IF you thought we left diet culture back in the 1990s, think again.
Toxic ideas about bodies and weight are creeping back into our lives, and it’s clear the lessons of the past haven’t sunk in.
Leading the charge is social media, with TikTok at the centre of it all.
A disturbing trend dubbed SkinnyTok has blown up so much on the app TikTok bosses had to step in and ban the hashtag.
But that hasn’t stopped sneaky variations of it from slipping through the cracks and landing in front of young girls and teens.
The trend saw the social media platform, with TWO million Irish users – many of whom are underage despite the 13-year-old age limit – flooded with hundreds of thousands of videos showing weight loss tips that could “promote eating disorders” and “objectification of women’s bodies”.
Both the European Commission and Coimisiún na Meán warned that the trend was promoting “unrealistic body images” and “extreme weight loss”.
Bobbi McDermott, 42, from Dublin, knows more than most just how insidious “skinny talk” can be.
She battled anorexia for years in the era of a comment made by model Kate Moss back in the 2000s that “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels”, a comment that the top model has since distanced herself from.
Bobbi told The Irish Sun: “This is skinny talk. They glamourise [the weight loss] like it’s amazing but they’re playing with fire.
“Kate was right for about five minutes until the world shrinks along with your body, and all that is left is pain.
“These trends add into that competitive nature and that need for perfection, which is so dangerous for addictions like anorexia.
“The biggest interest rates in the world are the weight loss industry and the porn industry.
“And both of them are designed to take you down and both promote an unhealthy body image. I think it’s always going to be there.”
The English model’s comment was heavily criticised in 2009 after it was adopted by a number of pro-anorexia websites.
Kate was accused of encouraging eating disorders at the time, and almost a decade later the supermodel said she regretted saying the controversial quote.
But years later, skinny talk is back, flooding social media channels with extreme weight loss tips.
TikTok chiefs have said the #SkinnyTok searches are now blocked since “it has become linked to unhealthy weight-loss content”.
And now searches for the hashtag lead to a link to mental health support.
But searches related to the hashtag ‘skinny’ are still available on the social media platform with hundreds of thousands of pieces of content related to weight loss.
And trends like ‘You Don’t Need A Treat You’re Not A Dog,’ ‘Skinny is self respect,’ ‘Being hot and skinny,’ ‘SK!NNITOK’ are still attracting hundreds of thousands of views on TikTok.
‘SOCIAL ADDICTION’
Bobbi added: “I think that there should be optional protections that you can put in there.
“I personally would go on and ban all these hashtags and I report damaging things that come up.
“And now, thankfully, they do not come up any more because of my algorithm.
“But [skinny talk] is a social addiction. We’re obsessed with how we look.
“I think if we want to fight against or if we want to starve the oxygen out of these trends, we have to push against it with more healthy trends, with more connection to real people, not these people that are, you know, putting on filters, doing angles.
“You fight it back with positive connections, positive stories, positive lifestyles.”
‘PRESSURE TO BE SKINNY’
Brazilian social media influencer Ana B, 35, who has been living in Dublin for over a decade now, has shared how she developed a binge eating disorder as well as the challenges of the unrealistic pursuit of a perfect body.
She said: “I have binge eating because of severe anxiety. I’ve had it since I was a teenager.
“I was around 15-years-old when I started taking weight loss pills along with laxatives, overexercising, and doing all sorts of things, because when I lived in Brazil, I really wanted to be thin.
“I really felt that pressure to be thin in Brazil. And from that point on, I started developing a binge eating disorder.
“It’s still something I carry with me. Now that I’m older, with therapy and self-awareness, I understand it. I know what it is. I’m working on it but it is hard, it’s really hard.”
Ana has also noted a change in social behaviour – especially online – after the Covid-19 pandemic in which the plus-size bodies were embraced through the lens of body positivity which also reflected in the fashion landscape.
But now, five years later, skinny talks are once again dominating the headlines – this time, the Brazilian woman believes it could be driven by the growing popularity of weight-loss drugs.
Ana added: “The whole of society embraced the plus-size business, and curvy women, because that’s what they were selling.
“But today, when you walk into the shops, you can’t find plus-size options anymore.
“And then people say it is because ‘there’s no demand’ or come up with other excuses, but to me that’s just not true. I genuinely believe it’s tied to the pharmaceutical push — there’s a lot of money involved.
“Sadly, especially on TikTok, people now feel increasingly comfortable promoting the idea that being thin is the ultimate goal.
“There’s even a trend going around in the US with people saying: ‘I’ll never be unhappy, because I’ll be thin.’
“And what scares me most is the level of engagement – so many likes and so many comments.
“People feel more and more free to say these things out loud.
“But I can’t even bring myself to blame them — it’s a reflection of the world we live in: the fashion industry, beauty standards, society.”
The 35-year-old revealed that she underwent bariatric surgery due to health reasons last April, and has lost 15kg since then.
‘QUITE CHALLENGING’
She added: “After losing weight through bariatric surgery, I can see how people treat me differently now.
“The decision to have bariatric surgery was for health, but from the moment you start to see that the world is easier and people are nicer when you start to lose weight, it is quite challenging.
“The way the world opens up to you when you’re thin — it’s real. The life of a thin person is way easier than the life of a fat person. Sadly, that’s just the reality we’re living in.”
New data from the Health Service Executive showed that more than 500 people were diagnosed with an eating disorder last year, 118 more diagnoses than in 2023.
And there was a 33 per cent increase in referrals for treatment in 2024.
Research and Policy Officer with Bodywhys, the Eating Disorders Association of Ireland, Barry Murphy, said that the algorithm is a systemic issue, adding: “It’s like a bad neighbour or someone you did not invite to your family party.”
He continued: “The algorithm gets to know our preferences in what we search for and what we access, view, watch and follow.
“And the concern with eating disorders is the person might then fall down a rabbit hole of content that ultimately promotes eating disorders.
“The problem with weight-loss-based content is that it really brings up objectification and that your worth is tied up in this part of your appearance when it should be a focus on health and not a particular body type.”
SIGNS & SYMPTOMS OF ANOREXIA
ACCORDING to the HSE, the main symptom of anorexia is losing more weight than is healthy for your age and height.
The full list of signs are:
- deliberately missing meals, eating very little or avoiding eating any foods you see as fattening
- lying about what and when you’ve eaten, and how much you weigh
- taking medicine that makes you feel less hungry (appetite suppressants)
- exercising too much
- making yourself sick
- using medicines to help you poo (laxatives) or to make you pee (diuretics) to try to avoid putting on weight
- an overwhelming fear of gaining weight
- strict rituals around eating
- seeing losing a lot of weight as a positive thing
- believing you are fat when you are a healthy weight or underweight
- not admitting your weight loss is serious
He added: “You can see problems with TikTok linked to eating disorders going back as far as 2020.
“There are some long-term issues there that clearly haven’t been fully addressed.
“They need to look at the algorithm from a risk perspective, so to identify the harms, to assess them and then ultimately report on them, so being more transparent with what’s going on.
“And individually, people need to be careful where they get validation from, particularly if it is online, because online is very fleeting.”
Over one million units of illegal medicines were detained by the Health Products Regulatory Authority last year, a 14 per cent increase compared to 2023.
The HPRA also noted an upward trend in detentions of GLP-1 products – medications used to treat type 2 diabetes and obesity – including semaglutide and liraglutide.
In a statement, a spokesperson said: “The HPRA confirmed that it detained 1,000,984 dosage units of falsified and other illegal medicines in 2024.
“The data highlights that anabolic steroids, sedatives and erectile dysfunction products are consistently the most detained categories of medicines year on year.
“While overall numbers remain low, 1,582 units of GLP-1 products were detained in 2024 compared to 568 units in 2023 and just 40 units in 2022.”
An estimated 188,895 people in Ireland will experience an eating disorder at some point in their lives, according to Bodywhys. And one in 20 people across the country will experience an eating disorder in their lifetime.
- BODYWHYS provides a non-judgmental and confidential support and information service to anyone experiencing an eating disorder. You can get in touch at (01) 270 7906 or alex@bodywhys.ie
TikTok has blocked the search results for #SkinnyTok since ‘it has become linked to unhealthy weight loss content’[/caption]
