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Essays on eating disorders and its impact
Essays on eating disorders and its impact
Essays on eating disorders and its impact
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Stereotyping Overweight People is Demeaning
Stereotyping can happen in numerous ways; one very cruel way of stereotyping would be stereotyping a person for being overweight. People often stereotype others because of beliefs they have learned from their parents or on their own.
Discriminating against a person because of one's weight can be a seriously hurtful and demeaning thing. Many people assume that the causes for being overweight are eating all day and rarely exercising. Some people call overweight people slobs or lazy, when in most instances this isn't the case. Some have health problems that lead to being overweight, like a kidney disease or malfunction, or the person may even be suffering from a birth defect.
The effects of stereotyping an overweight person can cause them great pain and devastation. Even death can be a possible result of this type of stereotyping. People who are obese usually already feel self-conscious about themselves, and if stereotyping leads to teasing or making fun of the person, as it usually does, it will only worsens matter. This may not lead directly to death, but it may lead to depression and loneliness. Frequently, eating disorders can occur. One prominent eating disorder is Anorexia Nervosa. This is when a person who is in the pursuit of thinness, starves themselves and often becomes malnourished. A second eating disorder is bulimia, which is when a person repeatedly binge eats, then self-induces vomiting to help prevent any weight gain. These forms of eating disorders can lead to various health problems, such as: Low body temperature, muscle weakness, dry skin, slow pulse, even death can occur if the problem is not treated. These complications are just a few, on a horrifically long list.
Under certain circumstances, being tormented about one's weight can be the foundation of other issues as well. For children growing up it can be especially difficult. There can be many social issues involved as far as making friends and participating in various group activities. Once school is finished, finding a job can be another challenge. By reason that the person may feel they are not good enough and furthermore may be apprehensive of the interview process.
Everyday we experience stereotyping in one way or another. Over the years stereotyping has become such a large part of our society that it is a vital part of our everyday communication. It has caused many of us to not really think about who a person really is, or what they are about, but to accept instead a certain stereotype that has already been created by our society and given to an individual. Stephanie Ericsson makes an excellent point in her essay when she says “they take a single tree, and make it into a landscape.” The statement she was trying to make by saying this is that many times, a stereotype is made by an individual because of something done by one particular person in a certain group, but is then given to the whole group as a result. Our society has given a stereotype to practically every form of human being out there. Some examples of this are the blond that is said to be dumb, the kid with glasse...
There is no shame that everybody had at least stereotyped once in their lifetime. Stereotyping is a common thing that happens whether someone does it intentionally or unintentionally. Some stereotyping causes mixed emotions; anger, sadness, humor, inspiration, many more. Though stereotyping will never be wiped from existence, many people have told their stories and seen from different perspectives when stereotyped. Take, for example, Judith Cofer and Lars Eighner.
Chinese people eat cats or dogs. Blue is a color for boys. Women are bad drivers. Those are the most common phrases I've heard about stereotyping. However, stereotypes are assumptions that are assigned to groups of people because of their religion, nationality, gender, race, clothing, among others. In our daily life, there are negative and positive stereotypes, and it is possible that we all use stereotypes, all the time, without knowing it. Also, in my life I experienced this issue because of my ethnicity and my gender.
Interest in the social aspects of obesity is nothing new. Jeffrey Sobal has written extensively about the social and psychological consequences of obesity , including the stigmatisation and discrimination of obese and even overweight individuals (Sobal 2004).
There is no doubt that at some point in life, we have all been guilty of judging somebody before we really got to know them. Perhaps we judged them based on their weight, their gender, their hair color, their clothing style, or maybe even all of those things combined. We were guilty of making that person into yet another stereotype. Or perhaps we have been on the receiving end of that judgment, and we may not have known it. At some point, everyone has most likely been a stereotype in one way or another.
Today obesity is talked about as a major physical health problem. It can cause diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, immobilization, and many other problems. However many articles fail to mention what is one of the most important and most destructive problems. This is the effect of obesity on one’s mental health and wellbeing. Being excessively overweight usually instills in it’s victims a sense of self worthlessness and gives them a very negative self-image. This can lead to an array of problems that affect the person in a way that is much more direct and difficult to deal with than physical problems. While the problem is known to affect men, it strikes women much more often.
Typically, people who develop an eating disorder are in emotional turmoil. They want to be in control but feel they are not. Any anxiety, self-doubt, or feelings of failure or inadequacy become tied to how they look. When being thin becomes an obsession, when self-worth becomes associated with slimness, the stage is set for eating disorders. People with eating disorders become preoccupied, even obsessed, with food and weight. Eating disorders can lead to extreme behavior including self-starvation, bingeing, purging, and compulsive exercise. Untreated eating disorder lead to heart damage, depression, permanent health damage, or suicide. Eating disorders-- anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder are psychiatric illnesses that affect over five million American women and men.
Everyone has heard the saying don’t judge a book by a cover. Sadly every minute of the day someone gets judged because of assumptions that are not correct. These assumptions overtime eventually lead to stereotypes. A stereotype is an image or idea of a particular type of person. Stereotyping a person is seen in many differents aspects such as race, groups, beliefs, appearance, etc. An individual may ask why people are stereotyped or stereotype. In reality stereotyping helps people categorize the different type of people. It narrows down the options of who one might want to associate with. Stereotyping can have its negatives, it makes people ignore how others really are. It may lead to a person not wanting to hang out with another person because of the stereotype that persons group has. Everyday the general public use cars for the means of transportation. But what about when people use their car for more than transportation, car enthusiasts often modify their cars to their likings. Enthusiasts often join car clubs to share their common interests with other car enthusiasts. Often the people in car clubs have a stereotype of being juvenile, racing a lot, low-life bums, and ghetto when actually most do not have those characteristics.
Eating disorders can be altered by many things including bullying. One way that an eating disorder can come about into someone's life if is low self-esteem. Negative body images can make someone want to become skinnier. When someone has a low self-esteem it means a person who has a very low image of themselves. They think that they are nothing and aren’t worthy of life. When someone thinks this they could exercise excessively thinking that it will make them skinnier.
I have always been told that I needed to eat every piece food on my plate because there are other people in this world that do not even have access to any food or water. I have struggled with being overweight for several years but that has changed not too long ago. Being overweight lead to feelings of shyness, sadness and depression. Losing weight not only enhanced my physical appearance but also has improved my overall mental discipline, my health, and mostly my confidence.
Stereotype is a wide topic that covers many aspects in the society. Stereotypes are harmful because it makes an impulsive judgment based on immediately observable characteristics such as race, gender, and religion. Stereotype can be defined as a common belief towards a certain group of people or an individual. There are many types of stereotype and the major ones are race, gender, religion, income and age and disability. There is negative and positive stereotype but many people ignore the negative side of it and they divert their attention on positive stereotype, this i causes many problems because many people suffer because of negative stereotype. Stereotype
Being overweight can often make employers view you differently and question your abilities. My supervisor at my internship is overweight and she shared with me that she had experienced weightism at a job interview once. This job required her to be able to get on and off of the floor with young children. During her interview, the interview her asked if she would physically be able to do this because of her size. This is just one example of how individuals who are overweight in the workplace experience weightism.
Some teenager are more then 145 lbs. The person that are obese have the less risk in finding a job. It's hard for them to find a job because of them being overweight. Theres people that don’t like hiring people that are obese because they think that they won’t be able to do anything they tell them to do. In the same time a person that is obese sweats a lot so when they try looking for a job in a restaurant they would not like to hire that person because they would probably think that their sweat would go on the food.
Obesity has the ability to control and ruin your life. Health related issues that are related to obesity include diabetes, weaker physical health and well being, and depression. Bullying is also often targeted towards people who are overweight. Those who are overweight may obtain a negative body image and being unhealthy physically and mentally can cause for a shorter and unhappier life.
Body-shaming can have a negative impact on a person's physical and mental health. They can end up with so many body issues. As teenagers, they can become self-conscious and have self-esteem issues. Mentally it may make the person feel ashamed and like there is something wrong with them (Loughlin, 2017). People also need to realize that skinny shaming is just as hurtful as fat shaming (Gies, 2017). Also, some skinny people can’t help that they are naturally thin it’s in their genetics. For example, I was born with a thin body type and eat whatever I want. It is very difficult for me to gain weight no matter how hard I try. The critical comments being made about a person’s body can lead to a development of eating disorders that can even be fatal (“Anorexia Nervosa”, 2015). So before you tell someone to go eat more remember that that person may be battling a serious illness like anorexia or bulimia and anorexia disorder has the highest mortality rate of any of the psychiatric illness (“Anorexia Nervosa”,