economic sense to rid farms of residents who were not paying their rent. Nevertheless, emigration did not prove to be an antidote for the Famine. The ships were overcrowded and by the time they reached their destination, approximately one third of its passengers had been lost to disease, hunger and other complications. However, many passengers did survive the journey and, as a result, approximately ¡§1.5 million Irish people immigrated to North America during the 1840¡¦s and 1850¡¦s.¡¨(Bladley, online) As a consequence of famine, disease (starvation and disease took as many as one million lives) and emigration, ¡§Ireland¡¦s population dropped from 8 million to 5 million over a matter of years.¡¨(Bladley, online) Although Britain came to the aid of the starving, many Irish blamed Britain for their delayed response and for centuries of political hardship as basi...
Looking for a better life away from death, oppression, and destruction the Irish headed to America by the thousands in the 1840’s. Ireland’s staple food was the potato, it was the main means of subsistence for the poor. Then in the 1840’s cataclysm struck, the potato blight caused famine, disease, death and despair. Close to a million deaths were blamed on the potato blight in Ireland. The potato blight was caused by a disease that rendered the potatoes inedible. It lasted for several years, from 1845-1849 the country suffered great hardships, sickness, and death. The blight was the final straw to push many immigrants out of Ireland and to America looking for a chance of survival (Marger, 2015, pg. 284)
Phythophthora infestans was the lethal fungus that infested Ireland's potato crop and eventually ruined all of the land it grew on. This time is called the Great Famine and has impacted Ireland due to its destructive extinction of the potato farms which caused disease, extreme poverty, and death.
In conclusion, this potato affecting disease, Phytophthora Infestins, resulted in killing over a million people in Ireland. In the time, the Irish relied heavily upon the potato crop. This devastating even greatly impacted the people through starvation, migration, and loss of land. The climatic change led to the end of the Phytophthora Infestins affecting the potato crop. The future generation diversified their food sources as a valuable lesson.
During the mid 1840’s, blight in the potato crops in Ireland caused widespread starvation and migration of Irish citizens to the United States. Yet, the massive loss of life and massive exodus could have been avoided if British taxation upon the working class of Ireland was nullified. Though the struggle for liberation was already taking place, the potato famine furthered the cause and helped spread awareness. Furthermore, the potato famine made the average Irish family more reliant upon the government for subsidies and supports to get by.
Without the potato or some food substitute available in sufficient quantity to replace it, the Irish simply died. Historians dispute how many died but the best of the experts, like Cormac O’Grada, estimate that about one million did. Some died of outright starvation, perhaps as many as 9 percent in Mayo, but most died of the diseases that easily infected and ravaged the malnourished, like dysentery or diarrhea. Whatever the cause, they died everywhere: in their mud cabin hovels, on the roads, in the fields, even in the squares of towns where they had fled looking for relief. In Kenmare in Kerry, the local priest, Archdeacon O’Sullivan wrote, they were “dying by the dozens in the streets.” 1 Even nearly a hundred years after the famine, old men and women told the Irish Folklore Commission that there were mounds in fields or the ruins of cabins scattered around the country where no one would walk because they believed famine dead lay there.
The Irish people greatly depended on the potato plant. It was their main crop that they grew. Also it was the main food source for a majority of the people. When the Phytophthera infestans attacked the potatoes it caused a great crisis. One of the crisis’s that the P. infestans caused was the potato blight. This led to the starvation of more than a mil...
Beginning in 1845 and lasting until 1861 the Great Potato Famine of Ireland killed over a million people, and causing another million to leave the country. The famine began in September 1845 as leaves on potatoes suddenly turned black and curled, then rotted. The cause was an airborne fungus (phytophthora infestants) originally transported by ships traveling from North America to England. Many other factors contributed to this devastation.
The blight caused a catastrophic effect on the Irish peasantry. The blight is a combination of parasitic fungus and bird droppings imported as fertilizer (Kelley 136). Furthermore, the farmers did not know what a problem this fertilizer would cause, which ended up ruining all of the Irish crops. The parasitic fungus, also known as phytophthora, is a destructive spreading fungus causing a brownish rot in plants. In addition, the blight first infected Irish potato crops in September of 1845 (Kelley 136). The blight caused the potato to rot in the ground, making it inedible (Kinealy, The Great Irish Famine 34). In addition, spreading the fertilizer all over the land not only ruined the crop, but the crop field as well. Consequently, the crop fields were in no condition to produce new crops for many years because the land was ruined. There were “recurrent infestations of the blight, which led to the failure of the potato crop in three seasons out of four” (Kelley 136). The blight traveled to Ireland from North America and Cont...
Eating disorders are described as an illness involving eating habits that are irregular and an extreme concern with body image or weight. Eating disorders tend to appear during teenage years, but can develop at any age. Although more common in women, eating disorders can affect any age, gender or race. In the United States, over 20 million women and 10 million men are personally affected by eating disorders. There are many different causes of eating disorders such as low self esteem, societal pressures, sexual abuse and the victims perception of food. Eating disorders are unique to the sufferer and often, their perception of themselves is so skewed, they may not be aware they have an eating disorder. Media, for quite some time now, has played a significant part in eating disorders. Magazines with headlines ‘Summer Body’, or ‘Drop LB’s Fast!’ attract the attention of girls who may be insecure with themselves. Television productions such as the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show or American’s Next Top Model, show airbrushed and photoshopped women who have body types that may be unachievable. Those who are suffering from eating disorders can suffer dangerous consequences, and it is important to seek help.
The Great Potato Famine was a huge disaster that would change Ireland forever. The people in Ireland were extremely dependent on potatoes and when the blight came the economy went down. When the fungus attacked the potato crops slowly crop by crop throughout Ireland, people began to lose their main source of food. With the people in Ireland’s huge dependency on the potato, people began to starve or get sick from the potatoes. No one had any food to eat. The potatoes were black inside with molds through out it that came from the fungus from something in nature. The weather that brought the blight also was one of the causes because they could not control how the weather was bringing the fungus. Ireland was under the British government and did not help Ireland when they needed Britain. The aftermath of the Great Famine was not only a huge drop in population, but emigration, and much more.
The media can impact people’s lives in many ways, whether it’s fashion, movies, literature, or hobbies. One of the impacts is how women view their bodies. Movie stars and models feel pressured to catch attention and to look good in order to have a good career in their respective field. People tend to judge how someone looks based on their body composition. The result of this “judgment” is that Hollywood is getting skinny. Since models and actresses serve as role models for people, people tend to want to look like them. The result of this seemingly harmless model of behavior is in an increase in eating disorders.
The mid-1840s was a rough era for the people of Ireland. All of the crops of potatoes became infected with fungus, causing a large amount of the harvest to go bad. Many of the Irish were affected by this because potatoes were the main food source for the poor. In those years, Ireland was being ruled by the British, so the few crops that did not get affected by the fungus were shipped to Britain, causing many Irish to starve to death. The shortage of food in Ireland was the main reason why the Irish began migrating to the United States.