Celebrities, Diets and Detoxes: The Danger of Selling Disordered Eating
Detox teas, appetite suppressant lollipops, juice cleanses — you’ve probably seen celebrities endorsing these so-called detoxes, diets and “lifestyles” on social media. It’s somewhat normal for influencers and celebrities to sell us stuff that we don’t need (that doesn’t work) in the pursuit of thinness. After all, when we’re constantly being told that thin equals healthy and beautiful, we will literally do anything to lose weight no matter what. Going on a strict diet, or restricting food heavily by doing a detox, is often seen as a form of strength. The person is praised for their determination and willpower, but it’s rarely sustainable because it involves forcing the body to ignore its own natural signals.
Any kind of restrictive diet or detox is effectively disordered eating. Read that again.
Does that seem extreme? Quite a lot of trolls on Twitter seem to think so! However, there’s tons of research to show that diets don’t work — read Health at Every Size if you don’t believe me. In fact, people often put more weight back on after a diet. Weight cycling (meaning when weight fluctuates due to yo-yo dieting) is not good for your physical or mental health and certainly doesn’t result in any long-term weight loss. It’s just a cycle of misery.
In Megan Crabbe’s book, Body Positive Power, she talks about how she was always praised for her weight loss and dieting behaviours until suddenly… it was diagnosed as an eating disorder. We have two very different rules for fat and thin people, stemming from weight stigma and fatphobia. Fat people are told to lose weight in any way possible, even if it’s bad for their health (oh, the irony). Eating disorders are about mental health — thoughts, emotions and behaviour. The eating disorder thoughts and behaviours are the same for somebody no matter what their weight. So Megan’s anorexic thoughts were likely still the same when she was larger as when she was thinner. The only difference is, as a society we deem it acceptable (even expected) for fat people to hate and starve themselves. Weight is really just a side-effect — medical professionals should not be diagnosing eating disorders based on weight, body shape or BMI (the Body Mass Index chart). But they do. They are often the worst culprits for weight shaming, but they’ve grown up in the same society rife with weight stigma, as we have.
Hope Virgo, an eating disorder campaigner, also talks about another common problem — being deemed “not thin enough” for treatment (check out her Dump the Scales campaign here). These decisions are often made by health professionals relying on the BMI chart, which is outdated (it was made in the 1830s for heaven’s sake!) and is not an effective indicator of health. But as there’s limited funding and resources for people with eating disorders, it’s a sad truth that often only the people who are “sick enough” can access help (see Jennifer L. Gaudiani’s book, Sick Enough). This is a big problem because there’s likely a huge amount of people who can’t come forward to ask for help because of stigma, shame, fatphobia, or because they don’t recognise their eating as disordered. This is likely especially the case in working-class areas or in different ethnic or cultural communities that don’t have access to the same mental health education or support. In other words, sometimes although it’s a stereotype that it’s just wealthy white young women who have anorexia, that stereotype comes from somewhere. They are the ones who have a privileged enough upbringing to recognise there is a problem and come forward for help.
Fat people can have anorexia.
I’ve literally been laughed at for saying that before, like it’s some crazy statement or conspiracy theory. Again, eating disorders are about thoughts and behaviours — weight is the side effect. When someone has anorexia and is not at a low weight it’s now known as “atypical anorexia” but really there’s nothing atypical about it. There’s likely to be a lot more people with atypical anorexia than “normal” anorexia (if I can even call it that) if we think about the amount of people who are praised for their restrictive eating habits. When detoxing, clean eating and fasting is widely promoted (especially by celebrities and influencers) it blurs the lines between dieting, disordered eating and eating disorders. This is why it’s so dangerous. It’s not just that a diet or detox advert might trigger someone with an eating disorder or someone in recovery, it’s that they contribute to the narrative that tells us that dieting and detoxing is “healthy”. It is definitely not healthy, it does not “work” — it’s causing serious harm to people’s mental and physical health.
Labelling people at “normal” or higher weights as having “atypical” anorexia only pushes the agenda that being thin is the normal version of having anorexia. Fat people can have anorexia and thin people can have binge eating disorder, and there are many other “looks” to an eating disorder in between. That’s because it’s not about the “look”, it’s about people’s mental health.
When celebrities sell detoxes and diets it sends a message of endorsement for these products. It backs the narrative that thin equals healthy, which is simply not true. But statements like this make a lot of companies a lot of money. Despite this, often these products or progammes have disclaimers saying that they don’t work and by the way they’re not liable if you get the runs or you die or whatever. But seriously, this is in the small print on the JJ Smith website — AKA THE DETOX PROMOTED BY LIZZO:
“All information, products, and services are not to be considered as legal and are to be used for personal entertainment purposes only.” (JJ Smith Online — not linking to the site so not to promote it!)
They are literally saying it doesn’t work, and the rest of the terms and conditions imply that it might even be dangerous, saying you should consult a doctor before you do the diet. Instead, how about just don’t do it at all?
Celebrities and influencers are selling this crap all over the internet and the social media platforms seem to barely be doing anything about it. Even with campaigns from Jameela Jamil, little change has come about. So I plea to you, good reader, to please ask yourself — “who profits from this?” I report diets and detoxes as scams on social media, because that’s what they are. They sell prey on people’s low self-esteem and shame and sell products that harm.
Celebrities and influencers are of course just victims of a society obsessed with thinness and beauty, so it’s not their fault but they do have a social responsibility. It just comes with the territory of being famous. They should not choose their own financial gain over the wellbeing of their fans. But this is the capitalist system we live in, so what can we do? That’s a rhetorical question, I don’t think we can dismantle the capitalism, white supremacist, patriarchal values that have created our profitable beauty standards… unfortunately. But we can individually choose not to buy into it. We can highlight the danger of disordered eating, refuse to buy into or promote diet culture, and spread awareness of eating disorders. We can refuse to be part of fatphobia and weight stigma. We can choose to be kind instead of perpetuating harm.
It seems like a bigger cultural shift is needed here in the long-term to build a better understanding of eating disorders, we really know so little as a society. The reaction to Lizzo’s detox promotion only proves how much we have normalised disordered eating. We need to re-evaluate what we think of as normal and healthy, without the influence of people profiting off our bodies. It’s hard to know what “normal” eating really is but I think a good basis is to reduce anxiety around food and your body and avoid restricting foods (unless in the case of allergies). I highly recommend Just Eat It by Laura Thomas, a great book about intuitive eating.
Everyone has the right to make their own choices for their own health, but without awareness of disordered eating and how the industry profits off it, our choice is not adequately informed. You can choose to do anything you like to your own body, so please… choose to be kind to it.
For support with disordered eating or body image issues check out:
Originally published at http://thecompassionatefeminist.home.blog on December 31, 2020.
