Here’s the thing. I’ve gotten mostly good feedback on my entry titled “teenage girls are fucking stupid these days”. But there have been some people who have struck back on a couple of points. The main two being:
* Not all teenage girls are like that. You’re stereotyping them.
* I’m clearly ignorant about eating disorders
I’ve responded to a few of these, but in typical fashion most people don’t read all the replies before they themselves reply. I can’t really blame them when there are several pages of replies. I’ve done it myself.
So let me clarify a couple of things.
On the first point. I honestly don’t believe most teenage girls are like that. My goal “although the title might suggest otherwise” was to target a certain subset of teenage girls who seek attention in the wrong ways. The type of girls like I describe in my entry.
On the second point. Yes I don’t understand eating disorders as well as maybe I or others should. But in all fairness, I also wasn’t targeting your typical eating disorder type of person. The theme was teenage girls who do stupid things to get attention. My rant was mostly spawned from a xanga blog I stumbled upon which read (and I paraphrase):
“My boyfriend and I met this girl who clearly has an ED. I asked my boyfriend if he thought she was skinner then me and he said yes. Now I’m on a mission to weigh less then her”
Obviously this girl, whoever she is, has some confidence issues. Without doing a complete psych evaluation I’m just going to rant about this type of person instead. You know what gives me the right to do that without the background check, links to reference material and a full course study on the subject matter? This is my blog where I speak my mind. I’m not writing for the New York Times here. I come across something that disturbs me, I rant about it. Simple as that. Never would I have imagined that entry would have gained the attention that it did. Something that took me ten minutes to write, and an additional ten minutes of thought afterwards. That was it.
Oh well. I guess if anything good did come out of it, there have been a few girls with confidence issues who have said “thanks, this is what I needed to hear.”
you are right to say what you said. and honestly eating disorders are totally messed up. i can understand girls who over eat, but can never understand girls who become anorexic. cause how i see it..girls who eat a lot are stressed, and eating produces endorphines. understandable..right? however anoerxia, and bulimics do this to be skinny, and it’s done in vain. not necessarily always due to stress, or control. i think honestl it’s a excuse. but that’s me. i think it’s done too look skinny, period. i mean no girl wants to look fat obviously both eating disorders..are completely different.
okay, sorry if i may have overreacted a lil… i just had the impression that you were referring to people with eating disorders.
Rock on! You said it perfectly!
Haha, I happened to be one of those girls who needed to hear it. I most def don’t blame you to rant about that.
Thats reaaaly nice that you wanted to set things straight. I wouldn’t have.
im with ya. im sure there are girls on xanga that trule have eating disorders, but i know there are a lot too who dont really, they just want attention. annoying as fuck.
I have to agree with xxanamiaxangelxx. Why, simply this… everyone is intitled to their opinions, regardless if it’s positive or negative. We all have a brain, a thinking process and also a sense of individuality. We are all here to express our OWN thoughts on certain matters. The comments you received that were not so positive are their opinions as well. The line is drawn when someone expresses their view or perspective in a way that clearly states they have no thought process.
I totally understood your point of your previous post, as well as this one, however you should not have to apologize or make any corrections because of girls who already have a confidence problem. The only reason it bothers them to read something like this is because of this problem and it struck them too close to home. They saw themselves in your post and it brought them down even more.
On the other hand, you can maybe come accross a little less crass. When wanting to help someone, you can be blunt, but less offensive. This is only my opinion.
i’m glad you wrote that blog. and i totally understood your intentions of the blog.
@LadyAsianInvasion – as far as people who have eating disorders for real, it may start as “wanting to be skinny” but for the most part it is really about control. they are depressed or have some other emotional issue or whatnot and so they do it to control something. they put their energy into their diets and crap not to think about the depression or their life is spinning out of control and they want to have their control on something. i understand it in that sense but at the same time i don’t. i always overeat but i’ve never even THOUGHT of eating less let alone starving myself.
I totally agree, thank you for clarifying.
It is your blog and you can rant away as you please… I didn’t see anything wrong with your post, after all you repeated yourself quite a few times that you weren’t singling out anyone or trying to stereotype anyone… Anyways, another good post!
I can see why some people took you wrong, and was afraid they might. But many of us understand understand hyperbole.
chill buddy… U made ur point. That’s it. This is an invisible rule – “Exceptions are always there.” U don’t need 2 mention it
I came by that blog from a rec. I actually had my fourteen year old daughter sit down and read it. While she does not have an eating disorder, I thought it was worth a read and I thank you for venting.
When I was a teenager, I exhibited a few of those traits. I think most girls who read that probably found pieces of themselves in what you were describing. The great majority of those traits seem to dissolve with age and education, and hell, just simple life experience, especially if you take into account developmental stages and such.
How sad that you actually had to write this blog in addition to the previous.
You have a right to speak your mind and if anyone disagrees with you then that is their opinion. If they don’t like what you said then they can just leave. You were simply speaking what you thought of it. I agreed with your posts and it’s sad what teenage girls(I myself being one) do to get attention these days whether it be to lose weight and look like a stick or falling under pressure from friends or family just to get attention. But with the ED it doesnt help that everywhere a person looks you have to be skinny to fit in with everyone else. Maybe they do it to look like the models or to fit into the size 0 jeans they saw in a shopping mall window. Or it could be the simple fact they don’t want to lose their boyfriend to some other chick who is skinnier then they are.
i wrote about you in my newest post
If more people took the time to read a complete entry and understand the message before they decided to make a comment; a lot of blogs would not be misunderstood.
Also we have to understand that everybody is entitled to put their opinions down on any subject; that is mostly the point of blogging.
I feel like “eating disorders” are kind of a trend on Xanga (and other places on the internet) and it’s kind of weird, because I’m sure many of those girls would not be blogging about their dieting if everyone else wasn’t doing it too.
I was one of those “not all teenage girls are like that” commenters, but I got what you were trying to say. I didn’t think you actually thought teenage girls were like that, but I always get a little irritated when people generalize (even when they clearly don’t mean it). I too didn’t read the many pages of comments. I figured someone else had probably already said what I said, but I was too lazy to check (because I have better things to do? Haha).
@Xx_Kittt_xX – it could be due to control, but for the most part it’s in vain. someone who was anorexic admit that it was due to weight, and not control, and etc. so i dunno..maybe some control..but i still don’t think it is. that’s just me.
i’m glad you wrote that. it may of been to judgemental to take you so seriously and ultimately decide you’re telling everyone to fuck themselves (or to be more accurate: to stop fucking with themselves). Anyhow, I probably would of ranted on that matter myself at one point in my life, so… well, as long as it woke some people’s eyes, it’s good.
have a great day~
My belief is it’s your Xanga–and you can write what you want. Too many people on Xanga these days are easily offended.
thanks for the clarification
the bigger picture can be seen more clearly now =]