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Feminist Perspectives on Eating Disorders

by: Melanie

"When you have no sense of physical integrity -- a sense that your own health is important, that your body, regardless of shape, is something that requires care and feeding and a basic respect for the biological organism that it is -- a very simple, all-too-common, truly frightening thing happens: You cross over from a vague wish to be thinner into a no-holds-barred attack on your flesh. You stop seeing your body as your own, as something valuable... " (Hornbacher, 108)

There is no way of truly knowing how many women are engaged in a war against themselves. Studies indicate that anywhere between 1 and 25 percent of all women exhibit some disordered eating behaviors. Even very conservative studies estimate that 90% of eating disordered persons are women. What do these demographics indicate? Are women inherently neurotic, vain, or shallow? Are they naturally consumed by concerns over their appearance? As a woman struggling to overcome bulimarexia I have faced these stereotypes. I have turned them on myself at times, when I relapsed in therapy or was prescribed a new medication. This project, which evolved into a survey of feminist literature on the causes of eating problems, has helped to liberate me from that thought-trap. Yes, women with eating disorders are obsessed with weight, scales, and mirrors. But the oppressive treatment of women over the course of history has undeniably contributed to the modern fad of self-destructive dieting. It is predominantly a woman�s problem -- statistics dictate as much. Meanwhile, inasmuch as society has created the problem, society bears the responsibility for eradicating it. Otherwise it risks losing some of its best and brightest young women to a tenacious, maddening, and often fatal disease.

The old adage holds true...
History repeats itself. The 20th century may boast remarkable strides toward equitable treatment for women; nevertheless, eating disorders thrive, the most recent in a long line of "women�s illnesses". Some researchers view eating disorders as akin to the fasting of medieval women saints, most notably Catherine of Siena (Brumberg 2). More closely related, though, are chlorosis, neurasthenia, and hysteria, illnesses afflicting women from the Victorian period onward (Fallon 77). Though the names change over time, the symptoms of these "women�s diseases" remain notably constant: depression, anxiety, headaches, amenorrhea, and disordered eating. Victorian patients were also described by their physicians as "slender", "trying to be slender", and "noncurvaceous" (Fallon 79). Since chlorosis, etc. were categorized as mere nervous disorders, it is difficult to know for certain that they are in fact the predecessors to modern eating disorders. Still, historical researchers like Deborah Perlick and Brett Silverstein hold that there is a relationship (Fallon 80). These two unearthed particular case studies and found that in the Victorian era, as now, sufferers were achievers. Then, as now, gender roles were in flux, and success was generally modeled by the father, domesticity by the mother (Fallon 89).

Popular Victorian thinking held that women were "slaves of their bodily appetites", an attitude long asserted by the Church. Moreover, food and sex were inextricably linked in the feminine psyche: "appetite was regarded as a barometer of sexuality" (Brumberg 175). Aesthetes like Saint Catherine modeled the stringent standards held for women in the 19th century, when the ideal was "a physique that symbolized rejection of all carnal appetites" (Brumberg 182). The same is true today -- people, especially women, are judged based on their appearance, and obesity is equated with a lack of self-control. So today and yesterday it has been "incumbent upon women to control their appetite in order to encode their body with the correct social messages" (Brumberg 186). And what is that message? "Women are expected to be the custodians and embodiments of virtue" (Fallon 11). Appetite, be it hunger or lust, is socially unacceptable in a woman -- "their body as repository of appetite fills them with shame" (Chernin 115). Girth is an undeniable testament that one�s appetite, for food at least, has been gratified.

Causing my brother to stumble...
When I was in New York this summer, the women were given a very specific dress code, with the overarching rule that we were "not to cause our brothers in Christ to stumble." A survey of history shows that this is not a new notion -- even the Bible as it is currently preached blames Eve for Adam�s fall. Appropriately enough, a Glamour magazine survey (1984) found that a majority of women were "ashamed of their stomachs, hips and thighs -- parts of the body that contribute to female shapes" (Thompson 6). Roberta Seid writes, "Our female ideal violates the natural anthropomorphic reality of the average female body... [it] is more like the body of a male than a female. The goal is to suppress female secondary sexual characteristics" (Fallon 8). This goal is in keeping with our culture�s "curse of Eve" myth.

If the female body causes men to sin, then it must be modified accordingly. Many eating disordered women exhibit extremely ambivalent feelings toward sexuality, which could easily be a result of the blame for sexual lasciviousness assigned them. Hornbacher supports this, writing that the seeming prudishness of anorectics is "less related to [their] own fear of sex -- I personally was not afraid of sex, merely ashamed that it so fascinated me -- than to a fear that other people will see them, and judge them, as sexual" (40). Again, women are given clear messages from girlhood that their sexual appetites should be a source of shame. Denial of one�s secondary sexual traits translates to a denial of one�s sexual nature.

Whose body is it, anyway?
In light of this extreme sexual pessimism it is perhaps ironic that men, who have controlled the means of representing women in art throughout history (Fallon 23), have so focused on the female form: the flesh, the body. The fashion industry has always been dictated by men, which has often meant beauty norms that immobilize women such as corsets, foot binding, and modern thinness (Fallon 58). Several essayists have also noted the 20th century�s extreme interest in the nude female form, in fashion as well as in the media. Roberta Seid points out that, fashionably garbed, a woman "virtually became wholly exposed." Hence clothing is no longer enough; a woman must manipulate her very being to be fashionable nowadays (Fallon 10). Wayne O. Wooley notes that the representation of women in the media has become "increasingly pornographic" (Fallon 39). Such pornoographic images are usually of curvaceous, voluptuous women. But beneath the seeming implication that sexuality is becoming more socially acceptable is an uncomfortable double bind: "the "fat" pornographic images present a female body without a mind, without subjectivity. The fashion models in women�s magazines are meant to represent women with minds to acknowledge and appeal to female objectivity, but they have no bodies" (Fallon 46). Women who have noticeably female bodies become objects in cultural consciousness. They are reduced to sex and sex alone, and are not allowed any sense of physio-spiritual integrity. If a woman wants to be taken seriously, she cannot be a sexual being and so, cannot be "fat".

This sense of objectification goes beyond what women see and informs their very realities. Inundated with pornographic images, women are aware of "an audience whose members believe it is their birthright to look at women�s bodies" (Fallon 40). It is clearly no coincidence that between one- and two-thirds of all women with eating disorders have been sexually abused (Thompson 47). Both of these conditions relate to an inability to see one�s body as one�s own -- sexual abuse as cause, eating disorder effect. Furthermore, the androgynization of one�s body via extreme restrictive dieting may be a method of warding off more unwanted sexual attention. That androgyny has become the ideal presents an unavoidable challenge to women in this culture, where feminine beauty remains a form of currency. Esther Rothblum notes, "fatness in women is associated with downward social mobility." Meanwhile, she writes that marriage is still a viable way for women to achieve upward mobility, and the more beautiful a woman is (by society�s standards), the more likely it is that she will marry well (Fallon 56). Marriage remains so valuable to women economically because "men earn more than women in nearly every job." Appropriately, the exceptions to this rule are the professions in which women�s bodies are most literally currency: modeling and prostitution (Fallon 62). Physical beauty affects a woman�s potential for success in all venues: "women�s self-image, their social and economic success, and even their survival can still be determined largely by their beauty and by the men it allows them to attract" (Fallon 9). By so limiting a woman�s potential for financial independence, society makes it very clear that beauty equals success. And thinness equals beauty. And androgyny equals thinness.

That eating disorders are a "rich, white, heterosexual disease" is a myth (online source 1). Both Kim Chernin and Becky Thompson worked with women who did not fit the stereotype, including women of color, immigrants, and lesbians. They emphasize the interplay of thinness with a sense of assimilation and belonging for minority women. According to a homosexual woman, "being successful heterosexually depended upon being thin" (Thompson 39). One immigrant from Panama recalls, "she [my mother] was preparing me to become American... that meant slender. And that meant diet" (Chernin 6). Their separate experiences and reactions support the "thinness as currency" theory.

But what about the Women�s Movement?
The prominence of eating disorders amongst women seems incongruous with the liberation they are supposed to have experienced in this century. Aren�t modern women fortunate, to have grown up with role models like Betty Friedan and her contemporaries? Are we squandering the gifts they fought so hard to bestow on us? There was a similar trend toward women�s rights in the Victorian era (see The old adage holds true). Authorities at that time misattributed contemporaneous and possibly related illnesses to "the stress placed upon the nervous systems of pubescent women attempting to "overeducate" themselves" (Fallon 81). It is obvious that even the modern Women�s Movement did not and could not completely eradicate the centuries of gender-specific cultural baggage. The result is increased confusion about one�s role as a woman; there are pulls toward career and family, independence and sensuality, that are irreconcilable within the current system.

Studies show a marked correlation between eating disorders and confusion over sex roles. Lewis and Johnson (1985) found that "eating disordered women lack a solid sense of sex role orientation, and this role ambiguity leads to lowered self esteem" (Jones 110). Rost et al (1982) noted a significant discrepancy between their "liberated" attitudes and their "rigid" behaviors (Jones 111). Difficulty in identifying oneself within stereotypical gender roles may contribute to the fact that a disproportionately high number of eating disordered men are gay (Siever 252).

Kim Chernin, focusing on women, defines eating disorders as the answer to "silent questions about the legitimacy of female development" (32). She points out the dichotomous nature of this answer as "tailoring ourselves to the specifications of this world we are so eager to enter" and "stripping ourselves of everything we have traditionally been as women" (33). Finally she writes, "Women today, because they cannot bring their natural body into culture without shame and apology, are driven to attack and destroy that body...there are no indications that the female body has been invited to enter culture" (186). Basically, she speaks to the tug-of-war that has defined the feminine experience since the Women�s Movement. While women have been asked to join the world of work (if somewhat reluctantly), they are still expected to fulfill their traditional role as objects. They are told that they must adhere to beauty standards in order to be successful, which cheapens any strides toward that success. Meanwhile, that modern standard of beauty is the androgynous form, an affirmation of male superiority.

Is it mere coincidence that androgyny has come into vogue at a time when women are making great strides toward asserting their intrinsic worth? Writer Naomi Wolf thinks not: "redefining a woman�s womanly shape as by definition "too fat"... countered the historical groundswell of female success with a mass conviction of female failure, a failure defined as implicit in womanhood itself" (Fallon 97). In other words, as women have become increasingly visible in our culture, their natural bodies have come to be seen as an insult to cultural sensibilities. Notably, the modern ideal female form is significantly smaller than is natural. Dieting is, after all, a way to shrink. As Rothblum points out, "Physical characteristics of dominance include increased size and use of space, yet women are expected to reduce weight and take up less space" (Fallon 71). Thompson writes, "discrimination against fat women reflects a society hostile to women who take up space and refuse to put boundaries around their hunger" (15). Society deems it prudent to deny women every appetite: for food, for success, for power, for a voice... The cult of thinness is a stern rebuke to a woman�s request for affirmation, reflecting "an obsession with female obedience" (Fallon 97). Men, who control the standards of beauty, have probably idealized thinness for women as a reaction to feminine assertion. After all, the ideal feminine form is pre-pubescent and child-like, and "there is something less disturbing about the vulnerability and helplessness of a child, and something truly disturbing about the body and mind of a mature woman" (Thompson 5). A mature woman has the strength to fight for her rights, whereas a child may comply willingly with authority. Eating disorders, so detrimental to one�s physical well being, do in fact render most patients absolutely helpless.

Individual timing...
It is estimated that one in four college women struggles with an eating disorder (online source 2). The times at which women are struck down by eating disorders reveal how they have internalized the cultural ambivalence described above. Often "onset of an eating disorder coincides with an underlying developmental crisis" (Chernin 23). Hornbacher recalls her own crisis, writing, "Faced with a staggering number of possibilities, I quit... " (55). Rather than facing the overwhelming dilemma of defining oneself within culture�s conflicted attitudes toward women, a woman may simply opt out. She can forge an identity on the much smaller plain of her own body. As one woman told Chernin, "My whole identity was placed on my weight" (22). In a society where every decision a woman makes has such tremendous weight, an eating disorder becomes something entirely private, a silent proclamation that one�s body is one�s own to control (Thompson 20). Unfortunately, what masquerades as " a freely chosen method of communicating and asserting power" (Brumberg 37) is really a way to self-destruct. Eating disorders are never freely chosen; they are submission to the cultural dictates for a woman�s appearance and behavior.

The desire for control that helps define eating disorders is accompanied by seemingly contradictory dynamics. For one thing, many eating disordered persons claim that they do not deserve to eat. History teaches that women "should suffer to attain an ideal, whether it be gender-specific beauty or the more general ideals of salvation, subjectivity, or autonomy" (Fallon 42). The self-sacrificing woman remains an idol; consider the Catholic pre-occupation with Mary and with female aesthetes. This is reflected in the portions of food that women feel comfortable eating, which "testify to and reinforce their sense of social inferiority" (Fallon 98). According to Wolf, women "do not feel entitled to enough food because [they] have been taught to go with less than [they] need since birth" (Fallon 99). This lesson easily translates to a low sense of self-worth. The physiological experience of an eating disorder is similar to that of starving, but the starvation is self-imposed. Is it a great leap, then, to view an eating disorder as a slow suicide? As one patient eloquently states, "Eating disorders are the most socially acceptable way to self-destruct" (Thompson 102).

Conflict without, conflict within. As a result, women with eating disorders often "feel confused and don�t know what to do with their lives. They have little sense of who they are or what they believe" (Chernin 20). Again, an eating disorder becomes an identity, complete with society�s stamp of approval.

Unfortunately, popular understanding often focuses on the individual experience of an eating disorder without taking into account the cultural context that helps spawn the illness. Chernin recalls the portrayal of eating disorders in the media during the 1980�s, its emphasis on the "bizarre symptomatology" and its failure to recognize that "the women involved in this behavior often abandon their careers and their studies... return home, become extremely dependent on their parents", that "their growth and development as human beings virtually comes to an end" (13). Eating disorders prevent one from growing up and entering the world as an independent being. The focus on an eating disorder�s "bizarre" symptoms keeps it at the level of individual pathology. Thompson equates this dynamic to "historical amnesia", in which an official version of history, informed by the interests of those in power, is substituted for what actually happens. She writes, "historical amnesia tells us that each injustice is an isolated incident rather than a part of a larger historical framework" (101). When the media portrays eating disorders as mental illness, entirely individual and without cultural referents, it gives us all permission to be apathetic. We can ignore the plight of women in society, ignore the fact that the psyche of an eating disordered woman is an embodiment of society�s ambivalence toward women: their human potential as well as their physical form.

And finally, my experience...
I have been receiving therapy at Jordan Center for about seven months now, although I have been struggling with my eating disorder, in various manifestations, since I was 16 years old. The odyssey of researching this paper has definitely helped me to understand all the things, individual and otherwise, that inform my own psyche. I think that Chernin captures it best: "a troubled relation to food is one of the principal ways the problems of female being come to expression in women�s lives" (xix). It is hard being a woman today; our reality borders on the schizoid at times.

Most of the women with whom I am acquainted count calories and fat grams, talk about their bodies with loathing, stare into mirrors with horror, exercise with the express purpose of losing weight, binge and fast, and exhibit other behaviors that may belie an eating disorder. We all understand that "issues of appearance are essentially currency for women�s access to power in this country, and thinness is a critical component" (Thompson 10). We want simultaneously to appear strong and non-threatening, attractive and self-sufficient, smart and sexy. Thinness seems to embody all this and more. Somehow, women have never received "the message that their bodies are valuable simply because they are in them" (Fallon 104).

My therapist will tell you that I have made especial progress lately. I wrote the people I met in New York about my disorder, hoping to eradicate some stereotypes and raise awareness. The responses have been largely positive. I also found a support chatroom online at www.something-fishy.org. Naturally this attracts mostly women, and we have chatted about many subjects I touched on in this paper. Many have talked about their self-hatred, their lack of identity, their confused relationships with the other sex. Peppered throughout our chats are affirmations and questions like "what do you like about yourself?" and "what are you good at, apart from your disorder?". Meanwhile, many of the women come in cherishing their disorder -- they know they have achieved the ideal, they know they have found an image that conveys all that they want to be. Eating disordered becomes firmly entrenched -- most of us will struggle with our illnesses for the rest of our lives. They are so comfortable, so safe, so rewarding in our everyday interactions with society. Abra Fortune Chernik once said "Gaining weight and pulling my head out of the toilet was the most political ac I ever committed" (Hornbacher 5). For a woman, gaining weight -- embracing one�s natural feminine form, daring to take up space -- is an act of civil disobedience. I am rallying the strength to take that stand, but again, we cannot focus on the recovery of individuals. Women need to oppose the system that still oppresses us, the industry that still objectifies us. Or else we will continue to lose our sisters and ourselves to eating disordered behaviors. These behaviors are an acquiesce to an order to self-destruct.

"I stared at myself in the mirror for a long time. I suddenly felt a split in my brain: I didn�t recognize her. I divided into two: the self in my head and the girl in the mirror. It was a strange, not unpleasant feeling of disorientation, dissociation... I would eventually have that feeling all the time. Ego and image. Body and brain." (Hornbacher 6)

"Tuck those ribbons under your helmet be a good soldier first my left foot then my right behind the other... and when I dance for him somebody leave the light on just in case I like the dancing I can remember where I come from I walked into your dream and now I�ve forgotten how to dream my own dream... " (Tori Amos, "Mother" from the album Little Earthquakes, 1991 Atlantic)

Works Cited..
(Books)
Brumberg, Joan Jacobs. Fasting Girls: the Emergence of Anorexia as a Modern Disease. Cambridge: Harvard University Publishers, 1988.

Chernin, Kim. The Hungry Self: Women, Eating, and Identity. New York: Harper Perennial, 1994.

Fallon, Patricia, et al. (ed.) Feminist Perspectives on Eating Disorders. New York: The Guilford Press, 1994.

Hornbacher, Marya. Wasted: a Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1998.

Thompson, Becky W. A Hunger So Deep and So Wide: American Women Speak Out on Eating Problems. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994.

(Articles)
Jones, Karen H. & K.L.Nagel. "Sociological Factors in the Development of Eating Disorders." Adolescence, vol. 27. Pages 107-113.

Siever, Michael D. "Sexual Orientation and Gender as Factors in Socioculturally Acquired Vulnerability to Body Dissatisfaction and Eating Disorders." Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, vol. 62. Pages 252-260.

(Online resources)
www.something-fishy.org www.student.com/article/eatingdisorders

©2000 Melanie. Reprinted with Permission.

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