A study released by the JAMA Pediatrics journal revealed that the prevalence of eating disorders among men is much higher than we had thought.
For starters, eating disorders exist in males, which seems to have boggled minds around the nation, because apparently gender stereotypes aren’t limited to discrimination against females.
Rather than focusing on specified eating disorders, the study chose to focus on anorexia nervosa, bulimia and how many young men are “obsessed with weight and size” — and yes, this includes wishing your body was larger than it currently is. Among young men aged 12-20, the study found 20 percent are concerned about the health and well-being of their bodies beyond the point of health and well-being.
Eating disorders manifest themselves differently in different kinds of people. Where one person may be crippled by anorexia nervosa, another may be enslaved to things like creatine and workout supplements without even realizing there’s a problem.
Biology senior Corey Sadd didn’t see eating disorders as having much of an effect on his social circle.
“I’d say maybe 3 in 10 of my friends use things like creatine and workout supplements, sure,” Sadd said. “But as far as taking something like eating and working out to an unhealthy level? I can’t say I know anybody like that.”
Pharmacy junior Daniel Farooqi didn’t see eating disorders as something that perforated his social circle at all.
“Honestly, things like creatine, and guys taking their health and appearance past a point of being healthy- that reminds me of high school,” Farooqi said. “I remember student athletes doing those kinds of things — taking supplements, not eating — moreso than my current friends in college.”
To most, 20 percent may not seem like a massive number. But when it comes to health or well-being — or anything, really — one in five people feeling or doing or saying anything is an incredibly large proportion, especially when associated with something so inherently harmful and widely hidden from the public.
And it’s not something that many of us really knew to be that pervasive to begin with. That shouldn’t come as a surprise, though — it seems like the needs of our society’s men are growing to be more and more overlooked. After all, in the midst of contraceptive debates, anti-abortion laws and the hopefully lasting trend of feminism this day and age, there simply isn’t enough time in the day to worry oneself about the plights of the American male.
It’s a sad observation, sure, but it’s not one that many of us can deny as true.
Of the young men surveyed in the JAMA Pediatrics study, 9.2 percent were cited as wanting to be “big and brawny,” 2.5 percent desired thinness, and 6.3 percent hoped for both.
It’s not a crime to be surprised by these numbers — you and I both have probably always associated eating disorders with affluent, young white women struggling to conform to the standards of Vogue or Elle cover models. It’s the story we’ve been told by the countless outdated health films that littered our middle school years.
It’s the story that stuck with us, and it’s officially been deemed as outdated.
“Male eating disorders are greatly underestimated for two reasons,” said the lead author of the study, Alison Field of Boston Children’s Hospital’s Adolescent Medicine Division. “Anorexia and bulimia — the disorders we studied — are traditionally associated with a desire to be thin, a standard that men generally don’t aspire to, and many are ashamed to seek treatment because the disorders are deemed a female problem.”
With so much media focus on how terrible media focus is on women, it’s no wonder that so many of our guys have been going through such a draining struggle in near-utter privacy.
Female body image is a massive undertaking to improve, yes, but there isn’t much of an excuse for neglecting the media’s effects on the body image of half our population.
And it’s the little things, really — the things that we may not realize have an effect on our male population until the ramifications are already set in stone.
Take something like “50 Shades of Grey,” for example. To say the least, it’s proven itself to be something of a controversial publication. It’s topped both the bestseller charts and the coffee tables of our aunts who otherwise never read.
It’s also been the subject of a colossal, seemingly unending debate on the message it’s sending to today’s women — how we’re not sex objects, what the difference between willingness to comply and true consent is, how S&M-based sexuality is rooted in dehumanizing, anti-feminist ideologies.
Whether any of this is true is beside the point. Taking a cultural phenomenon, like the widespread popularity of “50 Shades of Grey,” and you get a cultural debate on a likewise widespread array of topics.
None of these topics, however, seem to even acknowledge the message “50 Shades” sends to men.
There’s no talk of the unrealistic expectations given to men when women cite the exploits of Christian Grey, the novel’s leading anti-hero and unabashed sex fiend. He’s a sex object, pure and simple, yet there’s no mention of the pressure that Grey’s widely publicized physique and sexual performance could put on the average man.
And then, months later, we come to find that one in five males struggles with body image issues.
College students are particularly at risk for developing eating disorders. In addition to the already-crippling mental stress most of us subject ourselves to, The National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders reports that 86 percent of those with an eating disorder report the disorder’s onset before they turned 20.
Further, approximately 10 to 15 percent of those suffering from anorexia or bulimia are male. That might sound like an inconsequential statistic, but it roughly translates to saying that 10 to 15 percent of those who suffer from eating disorders don’t feel comfortable reporting it, or that 10 to 15 percent of those suffering from an eating disorder are people we never even suspected as such.
Finance and MIS junior Niccolo Buchelli cites the pressure that the mainstream media’s portrayal of men can put on the average male.
“I’d say it definitely makes guys feel like there’s only one kind of man that we’re supposed to be,” Buchelli said. “There isn’t a lot of attention given to how much guys can be made objects by magazines and the Internet.
“I’m not sure if it’s something that affects me personally, but then again, it might have more of an effect on guys than we’ll ever really realize.”
Senior staff columnist Cara Smith is a communications junior and may be reached at [email protected]
