Health & Fitness: Is diet culture real?

Another question…do you think diet culture is real?

Feel free to leave your thoughts and opinions!

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I didn’t realise this was here, it’s an interesting question that didn’t get any attention so I’ll give a bump and my opinion on the whole thing.

It’s quite short, yes a diet culture does exist, but it’s more to do with societal standards of beauty and just all round 'normal’ness. Like, chasing after a dress size or weight number is definitely not a beauty standard, no-one is attracted to a number, you’re attracted to a look. Diet culture can be very harmful, especially to young women

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In a word, yes. The diet industry is a multi-billion dollar enterprise. From Weight Watchers to Instagram fitness models selling you their 12 weeks to a bikini body diet plan to pills teas and other snake oils that will make you skinny, it’s kind of everywhere.

Even now, Weight Watchers is marketing to kids as young as 8 as well as teens, despite evidence that says that the younger you start dieting, the more likely you are to develop an eating disorder.

Agreed it’s definitely linked to society’s beauty standards that are reinforced by seeing skinny white women everywhere in the media.

While I agree that it’s not always about the number, I think that you do get caught up in numbers from an early age. Even if you ignore magazine articles that tell you how much models weigh, you use yourself as a baseline. I can tell you how much I weighed in high school, college, and times that I liked my weight and times I didn’t… So as much as people aren’t attracted to a number, you can spend your life hoping that just losing 1, 2, 10, or 50 more pounds will make you happy. (Even at my skinniest when I danced ballet and skipped meals I always though I’d be happy if I was just like 5 pounds lighter)

I adore Jameela Jamil and everything she has to say about diet culture (telling the Kardashians to f*ck off when they promote diarrhea tea) and she talks about the time she wasted weighing herself every day here and talks about that and how stylishs never have anything in her size at photo shoots because she’s considered big for magazines on the AMAZING podcast Sooo Many White Guys.

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This is why I stopped using IG because of this nonsense when I only go on it to look at workouts to do at the gym. It’s really sad that people don’t care about their health anymore, they just want to please others which is completely wrong. Workout, eat right, lose weight for yourself not because you wanna please your man.

That’s way too young! I get that kids should eat healthily and exercise but putting them on a really strict diet can cause an eating disorder as you have said. Yoyo diets can cause you to crave more junk food, gotta have a balance diet.

100% true. They are everywhere!

Is there a video of that on YouTube? I need to see this gets my tea ready

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I will look for it!!!

Ok, so here’s some of her tweets/Instagram comments about it

Sosh meeds

And here’s a (long) interview with her, but she talks about the lollipops from flat tummy co (that contain natural stool softeners to cause diarrhea) at around 27 minutes.

She’s such an amazing speaker and advocate. Also, though she’s like very “ideal” right now in terms of body size, she’s overcome a lot so I really can’t recommend her interview on Sooo Many White Guys enough. I mean every episode is gold, but it was like, eye-opening to hear her journey and takeaways.

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Dayum! She ain’t playing.

But I couldn’t agree more. These are complete nonsense and they’re making money out of everyone! Regular exercise and balanced diets are enough.

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Yepppp and that won’t guarantee that you’ll look like a Kardashian because, let’s face it, the Kardashians would look like Kardashians without plastic surgery. No shame in it because it’s their choice, but like don’t pretend you got that way through diet and exercise…

But good food and regular exercise will help you live longer and hopefully, enjoy that long life!

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I agree. I have no problem if people want to do plastic surgery (that’s their business) but if you’re gonna lie about saying that you lost weight by dieting & exercising but you taken plastic surgery then yes, stop lying about it! You can’t get a body like a Kardashian in a week as weight loss takes a lot of time & effort if you’re very consistent.

Remember, consistency beats perfection.

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Bump

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Same as the last one, moved to health & beauty but added discussion label :smile:

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Bump? :eyes:

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Bump (?)

DietBump

Bump :green_heart:

Closed due to 2 months of inactivity :black_heart: