Romanticizing ED’s on TikTok

AbsolutSkinny

AbsolutSkinny

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Mar 5, 2020
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I cannot stand people on TikTok posting content that should belong to MPA. Many claim they use this app as a “coping mechanism” and I find that completely ridiculous.

This to me is problematic because the age demographic on TikTok is very young. Children as young as age 7 are using this app. Seeing girls post videos where they show what they eat in a day, and it is basically a iced coffee and a cliff bar, could for obvious reasons be harmful to them.

I don’t find a issue in showing weight loss content if it is shown in a reasonable way, not pro Ana. What also annoys me, is that these girls seem proud of their eating habits. Like: Omg I’m so quirky, I ate nothing all day except for five raspberries at dinner!
Good job Becky you almost fasted a whole day! :rolleyes:

The bottom line is that stupid content like this really grinds my gears and should not be anything to be proud of because
a. it is literally pro Ana
b. fasting for 8 hours isn’t impressive, find something else to brag about😘

What do you guys think?
 
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Maybe because the target demographic of TikTok is middle schoolers, its users are prone to poor decision making and attention seeking
 
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I agree with @proseccoprincess, give any sort of platform to impressionable young girls and it will be used to promote body image stuff. It's nothing new.

In other news TikTok is infested with massive amounts of spyware and as of now there are barely any regulations in place as of yet. It's tempting to join in but it's just like that "old" filter that was a craze awhile back... Russia was just data-mining all our faces for their own purposes. I would avoid!
 
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proseccoprincess said:
Maybe because the target demographic of TikTok is middle schoolers, its users are prone to poor decision making and attention seeking
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litres said:
I agree with @proseccoprincess, give any sort of platform to impressionable young girls and it will be used to promote body image stuff. It's nothing new.
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That’s true, I guess girls in that age are prone to take advantage of any social media platform in order to gain attention! It just left a bad taste in my mouth, but I presume that it is inevitable avoiding those types of posts online.

litres said:
In other news TikTok is infested with massive amounts of spyware and as of now there are barely any regulations in place as of yet. It's tempting to join in but it's just like that "old" filter that was a craze awhile back... Russia was just data-mining all our faces for their own purposes. I would avoid!
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Really? Thats creepy. :confused: How was the spyware figured out and how is it posible? The lack of regulation is probably why people can get away with posting almost anything on there!
 
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AbsolutSkinny said:
Really? Thats creepy. :confused: How was the spyware figured out and how is it posible? The lack of regulation is probably why people can get away with posting almost anything on there!
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I don't know about spyware on TikTok, but I can chime in to say that at least the content on TikTok is HIGHLY regulated (I cross-post on TikTok as I grow followings elsewhere).

It's much more conservative than most popular platforms and they're faster to moderate, too. They'll take down a video for showing something that looks like a knife, someone appearing to smoke/drink, or anything that looks "explicit." They even took down videos of Lizzo in a bathing suit 😂 and they remove comments that curse. Perhaps more understandably, any/all China-bashing and references to Tiananmen Square are removed.

But yeah, they haven't seriously addressed how to remove ED content from their recommendation algorithm yet.

"Do you have anorexia? TikTok thinks you do, so here’s a bunch of triggering videos. Have at it!"
"Discovering, damage-controlling, and deleting pro-ana content has become a rite of passage for web companies." -- snippets from a good article on this at Wired.
 
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I'm too old to know what TikTok actually is...seems like it is pretty popular with teenagers though so not surprised MPA content is popular. It is probably just the new Tumblr for them.
 
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anne said:
I don't know about spyware on TikTok, but I can chime in to say that at least the content on TikTok is HIGHLY regulated (I cross-post on TikTok as I grow followings elsewhere).

It's much more conservative than most popular platforms and they're faster to moderate, too. They'll take down a video for showing something that looks like a knife, someone appearing to smoke/drink, or anything that looks "explicit." They even took down videos of Lizzo in a bathing suit 😂 and they remove comments that curse. Perhaps more understandably, any/all China-bashing and references to Tiananmen Square are removed.

But yeah, they haven't seriously addressed how to remove ED content from their recommendation algorithm yet.

"Do you have anorexia? TikTok thinks you do, so here’s a bunch of triggering videos. Have at it!"
"Discovering, damage-controlling, and deleting pro-ana content has become a rite of passage for web companies." -- snippets from a good article on this at Wired.
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Oh wow! I didn't know it was that conservative. Thanks for linking the article! The algorithm is tricky. I really like the idea of a personalized For You page but it does become problematic when it comes to ED content. I'm guessing that this issue could easily be solved by having more strict regulations when it comes to pro-ana content. However it might be difficult regulating this content because teenage girls always seem to find ways of manipulating or finding their way through the regulations and still manage to post ED content. It's a tricky matter but interesting though. :grin:

I'm also ever grateful of Tik Tok for doing charity work and removing videos of Lizzo in a bathing suit. :kiss:
 
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AbsolutSkinny said:
I cannot stand people on TikTok posting content that should belong to MPA. Many claim they use this app as a “coping mechanism” and I find that completely ridiculous.

This to me is problematic because the age demographic on TikTok is very young. Children as young as age 7 are using this app. Seeing girls post videos where they show what they eat in a day, and it is basically a iced coffee and a cliff bar, could for obvious reasons be harmful to them.

I don’t find a issue in showing weight loss content if it is shown in a reasonable way, not pro Ana. What also annoys me, is that these girls seem proud of their eating habits. Like: Omg I’m so quirky, I ate nothing all day except for five raspberries at dinner!
Good job Becky you almost fasted a whole day! :rolleyes:

The bottom line is that stupid content like this really grinds my gears and should not be anything to be proud of because
a. it is literally pro Ana
b. fasting for 8 hours isn’t impressive, find something else to brag about😘

What do you guys think?
Click to expand...

My cousin is 12 and is on TikTok all the time. She showed me videos (TikToks? What do you call those? I feel old already) where some teenage girls were doing 'what I eat in a day's and had literally an apple and a pack of cigarettes. Sure, it's nothing new, when I was 13 it was actually normal to starve yourself to some point and (at least in my bubble) we did contests on who could go the longest without food.
Anyways I don't feel comfortable with young girls and boys watching those videos without requesting those, you know? I mean, I am no fan of fat kids and careless eating but I think it's not good to be confronted like that without asking for it.
 
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noyoudont said:
Anyways I don't feel comfortable with young girls and boys watching those videos without requesting those, you know? I mean, I am no fan of fat kids and careless eating but I think it's not good to be confronted like that without asking for it.
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Online anorexia/wannarexia culture leads to dumb crash diets, leads to "eating disorder", leads to binge eating and weight gain, leads to body positivity/fat acceptance warriors.
 
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Can this be, or can we create a general tiktok thread? Quarantine has gotten to my head and I did some digging today.

Highlights (and I use that term VERY loosely) from the models:






 
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I’ve noticed an interesting phenomenon with the Tiktoks of people printing starvation and surviving off adderall and mango flavored juul pods. The people promoting EDs and bragging about their unhealthy behavior are usually chubby or at a normal weight (not skinny). Whilst the actual skinny girls on there that flood my For You Page rarely brag about what they eat or how they exercise. Sometimes they make a workout video or a “What I Eat in a Day” upon request, but it’s always healthy and filled with fruit, veggies etc.
 
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I’ve noticed on tiktok that many skinny girls are bashed and “praised” in the most negative ways. I always see comments like “I’m not eating ever again so I can look like that” and “I can see your ribs that’s so gross and unhealthy.” That’s so insensitive and just rude to the individual you’re making comments about. It’s especially annoying when that skinny girl actually just eats healthy and workouts consistently and people just assume they have an eating disorder! Seriously what the fuck, just because they’re thin/take care of themselves they have an ed? :headbang:
but ofc we need to worry about these girls more than the young kids exhibiting actual Ed behaviors and overweight individuals on the app:whistling:
 
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I was scrolling thru pro ana scumbags thread on /snow/ and this girl popped up. She claims to be 5'8 and 88 pounds. No one's buying it. She makes her weight such a huge public deal that she has at least 10+ tiktoks (cba to look thru them all) dedicated to her [alleged] weight.

What do you girls think?
https://www.tiktok.com/@rylea.13
 
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anne said:
"Do you have anorexia? TikTok thinks you do, so here’s a bunch of triggering videos. Have at it!"
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That's hilarious.

But yea, TikTok is spyware. It was reverse engineered a few months back. Now, if only Trump could say something positive about the platform, we might have the outcry from his parasites* about how extremely dangerous it actually is. Threatening American democracy etcetera etcetera.

*Vox News and its readership.
 
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saturation said:
I was scrolling thru pro ana scumbags thread on /snow/ and this girl popped up. She claims to be 5'8 and 88 pounds. No one's buying it. She makes her weight such a huge public deal that she has at least 10+ tiktoks (cba to look thru them all) dedicated to her [alleged] weight.

What do you girls think?
https://www.tiktok.com/@rylea.13
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I found this. She looks pretty good but i would guess 100 at the lowest. Maybe 105-110 but thats a bit high. If she is 88lbs then she must have the smallest bone structure known to womankind.
 
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FailedSupermodel said:
I found this. She looks pretty good but i would guess 100 at the lowest. Maybe 105-110 but thats a bit high. If she is 88lbs then she must have the smallest bone structure known to womankind.
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Well I will never get the minutes I spent researching this back. But she's taken multiple videos weighing herself as "proof" (not scrolling further to see if she's ever verified her height though):

 
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anne said:
weighing herself as "proof"
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Honestly those could be easy to fake, still.

I don't care that much what her actual weight is though, the thing is the extent she takes it to is so bizarre. She just made a tiktok with only text something along the lines of "I'm a HS senior who weighs 88 pounds"???
She's constantly bringing it up herself (and then ofc cries bc gets skinny shamed). Why does she make her weight so public I can't fathom. The publicity ain't even good publicity for her.
 
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anne said:
Well I will never get the minutes I spent researching this back. But she's taken multiple videos weighing herself as "proof" (not scrolling further to see if she's ever verified her height though):
Click to expand...


RIP the time out of my life as well - but there are a couple of videos further back that would support the 88 lbs claim:





I agree with @saturation that her own obsession with stating her weight and height indicates.... something not quite right. She denies an ED over and over, but you don't get to BMI 13.2 by accident and then flaunt your stats at every opportunity. She's also 17, and speaks with the sort of willful lack of self-awareness that I remember from my younger disordered self, so 🤷‍♀️
 
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