We've been here before, and most millennials will tell you it didn't turn out well for us. The problem is not GLP-1 itself, bariatric surgery, or any one person's decision to lose weight. This is a revival of ideas and pro-ana content. in the form of #SkinnyTok. It is the misuse of medications and other tools to achieve a level of thinness that has nothing to do with health or happiness. And this lack of care or respect for those who do live in large bodies and for some reason do not actively strive to lose weight.
“What makes this moment so confronting is the visibility,” Gordon says. “We briefly saw greater diversity of bodies in mainstream spaces, and now we're seeing those bodies disappear again. Many people who appeared in public in non-thin bodies have since lost weight, and when bodies get smaller, it's noticeable. This shift can feel like a regression, even though the underlying value system has never really changed. This cycle highlights the constant obstacles the movement faces.”
I think this is where my naivety took over when I wrote about these issues in the past tense. Anti-obesity bias and the combination of extreme thinness with beauty, discipline and health have never gone away. But this moment in time does recall the toxicity of the early aughts, when tabloids freely and shamelessly compared celebrity bikini bodies and bloggers reflected on every pound lost or gained. “What has changed is not the desire for thinness, but the scale and speed of its spread through technology,” Gordon says. “Medicines, filters, artificial intelligence, cosmetic procedures and heavily edited images tighten unrealistic standards, making them even less achievable and more common.”
Therapist and eating disorder specialist Alyssa Mass, Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist.says cultural waves are rarely a true sign of the “beginning” or “end” of anything, including the body positivity movement. “Honestly, I think this kind of completely black and white thinking is more dangerous than anything else,” she says. “The pendulum swings, and medical and technological advances are always changing our world and culture. We don't need to sensationalize these changes. However, we can continue to learn, grow, and have healthy dialogue about what's happening around us and how we want to interact.”
