Is There a ‘Skinny Apocalypse’ in Hollywood?

Summary

Diabolical Lies Podcast Summary

Episode: Is There a ‘Skinny Apocalypse’ in Hollywood?
Hosts: Katie Gatti Tassin & Caroline Claire Burke
Date: December 14, 2025

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Main Theme:

A searing, deeply researched discussion on contemporary panic over body image and thinness in Hollywood, focusing on Wicked’s lead actresses—Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo. The episode unpacks current discourse about body positivity, allegations of eating disorder “contagion,” and the cyclical public “womaning” of famous women, using viral reactions to Wicked as a jumping off point.

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Episode Breakdown

1. Introduction: Wicked as Cultural Flashpoint

• Caroline (00:00): Sets the scene with rapid-fire references: everything from Ozempic, Victoria-era medicine, Kardashians, and the BMI to Adderall, tabloid eras, and digital algorithms.
• The Wicked film adaptation becomes a stand-in for larger debates about thinness, representation, and girlhood narratives.
• Explains Wicked's plot: a feminist reimagining centering female friendship and resistance.

  “It is a story that really centers womanhood … the heterosexual love story is really secondary.” (Caroline, 03:08)

2. Wicked’s Reception & Thinness Backlash

• Phenomenal anticipation for the film, historic casting of Cynthia Erivo (first Black Elphaba), Ariana Grande’s dramatic career shift.
• Viral meme culture surrounding the stars and their off-screen friendship.
• Initial acclaim (“hugely celebrated”; 2 Oscars) gave way to obsession: “how thin Ariana Grande was” (13:11), centering physical appearance over performance.

Memorable Moment

• Katie is moved to tears while watching the Defying Gravity scene:

  “I'm mad at you for making me cry at 9am on a Monday.” (Katie, 11:06)

3. “Skinny Apocalypse” Panic: TikTok, Tabloids, and Temporal Language

• Caroline presents a series of viral TikToks and social commentary, each amplifying what’s dubbed the “skinny apocalypse” or “skinny epidemic.”
• Notable Quotes
  • “I knew that movie was pro-anorexia ... when I saw those little glitter things on Ariana's shoulder. Collarbone. What even is that bone?” (Viral TikTok, 16:34)
  • Jamila Jamil:

    “It is not body shaming to comment ... why is famine a desired aesthetic again?” (Jamila Jamil, 21:33)

Hosts’ Analysis

• Katie deconstructs the “bone skinny” vs “normal” dichotomy (20:49) and the policing of women’s bodies.
• Critique of concern trolling under the guise of “public health” and exhortations not to “normalize” thinness.
• Viral before-and-after celebrity montages—per specialists, the single worst way to discuss eating disorders online.

Key Insight

These viral videos and thinkpieces create a manufactured sense of abrupt, crisis-level cultural shift—when in fact, as Caroline uncovers, skinny culture never went away.

4. The “Body Positivity” Era: Myth vs Reality

Timestamps:

• Body Positivity Movement: 29:00–45:00
  • Katie recalls Dove campaigns but notes the beauty ideal never changed (31:25).
  • Caroline’s research: High fashion and media never truly diversified; even at the “peak,” representation of size 14+ women was 2–5% (40:07).
  • Quote: “If I had just seen this [Vogue cover] in the wild, I'd be like, there are three models. Pretty thin.” (Katie, 37:20)
• Most so-called “body positive” milestones are surface-level, driven by capitalist logic, not legislative change.
• Fat activism: Distinct from body positivity—demands legal protections, not just visibility.
• Fat activists’ take: If all we’re worried about are “Ozempic bodies” in pop culture, we’re missing the point.

5. The Anorexia Myth: Science, Stigma, and Systemic Errors

Timestamps:

• Eating Disorders Deep Dive: 57:00–79:00

  • Modern science finds genetic and chemical roots (“biopsychosocial”)—NOT primarily caused by vanity or celebrity images.
  • Suffering is based on control, perfectionism, and not appearance per se; disordered eating can be driven by trauma, loss of control, or social transition.

• Revelation:

  • For decades, anorexia clinical studies only included emaciated, menstruating (therefore, not fat and not men) girls—a systemic diagnostic failure (79:03).
  • Men and higher-weight individuals with identical symptoms are ignored/misdiagnosed. Eating disorders exist across all genders and sizes.
  • Access to treatment is rare, skewed toward privileged demographics.

Quote

“If social media were to disappear and actresses were no longer to exist, we would probably still have 95% of our eating disorder clients.” (Caroline paraphrasing an expert, 73:15)

6. The “Womaning” of Ariana Grande & the Morality Policing of Women

Timestamps:

• Feminist theory of “womaning” (Rain Fisher Kwan, 86:45)

  • Public turns on female celebrities in observable cycles: adoration → oversaturation → vilification → (sometimes) redemption.
  • This process is couched in new, "woke" language but echoes tabloid misogyny—just with self-care and “role model” discourses.

• Only women are expected to be morally flawless in public; mistakes or simply body changes become massive cultural referenda.

Quote:

“The ideal public facing woman is a product with planned obsolescence.” (Rain Fisher Kwan, 105:22)

• The “God’s police” concept: societal expectation that women regulate morality for themselves and others; men get to be “just people.”

• Jennifer Lawrence clip:

  “It's really easy to hate women viciously … it's almost like we have this ire in us that specifically there's like an extra pocket for it.” (95:56)

7. Wicked as a Case Study: Beneath the Social Justice Rhetoric

• Wicked presents two powerful, unmarried, childless women with immense talent and ambition supporting each other—leading to a cultural need to “punish” or destroy them (“womaning”).
• Ariana Grande: Public is furious not just about her body, but any possible imperfection, past relationship, or public statement—even speculating she caused other actresses’ alleged disorders.
• This cycle is intensified by social media, but its root is much older—cultural anxiety over women with power and visibility on their own terms.

Critical Insight

• Hosts argue that “concern” over celebrity weight or health is almost never about systemic change or genuine care for others, but is about reinforcing status quo controls over women’s bodies.

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Key Quotes & Timestamps

• “Bone skinny is where we now have a problem.”
  – Katie (20:43)
• “Body positivity was a movement defined by visibility. Fat liberation is a movement with specific demands.”
  – Caroline (44:36)
• “If body positivity isn’t for fat people, who is it for?”
  – Aubrey Gordon (52:56)
• “Biopsychosocial … combination of factors ... it might be your biology that impacts how you respond to those triggers.”
  – Caroline (64:13)
• “Men get to be people. Women are role models.”
  – Caroline (95:24)
• “When women do it, they are disqualified for what they have accomplished because of that fact.”
  – Caroline (109:19)
• “You can be talented, but you also have to be good in order for us to celebrate and approve of you… that’s gonna stick with me for a long time.”
  – Katie (112:04)

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Timestamps for Major Segments

| Segment | Approximate Timestamp | |---------------------------------------|----------------------| | Intro, Wicked, Wicked’s cultural reach| 00:00–11:59 | | Defying Gravity, emotion of performance| 09:30–13:11 | | Thinness discourse & TikToks | 16:12–27:49 | | Body positivity history & visibility | 30:08–45:01 | | The science behind anorexia | 57:36–84:39 | | Feminist “womaning” theory | 86:45–99:39 | | The moral double standard | 99:39–109:19 | | Conclusion: moving beyond “role model”| 112:33–End |

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Takeaways

• The “skinny apocalypse” narrative is a panic driven by privileged voices and is not substantiated by real shifts in representation or health outcomes.
• The body positivity movement, as implemented by media and commerce, was always surface-level, rarely translating into legal or cultural change for truly marginalized bodies.
• Modern eating disorder science debunks the notion that seeing thin celebrities “causes” anorexia—these are serious, multi-factorial, frequently inherited conditions.
• “Womaning”—the ritualistic, public teardown of famous women—is society’s method of maintaining patriarchal boundaries, no matter how much “progressive” language is used.
• The conversational policing of women’s bodies and health posing as social justice is simply old misogyny in new wrapping.
• A call for genuine trauma-informed, non-judgmental conversation about bodies—directed away from obsessive celebrity concern and toward actual systemic support and equity.

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In Their Own Words:

• Caroline (summarizing):

  “Not because we're rapidly backsliding from a world where young girls knew what healthy bodies look like. Because we never actually had that. We need to do it because we need to destroy her reputation and we need to use her as a warning for other women who dare to succeed to the extent that Ariana Grande has succeeded.” (106:44)

• Katie (reflecting):

  “You can be talented, but you also have to be good in order for us to celebrate and approve you. And that’s gonna stick with me for a long time.” (112:04)

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Memorable Moments

• Katie crying over Defying Gravity, confronting her own assumptions about pop culture and musical theatre.
• Hosts’ astonishment at the complete disconnect between visible “body positivity” and actual change for fat people.
• A “lifetime-comp” worthy listener comment on the transcendent, sexless control that anorexia can manifest (66:56).
• The sharp, self-reflective conclusion: Both hosts own up to having “womaned” female celebs in the past, and urge a more humble, trauma-informed way forward.

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Closing Insight

The persistent policing and punishment of women’s bodies in Hollywood and beyond is not a sign of cultural regression or simply an individual failing—it’s a byproduct of an enduring social logic that rewards control, punishes female ambition, and disguises ancient misogynies in ever-evolving progressive language.
True progress, the hosts argue, lies in ending the relentless scrutiny of women’s bodies, rejecting the “role model” trap, and advocating for meaningful, structural support for all those affected by body image and eating disorders.

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For further engagement and trauma-informed commentary, visit www.diabolicalliespod.com

Transcript

[Caroline]

Today's episode of Diabolical Lies is brought to you by Wicked. Heroin, cocaine, cigarettes, liposuction, Ozempic, Adderall, flat tummy tea, a 19th century British physician named William Gull, the Kardashians during their fat ass phase, The Kardashians during their assless stage, the tabloid era, as well as the algorithmic era, and last but not least, the bmi. Katie, Today we are going to take the Homer's odyssey of journeys. We are going to be talking about the history of the body positivity move. We're gonna be doing a deep dive on the cultural myths we have around eating disorders. We're gonna talk about Wicked and Ozempic and thinness and what it means and how we talk about it and why that matters. And like all great journeys, ours begins with a yellow brick road.

[Katie]

With doing heroin?

[Caroline]

No, with wordplay. With musical wordplay. First, Katie, some housekeeping before we get started. Merch.

[Katie]

Oh, that's my part. Yeah, that's my part.

[Caroline]

That's your part.

[Katie]

So we just dropped our debut merch, which you already know if you subscribe Diabolical Lies on substack, which you should, but it is. And I'm just going to toot our own horns here. It turned out beautifully. So we will link the URL for our store in the show notes so you can see it. And paid subscribers, you all have a super secret special password that is going to allow you to access merch items that are only available to you. So anything else we want to say about that?

[Caroline]

Just as a reminder, we're also committing redistributions to merch as well. And so 33% of net profit will go towards feeding America for this merch haul.

[Katie]

Beautiful.

[Caroline]

Great. All right, Katie, what do you know about Wicked?

[Katie]

I know it was, like, the favorite musical of all the most annoying kids I was in theater camp with.

[Caroline]

Were you in theater camp?

[Katie]

Oh, we've been over this. Yes, I was in Drama Club, my debut role as Charlie in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and then later as orphan number seven in Annie.

[Caroline]

And you had never seen Wicked. So you were a theater kid, but you didn't get into Wicked?

[Katie]

I am familiar with Defying Gravity, and I know it makes the theater kids go wild, but no, I've never seen Wicked. I know that it was basically the musical theater cinematic experience equivalent of Barbie this past, like, year or two.

[Caroline]

That's a great reference.

[Katie]

And you could not escape the merchandise. There was green and pink everywhere.

[Caroline]

Yeah, like Wicked. I did see Barbie. Do you know what the plot of Wicked is. Can you describe it to me or do you want me to summarize it for you?

[Katie]

So really, all I know about it is that isn't it like a flip on the wizard of Oz? Oh, it's a prequel. Okay.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

And it tells the story of the witch, right?

[Caroline]

Yeah. It's a reimagining of how the Wicked Witch of the west came to become the Wicked Witch of the West. In this story, she is the protagonist. And so the two main characters of Wicked are Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the west, and. And Glinda, the Good Witch. And so there is this kind of reimagining for how the story that everyone knows, the wizard of Oz, came to be. So Wicked was originally written as a novel, then it was adapted to become a musical. It is wildly different as a musical than what it was as the original format. They took a lot of liberties, and it quickly became one of the most famous and beloved Broadway shows of all time. So the thing that I find really interesting about this show is that the plot is ostensibly about a city, the city of Oz, falling under fascism, and the diverging roads that these two women, Elphaba and Glinda, take to deal with these circumstances. Right. But really, I think the reason why this show became so beloved is that it is a story that really centers womanhood. There is a heterosexual love story in it, but it's really secondary. It's secondary to the story of these two friends who are coming into their power as women. And some have also argued that it's kind of a queer love story between Glinda and Elphaba. There's like a gala world for Wicked.

[Katie]

Oh, love.

[Caroline]

So when it was announced that Wicked was going to become a film, there was obviously very, very high expectations. It's very hard to convert a musical into a film and to retain support from the fandom and to retain any sort of critical adoration. And it's notable that in this film, the person who played Elphaba was Cynthia Erivo, who was kind of like a niche, very respected singer, but who I would describe as Indy. She was not a household name, and she was notably going to become the first black woman to ever fill the part of Elphaba. It's pretty interesting when you consider the symbolism of Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the west, as a woman who is judged by her skin color. She is born green, and that is a very central part of her character. When you think that she is kind of presumed to be all these terrible things by people who don't ever take the moment to understand her. It was an incredibly meaningful decision for them to make. Elphaba, Woman of color. Then they announced that Ariana Grande was gonna become Glinda the Good Witch. So this immediately becomes this like massive, massive anticipation for a cinematic experience. Right. The fandom is decades deep. It's multi generational. There was so much anticipation. And so when part one came out last year, so December 2024, I went to see it and I became very interested in it because I was kind of struck by the level of talent of these two main stars. I was bowled over by what a career pivot Ariana GR had made. I think I had kind of understood her as like the seven Rings kind of run. She incredible singer. And all of a sudden she had taken this turn as like an Oscar nominated actress.

[Katie]

Pete Davidson's coolest girlfriend.

[Caroline]

Exactly. Which.

[Katie]

Wait, by the way, have you seen the memes of. It's like someone is like photoshopped Erica Kirk with Pete Davidson.

[Caroline]

Wait, what? I don't even understand what that means. I feel like my brain is.

[Katie]

Oh, it's just a joke that like anytime like a famous marriage breaks up, it's like the next thing you see is like that woman with Pete Davidson like walking down the street.

[Caroline]

I thought you meant that someone had.

[Katie]

Nevermind.

[Caroline]

I was imagining Erica Kirk's face on Pete Davidson's body and I was like, what's happening to me?

[Katie]

JD Vance in the background, just stewing.

[Caroline]

So anyways, I liked the movie and I started to pay attention to the reception and it seemed that the franchise had done what no one thought it could do, which is basically win over the fandom. It was hugely celebrated. It was nominated and ended up winning, I think two Oscars. It was a commercial success. It was a relative critical success. And I was really, really interested in particular in how Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo, who play the two main characters presented off screen. And you sort of started to have this mirroring of the story where you have a story about two very different women who step into the center of their powers and who retain a friendship in spite of like the odds. And then you see that happening in real life, right? You're watching this off screen friends kind of mirror the on screen one.

[Katie]

Is this the meme where like Ariana's like holding her nail?

[Caroline]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. There were. So it became very meme worthy. It was all over the place. Like they were in so many interviews. Everyone thought they were very cheesy, but it was relatively saccharine and I think low stakes. And so I want to pause here before we get into the backlash to Wicked, which is why we are here today. We're going to pause and we're going to watch the Defying Gravity scene. So just so you understand, this is at the end of part one of the musical. So this is like before the intermission. This is the end of the first movie. And this is largely believed to be like the emotional peak of the whole story. Right. Like a lot of people have have been critical saying the second half is nowhere near as good. Because Defying Gravity just has such emotional thrust. And I really want you to see like the performance that these two women did. It's notable they performed live. So for every scene they were singing live. And I think you can really feel that. And so I want us to stop here and like have a sense for who we're talking about as like a foundational understanding for the rest of this convers for the audience. I'm not gonna make you listen to the whole 15 minute scene, so I'm gonna play you the two minute Oscars version. But I want Katie to watch the whole one. So.

[Katie]

Okay. You know, I have to say that I do think I will consider Diabolical Lies as a project, a failure if at some point there is not a gaylor sub niche universe for us.

[Caroline]

Oh my God, our relationship is so homoerotic. I was thinking about that the other day. Okay, so all you need to really know for this scene is this is basically the moment where Elphaba and Glinda realize that their paths are diverging for how they're going to deal with this fascist regime. Elphaba is going to lean into being the Wicked Witch of the West. Glinda wants to work within the institutions. She's like a liberal feminist. Oh, Glinda is a liberal feminist. And Elphaba is like a Marxist revolutionary concave.

[Katie]

And Elphaba is like diabolicalized, 100% unlimited.

[Caroline]

Live together we're unlimited together we'll be the greatest team there's ever been Gl dreams the way we planned on if we work in tandem there's no fight we cannot win Just you and I Define B with you and defining gravity they'll never bring us down.

[Katie]

So if you care to find me out to the western sky has someone told me lately Everyone deserves a chance

[Caroline]

to fly and if I'm flying so long at least I'm flying free to those who ground me Take a message back from me

[Katie]

Tell them how I

[Caroline]

am defying gravity I'M flying. Had nobody in all of us. No wizard that there is or was is ever gonna bring me.

[Katie]

Jesus Christ. Oh, my God.

[Caroline]

Okay, good. Are you crying? A little bit?

[Katie]

You should be. Yes. God. And I'm mad at you for making me Cry at 9am on a Monday.

[Caroline]

Katie Riley and I were sobbing. I cannot watch that without crying.

[Katie]

First of all, Ariana. What the fuck? Why aren't you going with her? Are you kidding me?

[Caroline]

No. She's gonna do incremental change over time inside of the system.

[Katie]

We're gonna start with. With. With Ariana Grande's Chuck for you to buy private insurance.

[Caroline]

Ariana Grande is like. Have you considered a child tax credit?

[Katie]

Yeah. Wow. Just. Yeah. That was really powerful. God, what talent, too. Like, her voice is so piercing. I mean, the moment that kind of like I've felt myself actually, like, really tearing up was when she saw herself as a little girl.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

I was like, oh, my God.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

And I think the speech about the. The green skin being like an outward. What did she say?

[Caroline]

Like, manifestation of the wickedness within.

[Katie]

Yes. And I was like, oh, my God. That is just.

[Caroline]

And it's kind of shocking we haven't had a black Elphaba. Do you know what I mean? When you think about how on the nose it is. Yeah. I really wanted you to see it because I think. I don't think you do this, but I think generally speaking, girly things or musical things or stories about women are often seen as flippant. And I think in particular, you have to see Ariana Grande act to know that she's capable of that. And I know she was a Disney star, but I was bowled over by her acting and of course by Cynthia Erivos. And so it was important to me to ground that. And, like, this was the level of performance that was taking place in Wicked. These women are some of the best living singers we have. And they delivered an incredible acting performance. And there was so much effort put into this film. What you're dealing with is people at the height of their profession.

[Katie]

Yeah, People at the height of their profession telling a very poignant and relevant story that is kind of trying to answer, like, the question of our times. Like, how do we move forward right now?

[Caroline]

And there isn't a simple notion of good versus evil, which I thought was really nice. Like Glinda and Elphaba kind of represent that. Right. Like Elphaba chases truth and is punished for it. And Glinda kind of is. Becomes symbolic for goodness, but actually is a little bit of a coward but they're very complex characters, and I think a lot of that is just communicated in their facial expressions and in their love for each other. And so I was really impressed by it as a movie, and I was really moved by it. And so I was paying attention to the response to this film, and I was really interested to see the response to the part two of this film. So when the first film came out, in addition to the critical success and the massive commercial box office sales, there were two cultural conversations that immediately began to creep around the edges. Number one was how thin Ariana Grande was. And then one had to do with her friendship to Cynthia Erivo. Pretty much immediately, people were like, it's too much. It's over the top. They're weirdly sentimental. They're holding little each other's fingernails. They're so gushy, they cry in every interview. Which, like, tell me you've never been to theater camp without telling me you've never been to theater camp. Katie, you can.

[Katie]

I'm like, yeah, guys, that's just part for the course.

[Caroline]

Okay, I have never been to theater camp, but I do dabble in theater camp, TikTok. So I like to think I'm an ally.

[Katie]

Yeah, I mean, dramaturgically it works is all I'll say.

[Caroline]

So then part two comes out this fall, and these side conversations essentially threaten to overtake the film altogether. I think it doesn't help that part two is just generally not considered to be as good as part one, even in the Broadway consideration. But almost immediately, there was a fixation on the three most prominent main stars of Wicked, which is Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba, Ariana Grande as Glinda, and then Michelle Yeoh as Madame Morrible. And so all three of these women were noticeably very thin. They had all visibly lost weight in recent years in slightly varying timelines, but it was pretty stark when you looked at them all together, for example, at the movie premiere. And so that's why we're here today. I wanted to look at a conversation that was taking place online at a decibel level that was kind of overwhelming to me.

[Katie]

And.

[Caroline]

And I wanted to understand why it felt so familiar to me, and I want to understand why it feels so uncanny to me. To understand how this conversation takes place, I think we have to first address the elephant in the room with these conversations about women's bodies that you and I have all the time, which is like, yeah, of course you can talk about women. You and I talk about women all the time. On Diabolical Lies. But something that is used almost as like a defense mechanism for what these people are saying about these famous women's bodies is. Don't tell me we can't talk about women. That's like pseudo feminist crap. We have to talk about women to protect other women. And saying we can't talk about women's bodies, it feels like the spiritual equivalent to like, does Israel have the right to exist? It's like, babe, it does exist. Like, you are having the conversation. So it's like, I don't want to make the impression that I don't know if we should be talking about women's bodies. What I'm interested is not whether we should or not. It's how we talk about them and what this current conversation tells us about ourselves. So, Katie, I'm going to show you some of the most viral tiktoks that have spread around this online conversation. Ooh.

[Katie]

Okay.

[Caroline]

And we're just gonna go through them one by one. So this first one has 7 million views and 600,000 likes.

[Katie]

Holy smokes. Okay. I saw it as the search on someone's video, but the moment that I

[Caroline]

knew that that movie was pro anorexia, regardless of your ass opinions because you're

[Katie]

obsessed with Ariana Grande or you're a wicked gal, I don't care.

[Caroline]

Was when I saw those little glitter things on Ariana's shoulder. Collarbone.

[Jennifer Lawrence]

What even.

[Caroline]

What even is that bone? Tbh. I don't know.

[Katie]

Because no one is skinny enough to have it pointing out that much.

[Caroline]

What the hell was that?

[Katie]

But you're gonna tell me of all the accents you could do of any

[Caroline]

of the huge necklaces, you could adorn

[Katie]

her with the hair shimmer, you could put on the makeup.

[Caroline]

You can achieve the dress.

[Katie]

You can glamorize. You're like, let me decorate these weird little bones right here.

[Caroline]

This TikTok is in regard to Glinda had little, like, bedazzly gems all over her.

[Katie]

I think I found what she's talking about. Shoulder gem detail. Oh, okay. So it's. It's actually in the movie.

[Caroline]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Katie]

Okay, so, yeah, so it looks like there are little rhinestone. Almost like the way that when you're a kid and you have the, like, stick on earrings that kind of look like that. And I mean, from what I can tell, and I'm trying to be fair here, I wouldn't say they're on a bone. They really are just like on the tops of her shoulders. She is a very thin woman, but I. I don't Necessarily see what this person is.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

Talking about.

[Caroline]

This person, I should note, has 1200 followers. So clearly what she was talking about was good for the algorithm. If you've got like a thousand followers and you get a 7 million view video, you are doing something that people want to hear, essentially. She also, I thought it was really not. Is like white and thin herself. And most of her videos on TikTok are her running and videotaping herself running and being fit. Interesting so far. Wicked is pro anorexia. That's pretty abrupt. Let's go to the next one.

[Jamila Jamil]

Okay, I'm not trying to body shame when I say this. I'm not trying to come for anyone's looks directly when I say this. Why is it so normal now to be so sickly skinny? It is like, mainstream. Like, every celebrity that I haven't seen in a year, I see, and they're bone skinny and it's like, normal to be able to count their ribs. How is this healthy in today's society? Like, I feel so scared for the girls that are like 13, 14, 15 growing up seeing their favorite celebrities and they're all bone skinny. Like, why is this the new thing to be achieved or to want? Like, do we not want long, thick, healthy hair? Do we not want muscle mass? Do we not want to be able to have kids someday? Why is this normalized? I hate this. I would not want a kid growing up in this. And I think it's so important to know that like, like, normal people don't look like that and eat real food and regular food and don't do, like, it's just so, like, why is that okay, now? Why is everyone getting bones skinny again? Why is being who you are and the healthiest version of yourself not the best trend? Like, I hope you know, when you see all that stuff, like, do not look at it and think that is something to be achieved because it's not. To be achieved is something that's long, thick, healthy hair. Being healthy, being able to hike, being able to move, being able to weightlift, being able to pick up your kids one day. Why is this so normalized? I hate it. It's not normal. And that's my 2 cents on it. I don't really give my opinion that much, but I just feel we need to talk about it because real people get affected by this stuff. It's not normal.

[Caroline]

Katie, before you give me your thoughts, can you just tell me what that woman looked like?

[Katie]

She had like a glossy blonde blowout.

[Caroline]

Blowout. She was stunning.

[Katie]

Blow tall and Thin and kind of hunched over a counter.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

And I was kind of like looking at the outfit because I was just curious. And she was wearing like low rise jeans and was you? I mean, she was a thin woman too. I don't necessarily love to do that thing because it kind of reminds me of when we talk about Marxism and people are like, man, two, rich women talking about Marx. It's such like low hanging fruit. But what jumped out at me about that were a couple of things. One, the assertion that like normal people don't look like that, that's not a normal body. That to me is a really big red flag if there's any particular body type that we are assigning to as normal. And I think the phrase that was being repeated over and over again was bone skinny. That's really, really interesting because the undertone of that comment is that regular skinny is good, skinny is normal. Bone skinny is where we now have a problem.

[Caroline]

Right. It's like you don't want to be dishwater blonde, but you do want to be dirty blonde or honey blonde.

[Katie]

Cookie butter brawn, if you will.

[Caroline]

Is that a thing? Wow.

[Katie]

Yeah, it's a thing. Are you kidding? Oh, you're not on cookie butter brown TikTok. All right. Also, she mentioned long thick hair twice. I was like, babe, there's a lot of normative assumptions being made about what a normal body looks like. In many ways, that sort of discourse and policing of what people's bodies look like is just as, if not more harmful than only ever seeing people that are extremely thin.

[Caroline]

All right, so we're going on to the next one. Do you know Jamila Jamil?

[Katie]

Yes. From the Good Place, right?

[Caroline]

Yes. So she talked about this. So we're gonna watch her tick tock next.

[Jamila Jamil]

It is not body shaming to comment on the fact that there is a rapid rise of the aesthetic that they may see in amongst women in Hollywood. Women in their 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s even, all of a sudden becoming so thin that you can see their ribs, you can see their hip bones jutting out their arms. You can see the kind of bone and muscle. No one's saying, oh, they look disgusting. Oh, this is so foul to look at. It's unsexy. That would be body shaming. But we are are commenting on it for is because it's so widespread, it's so extreme, it's happened so fast. And the question is, who is pushing this aesthetic? Why are so many women falling in line by so many feminists who understand the damage of pushing this aesthetic? Participating it and wearing clothing that accentuates how skeletal they are becoming. Why is this a conversation we're not allowed to. Allowed to have? What happened to the movement of women being allowed to eat and accept their bodies and accept growing older? What's going on? Why is famine a desired aesthetic again? Now, some people are born tiny and frail and fragile, but these are people who weren't tiny and frail and fragile before. They were all small. Almost all of them were already small, very small, more, but none of them this frail looking. And it's come along at a time of rise of conservatism. It's come along at a time where people have literally got less access to food on mass.

[Katie]

Not these people.

[Jamila Jamil]

These people are millionaires. They've got plenty of access to healthy food. And it's very sad that they're choosing not to eat. I'm incredibly worried about my peers. Every event I go to, genuinely when I have hug people it feels like they're going to snap in my hands and it makes me scared for them because osteoporosis is real and these people are of an age where they're not eating enough calories, where their body's going to look for that energy in their muscle and in their bone tissue, you know, their bone marrows and developing, you know, osteopenia, which is the precursor to osteoporosis. Some of them are old enough that they're actually developing osteoporosis. They're going to have to a slight fall and break a hip, break a leg and then be taken out for months and months and months at a time. This stuff is really, really serious and it's being so hyper normalized. And it's okay for us to say that this feels very discombobulating.

[Caroline]

Okay, so we'll stop there. Any thoughts?

[Katie]

Sorry. I'm laughing because it looks like she. It looks like she's been like kidnapped. She's like in the back of a dark car that's like thumping along like a very. Okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Yeah, you know what, I'm not gonna like pretend to be obtuse here. I understand the argument that is being made and I think that there's certainly like an element of truth to situating this body trend within the broader context of our sociopolitical moment and similarly to how I think trad wives kind of felt like a precursor or an omen for what was coming and a shift that had already happened. I understand that we're to the physical world to tell us Things about that moment that we are in. However, I think when I sit back and reflect on the work of people like Jessica Defino and what she has said about the other sorts of body modification that all this time have been considered fine and empowering and wonderful, like Botox and filler and what have you. You can't really embrace that philosophy in one arena. The faith. And then below the neck say that that's all off limits. I feel there's a lot of cognitive dissonance between the emphasis on health and nourishment and what is quote unquote normal for the body below the neck, but then a completely different approach and perspective for the face.

[Caroline]

Yeah, that's an interesting point. Pay attention to how these people are creating a sort of temporal language that establishes a foundation of urgency. Things are changing. These women are shrinking. There is a sense of urgency that is established by claiming that we are in a changing moment and that if we don't do something more women will shrink.

[Katie]

Something must be done.

[Caroline]

Yeah, I also came across a post by this food influencer with a million followers. Again, a very thin, white blonde woman who is delivering this message. And her caption said, quote me with a loss for words, seeing all the celebrities and influencers becoming dangerously thin. She said, I'm shocked that we're back here. So again, that temporal language. She said, I'm shocked to see media companies support and promote them on tv. It's heartbreaking and dangerous. End quote. So like, you have this back and forth with all these videos and posts between fixating on a handful of people, primarily the Wicked co stars as well as three or four other A list women whose names are constantly referenced in the comments and fixating on what appears to be this sudden epidem. You see some people calling it the skinny apocalypse, some people calling it a skinny epidemic, and all of it is happening right now. Suddenly there is a clear positioning of we are at the end of one movement and the beginning of another and this new generation might see these bodies and think that's normal and we don't want that.

[Katie]

I think the temporal thing is really smart. I had not picked up on that, but what I did pick up on was something that felt like the reverse of what Aubrey Gordon will talk about sometimes, which is concern trolling. Like the focus on like osteoporosis and like, well, you need to be lifting weights and getting enough, like all of that is true. You, you do need to have enough caloric intake and you know, use your bones if you want them to last a Long time. That's not wrong. But I have a level of, I guess, skepticism around that point being employed in this particular context. As if we are so nervous about these Hollywood actresses were so scared for their health.

[Caroline]

So the final video, which was just taken down yesterday, probably because it violated TikTok's community guidelines, has 80 million views and 8 million likes. It was set to the soundtrack of Adele's Skyfall. And it was just before and after pictures of the main stars of Wicked, showing Ariana Grande when she was heavier, showing her when she was super thin, showing Cynthia Rivio when she was heavier, showing her when she was super thin. To be clear, all of these women have been very thin their whole lives. But basically it's before and after pictures, which is essentially the one thing any specialist will tell you not to do is show before and after pictures. That is like a number one. No, no. In talking about eating disorders online, you don't show body pictures, and you certainly never show before and after pictures. So again, 80 million views, 8 million likes. So to summarize the arguments that are being made online in articles at, like, prestige publications, in podcasts, in newsletters, there was once a time when we celebrated health and strength and diversity of bodies, and that was the body positivity movement. Yeah. And that was recent and that has apparently ended. Number two, the rise of conservatism is what is fueling the return of skinny culture. Number three, these famous people are starving themselves intentionally and they are bad role models to young women and we should not see them on the screen. So I view this as, like, a spiritual part due to your Liv Schmidt Skinny Talk episode. And I think that that conversation was a more aer understanding of, like, the history and the future of our relationship to thinness, like, where it comes from and how we kind of move towards achieving body liberation. And I think this conversation is framed more squarely in the now. Like, how do you live in a world that is not going to be liberated anytime soon? So here are some of the questions that I want us to be thinking about moving forward. How do we talk about celebrity weight loss? Is there any value in it? What is that value? What was the body positivity movement? What was the output of that movement? What caused that period to end? How do eating disorders factor into this? What causes eating disorders to begin with? And why did all of this culminate with the premiere of Wicked Part 2? I just want a really light topic for people to listen to while they're holiday shopping. So, Katie, what is your. What's Your understanding of the body positivity movement. You and I were both like in our teens and twenties for this time period. So what do you remember of it?

[Katie]

The symbolic representation of the body positivity movement was those dove real beauty campaigns where it was like, suddenly we were seeing the presence of people who were not able bodied, thin, white, blonde women in advertising. I know that there are people who are like fat activists who would be like, no, it was so much more than that. Similarly to how I think feminist activists will be like, no, the pop feminism of like lean in the 2010, that. That was not the feminist movement. Like the real feminist movement has been working all along and it exists outside of these corporate boardrooms. So granting that, I think the way that I experienced the body positivity movement was primarily through advertising and like the commercial messaging from brands. I think the limitations that I always saw or felt in the way that I experienced that time was that the capital B, capital S. That's ironic. Beauty standard never really changed. There was never a time that I have experienced in life culturally where, like, it was not considered preferable to be thin, where there was not a serious taboo or stigma against fat people.

[Caroline]

So you weren't briefly liberated from your shackles in like 2017?

[Katie]

No, certainly not. There are just certain, like, cultural beauty trends that I don't think ever really went out of vogue. And I think at every step that you saw any push against those things, they were always met with severe backlash. Like when Victoria's Secret started having models in their shows that weren't size triple zero. You would not want to read the comments on an article about that show. Like, and it. I don't feel like the culture ever really shifted, I guess.

[Caroline]

No, it didn't. And I will note that fat activists don't either. So you mentioned that fat activists think the body positivity movement was more than it was. I'll give a little spoiler which was it was fat activists who tipped me off to how little the body positivity movement actually was.

[Katie]

Ah, interesting, interesting.

[Caroline]

So what's really interesting is that this conversation again about the wicked stars and about how important it is to talk about thinness and this, this backsliding into skeletivity is grounding it in the body positivity movement. Right. Like we were somewhere healthier. And what I found really interesting as I was starting to take note of how everyone was referencing this is number one, there were never any specifics. There was never any conversation about what it was, what it did, who was front and center there would be like three or four stars mentioned, but that was it. And there wasn't clarity on the timeline. So I had like some gen zers who were referencing it as the early 2000s, which I thought was hysterical. I was like, babe, absolutely not.

[Katie]

General rule, if you don't remember 9 11. Yeah, this is maybe not exactly.

[Caroline]

Exactly. And I would also say there were people who were referencing like the heroin thin Kate Moss phase of the 90s. I would also say it's interesting because plus size fashion was actually born in the 90s and there was this surge of representation that took place in the 90s before dying down in the 2000s again. So you know what?

[Katie]

I think it actually was then Caroline line. This just came to me. I think what it was is that the aesthetic itself, the change in the desirable aesthetic, was barely discernible. What changed was how we talked about it. It went from being, you want to be skinny to you want to be healthy.

[Caroline]

Yes, a hundred percent. There was a lot that changed in the late 2000s and early 2010s. That kind of gave way to the body positivity movement too. So you have this proliferation of social media networks which just generally allowed for a more diverse cast of voices. You also have the crusade of online social justice movements kind of taking off around this time period. And you're totally right. We have the end of diet culture and the rise of self care culture, which were, spoiler alert, the same exact culture cloaked in different colors and different language. It's generally believed that body positivity took place during the latter half of the 2010s. So I'm going to have you read a section from this piece from Rose Stokes, who was a fat writer and columnist who talked about the end of body positivity for the Guardian earlier this summer.

[Katie]

Oh, here you go. Here's the temporal Something is changing. Gone are the days when there was a deluge of messaging that told us to love our bodies no matter their size. When brands were falling over themselves in the who Can Shout Self Love the Loudest Olympics. When Vogue, once a shrine to the skinny, declared three plus size women were the new supers and plastered them on the COVID instead. In a change I'd never have believed possible just two years ago, we have somehow been thrust back into a Nazis level skinny worship culture that is bringing up the same feelings I've been running from since I was a girl. For Alex Light, a British body positive influencer, things had started to change even before the arrival on the mass market in the UK. And US of GLP1 agonist drugs used exclusively via prescription for weight loss. Before this, they were used mainly to treat symptoms of type 2 diabetes, including obesity. Quote. For a while, there were subtle signs. Light said fewer size inclusive launches, less campaign imagery, more brands quietly reducing size ranges, and a shift in which kinds of bodies were getting visibility and praise. But weight loss drugs have made this shift impossible to ignore. The signs are everywhere. Dozens of a list women who were once intentionally or not symbols of what it means to rebel against diet culture are now changing shape dramatically. First Adele, then Rebel Wilson Lizzo, Meghan Trainor, Kelly Clarkson, Serena Williams, Mindy Kaling, and oh my God, this reminds me of. There's some comedian Amy Schumer. Amy Schumer, yes.

[Caroline]

Yeah. She's often referenced in these conversations.

[Katie]

Yeah. Where she posed in a bathing suit on a magazine. And they were like, that is so brave. And she's like, wait, what? Like, that's how I.

[Caroline]

Size 8.

[Katie]

That's how I would feel if someone was like constantly referencing me in this context. I'm like, stop talking about me. Stop talking about my body.

[Caroline]

Can't imagine why these women would lose weight.

[Katie]

Right. Okay. And although some of these attribute their weight loss to strict diet and exercise, others are openly using the jabs. Okay, see, and there's a lot of, like, judgment kind of inherent in this construction. Like, while some are doing it the correct way, others are using the jabs. Plenty of once overweight A listers have been explicit about how much they've benefited from using the jabs. With Robbie Williams calling them a Christmas miracle in a 2023 interview, you others, such as Queer Eyes, Jonathan Van Ness, and Oprah Winfrey, have spoken openly about their use not, they say, in the pursuit of skinniness, but to get to what they feel is a healthier, more comfortable weight.

[Caroline]

She references a Vogue cover shoot with three plus sized women. I'm going to send you that Vogue cover shoot and I want you to describe how plus size these women are.

[Katie]

Oh, good. Okay. I love this game. Oh, my God.

[Caroline]

Body positive, everyone. Oh,

[Katie]

my gosh. This is actually worse than I thought it was going to be. To be completely honest with you, I

[Caroline]

am trying to abide by, like, certain trauma informed guidelines by not talking too much about people's bodies and talking more about the conversation. But, like, it's very important to me that Katie gives a general overview of, like, what bodies we are seeing on this cover as representative of a movement when we care to put about people feeling healthy and safe and free.

[Katie]

Oh, my Gosh, yeah. Here, I'll just. I'll describe it this way. If I had just seen this picture in the wild, I'd be like, there are three models. Pretty thin. There are three models. There are three thin women like Katie.

[Caroline]

I went through every single Vogue cover of the last 20 years, and I found two fat women who have ever graced the COVID One of them, Ashley Graham, was in her final trimester of pregnancy in 2019, which feels kind of notable. And then the other woman was Lizzo in 2020. And that is it.

[Katie]

Yep. I mean, I have read a lot from people who feel all sorts of ways about this, and I think what. What I was thinking of, really, when I was reading that excerpt was the people that I have spoken with who take GLP1s because they want to do exactly what Van Ness and Winfrey describe, which is, I want to get to a weight that feels more comfortable to me. And the construction of that paragraph is like, well, some people are getting thinner through diet and exercise. It just reminds me of what Aubrey and Michael talk about on maintenance phase, which is basically that, like, there is a correct way to be thin and it is suffering.

[Caroline]

Right.

[Katie]

And if you are not suffering, you are doing something wrong and you are taking a shortcut and you are cheating. And I just think that it is such an unfortunate catch 22 to live in a culture where those three women are plus size and to be told you're doing it the wrong way.

[Caroline]

Yeah. So, again, as I was looking through this history of the body positivity movement and this criticism of the apparent loss of the body positivity movement, I was trying to find concrete examples of how this visibility has changed. And one thing I found that was referenced frequently was a Vogue business report about inclusivity on runways. So Vogue and a few other outlets have basically been tracking different metrics over Runway season. So, like, gender, race, body inclusivity, all these kinds of things. So in the 2025 report, Vogue essentially said that the body positivity movement, quote, has lost stream in mainstream culture as the pendulum has swung back to the glamorization of thinness amid the rising use of Ozempic and the subsequent shrinking of celebrities and influencers. And so I was like, okay, they have evidence that this has shrunk. Katie, do you want to guess what the peak of body inclusivity was in the form of. Of any representation of plus size models, meaning anyone a size 14 or over on runways at the peak of representation. Do you want to guess what percentage there was?

[Katie]

5.2percent? Oh, my gosh.

[Caroline]

In the spring fashion months in 2020 and 2022, these were the most body inclusive on record. Okay. And so across the New York runways, the Milan runways, the Paris runways, and the London runways, ways for women who were a size 14 or larger, less than 2% total, that was 86 women across four countries. Half of those women were in New York. And the majority of those 48 women in New York were in three brands. Tommy Hilfiger, Christian Seriano and Chromat.

[Katie]

I'm struck too by like even just the premise of where we are looking for representation.

[Caroline]

Sure.

[Katie]

High fashion Runway shows. I would think that if you're going to really try to quantitatively study how the beauty standard has changed, you would look at pop stars, you would look at streaming services, and like, who is being represented in popular television shows and more mainstream elements of culture.

[Caroline]

I do think fashion trends as translated from high Runway fashion is relevant to the conversation. But I do agree with your point and I looked into those elements of culture as well. The biggest body positivity example, I would say in terms of 2010's zeitgeist, visibility for music would probably be Lizzo and just her presence in the industry. And then for television, I think there were a number of television shows like Girls and Shrill and Somebody Somewhere, all great shows that featured both like fat and straight sized bodies in a way that weren't considered the norm for television. And I don't want to say that was nothing. It was definitionally something. But number one, this was also during the golden age of the streaming era. So there were a lot of niche projects that were greenlit because there was so much money in Hollywood at the time. And that money has since dried up, up. And number two, the question, even with shows like Girls, is what percentage of television representation was that even to begin with and what does that visibility lead to? And unfortunately, the answer to both of these questions is really not that positive. I spoke to a few different fat activists about the body positive movement. And generally speaking, fat activists are very negative about the body positivity movement.

[Katie]

Interesting.

[Caroline]

Because it was a movement defined by visibility. I talked to Virginia Soul Smith and something she said that kind of struck with me is like, the message of body positivity was that fat women deserve to be able to buy string bikinis too. It was about commerce. Right. It was about like, oh, great. Khloe Kardashian started a jeans line that fits women of bigger bodies. And like, great. I mean, I think everyone should be able to buy jeans, but visibility only Works as a strategy if the visibility in question is leading you down a road that is defined by like legislative change. Right, right.

[Katie]

Huh. Okay.

[Caroline]

So another way that I wanted to determine visibility with body positivity. So even defined by its own standards, was it successful? Is the Met Gala. That is where you see pop stars. That is where you see famous actresses. That is basically each year you get a collection of the people who are perceived to be the greatest taste makers of each year across the board. Right. And so I thought this will be a good representation of like the zeitgeist of each year. First of all, I saw some incredible outfits that are really dated now. Taylor Swift used to really rock the Mech Galaxy Gala. I went through every single photo on Vogue's Met gala's archives since 2010.

[Katie]

Everyone, I just need you to know that Caroline has been working on this episode for a month. 150 hours of work went into this Google Doc.

[Caroline]

This is my rise and fall of capitalism. But again, I wanted to get an idea of like we. We reference the same five people, right? We referenced Mindy Kaling and Amy Schumer. And I don't want to deny that they might make someone feel seen.

[Katie]

And Lizzo.

[Caroline]

And Lizzo's like, stop fucking talking about my Lizzo. At the most, Katie, for each archived year there are probably between 100 and 150 pictures. So we're looking through a few thousand pictures from 2010. I would say that I counted two dozen bodies, non pregnant bodies that were over a size 8. I would say the rest of them were probably a size 0. They looked identical to me to the co stars of. Of Wicked. So. And I don't say that facetiously. I, I think that they looked like. It was hard for me to tell the difference in terms of, of what Jamila Jamil would call skeletal. Like this is just kind of the visuals when we talk about the fat activist movement, that also is a movement. The fat liberation movement is a very distinct movement from body positivity and it has nothing to do with bodies. So I talked to Virginia about this and I was like, would you say that body neutrality is a term that is kind of synonymous with fat activism? And she was like, no, we don't care about how you feel about your body at all.

[Katie]

Oh, okay.

[Caroline]

Fat liberation is a movement with roots in the 90s with black activists, queer activists, disabled activists. And it has specific demands. Right. And the primary goal is to outlaw discrimination based on weight. So from employment to housing to public accommodation, it's completely distinct from Body positivity because it has very specific demands, and those demands were not even remotely encapsulated in the body positive movement.

[Katie]

Interesting. Well, and. And I'm just thinking about. About how fat discrimination in the workplace is so real today. I think it's. I mean, it's crazy. There is, like, a larger wage premium from being thin than from having a master's degree for women.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

Clearly this is something that is, like, very necessary. But, yeah, it's interesting to think about the. The specific policy demands that. I'm just thinking of what our friend Helen Andrews would say. These specific policy demands that were completely absent from, like, the. I want to see somebody who has the same body type as I do in, like, the Old Navy advertisements.

[Caroline]

Right. I was also interested to learn that a lot of fat activists display a lot of ambivalence around these conversations around Ozempics. You see, like, a lot of these, like, thin, beautiful, blonde women being like, ozempic is taking away representation. But when you talk to a lot of fat activists, something that they will say is, like, if you are fixating on visibility, if your anger about GLP1s has to do with how they are changing visibility as it pertains to bodies, then you are kind of, again, missing the point. Like, again, I think the goal would be access, and then the goal would be equity under the law, regardless of your weight, regardless of what medications of that you're on, regardless of how much weight you lose from Ozempic. And I would also say, I'm sure you know this, Katie, there is this fixation on GLP1s in this conversation as them kind of fueling this return to skinny culture. But I think that that kind of presents a vision of GLP1s that is not really true to scale. Like, clinical trials suggest you can lose 25% of your body weight, but real world settings suggest the number is way lower. Like 10 or less.

[Katie]

I was gonna say, I thought, from what I remember, it was like the clinical trials, they were getting like, 15%.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

And then in real world, it was half that. So. Yeah, I mean, you're right. I think you're absolutely right. Right. The idea that somebody taking a GLP1 will become skeletal is, I think, a misunderstanding of how those drugs work as well as why somebody would take one, frankly.

[Caroline]

Yeah. It might be worth saying the quiet part out loud here. The vast majority of deeply viral content on this topic is delivered by women who represent the beauty standard. And when they lament how drugs like Ozempic are ending body positivity, you really get a window into who they perceive as fat in this world. And it is not people who are actually fat. Any person who experiences profound body transformation by losing, say, 10 or 15% of their body weight, aka the standard with GLP1s, was not fat to begin with. They were at most straight sized, maybe on the small side of plus size. And that really gives you an idea of who this conversation is driven by and whose bodies are being centered in this, quote, body positivity movement. And also how truly thin Hollywood is and has always, always been when you have a straight sized famous person or a small plus sized famous person who becomes emblematic of said body positivity. And that kind of brings me to this idea of weight loss of celebrities and that visible weight loss. I think again, when we're talking about these wicked stars, there is a fixation with these arguments to claim that this is a change that needs to be documented, that needs to be discussed. And something that I became very aware of as I was pouring through these archives is that weight cycling is constant in Hollywood. And weight cycling is basically when you are cycling through the loss and then the regain of a small percentage of your weight. A lot of people who are susceptible to diet, culture, weight cycle their whole lives, and it's incredibly damaging, it's incredibly unhealthy for you. It can damage your metabolism, it can hurt your cardiovascular health. You are essentially constantly working desperately to get to a marginally smaller body and then. And over 90% of people gain it back within a few months.

[Katie]

Is this the thing where it's like if you're kind of like losing and gaining the same £15 over and over again? Yeah, it has like, metabolic. Okay, I think, I think I've heard this before, that it's like very bad for your health to be in that loop.

[Caroline]

And so something I, I came to realize is that, like, it seems to me that the baseline for fame, for hypervisible fame, for these actors, for these performers, for these models, the people who are famous enough to go to a Met Gala or to star in a franchise. Guys, the basis of your life is weight cycling. And I think that it makes a lot of sense when you think about what their jobs are like. These are people for whom their bodies no longer belong to themselves. You have to get very thin for the Met Gala or for your next movie premiere or a role or a concert tour, and then you might gain those 10 or 20 pounds back, you know, six months later. And so you. Again, I don't encourage anyone to do this who has suffered from any sort of eating disorder. But like, you can see this as you move through the years that, that this weight loss and gain is constant for virtually everyone that you can see on these red carpets. It is, it seems to be a feature and not a bug. And as such, if a person wanted to mount an argument that any given celebrity is losing weight rapidly and this rapid weight loss is indicative of a cultural shift, then a person would be able to find people for this argument every single year without fail. I know this because I went year by year through the 2010s and 2000s, and every single year I found a new crop of articles about the latest group of quote, unquote, unheard healthily thin celebrities who were, quote, unquote, representing a dangerous new trend in beauty culture like clockwork. And so again, as I'm looking through the visibility of these pop stars, of these actresses, of all these people who represent the beauty standard to us over this time period of body positivity, it was very clear to me that the visibility hadn't changed. And so I wanted to look into any sort of legacy. And so for an example, when you look at something like me too, that's pretty roundly criticized right now as something that has kind of lost steam and led to a, A, a pretty big backlash. But over 80 pieces of legislation have since been passed in 24 states related to MeToo.

[Katie]

Oh, really?

[Caroline]

There are workplace harassment laws, there are office protections. There are certain legislative changes that have been made that you can attribute to, you know, the outcome of the MeToo movement.

[Katie]

Man, you can't even your secretary anymore without love.

[Caroline]

That. What is that? W. Is that a George W. Bush?

[Katie]

I don't know. I just, it was, it came over me and I had to let him out.

[Caroline]

So this is all to say that didn't happen with body positivity. The legacy of body positivity, the legacy of this, like the legal framework is non existent. The BMI has not changed. Our understanding of the BMI has not changed. The, the size of the famous people that we look up to has not changed. We have made no national headway whatsoever in terms of fat activism. There have been some small wins on the state level, but also in terms of, of how we perceive health, that has not changed.

[Katie]

Well, and I think with the current administration, the big health wins, according to the RFK school of thought, is like making it so people who receive SNAP benefits can't buy soda.

[Caroline]

Right. And you know, it's interesting too, I was, when I was talking to Virginia about this and about the kind of fraudulence of the body positivity movement as really nothing more than a little bit of corporate capture. Something she mentioned when I brought up this theory that conservatism is fueling skinny culture is the Obama era. And how dangerous like Michelle Obama's crusade against fat kids was and how like that was really terrible and like everyone was fixated on how fit her arms were. And like there was this whole thing that if you just like give these kids an apple at school, then we'll solve obesity. And anyone who isn't in her defense,

[Katie]

though her arms, she was pretty hot. We're pretty rocking.

[Caroline]

So I want to to sort of close our conversation about body positivity, specifically with a little piece by Aubrey Gordon. I thought that this was a really interesting perspective from like, I think a very respected fat activist on just how useful this time period was that Jamila Jamil claims was really helping everyone feel healthy.

[Katie]

I've heard I'm body positive, but more times than I can count. Caveats abound. Yes, you should feel good about your body, but only if you're not too familiar at only if you're healthy, only if you're able bodied, only if you remember your place, only if you stay forever vigilant, always remembering that your body is less than only if you stay ashamed. I'm body positive as long as you're not, you know, obese. For fat people, daring to feel even neutrally about our embattled bodies is a mortal sin. But if body positivity isn't for fat people, people, who is it for? If body positivity only extends to people who already meet our standards of beauty and virtue, what does it accomplish? I'm body positive as long as you're healthy, but what of those with chronic illnesses reaching to love the bodies that cannot love them back? Are cancer patients the kind of healthy that will be permitted to embrace their own skin? What about type 2 diabetics? People with hypertension? People with gas out? What if you're sick and the whole world tells you it's your fault? What if you're not sick and the whole rest of the world insists you are? Would you permit those people to love themselves? Underneath all those caveats lies an insidious implication that body positivity is reserved for the pure, the pious and the strong of heart. The belief that body positivity only belongs to those of us who remember the inherent repulsiveness of our body bodies who have done penance for our size 6 silhouettes too long body Positivity is only for people who are wrong about the disgustingness of our bodies. Body positive caveats tell us that there is a kind of body that deserves to feel good about our bodies. The rest of us, though, ought to stay on our toes. Yeah, yeah.

[Caroline]

I would describe the body positivity conversation I've seen over the last few weeks at as I am body positive, but not for people with eating disorders. Oh. When you think about body positivity as not just a message for how to view yourself, but for how to view other bodies, right? Like, you need to become more okay with different types of bodies. That was arguably one of the goals of body positivity was changing your perception of other bodies. Right. And the central tenet of this conversation is, well, we should be body positive, but this body is too fucked up up. Right? Like, this body promotes a bad message and as such we need to root it out. So returning to the Wicked argument, remember, one of the foundational pillars of like, legitimacy for this panic over these Wicked stars is that something has changed, right?

[Katie]

Something has changed within me.

[Caroline]

Something is not the same. We're seeing a return to skinny. Celebrities are disappearing. And that's not true. True. Like just put as simply as possible, it's just not true. Skinny culture has always been incredibly, incredibly potent. Celebrities have been weight cycling all through the 2010s. If you look at the highest paid actresses, the highest paid pop stars, if you want to nitpick over details, maybe there's been a slight shift, but we really don't see the, the change that I think that we want to believe that there has been. So now we're basically looking at like a one legged stool, right? Like the reason that we're making all these videos and essays and news stories about how thin these Wicked stars are, are, and what a bad message that is for little girls and what terrible role models they are, has to do with the claim related to eating disorders, right? This is the argument. Now, these women clearly have eating disorders. They're clearly anorexic.

[Katie]

Oh, right. Because the original video you showed me, the claim was that the movie Wicked is pro anorexia, right?

[Caroline]

So now we're saying, I know what anorexia looks like. Like, these people are anorexic. Anorexia is a contagious disorder. They're giving it to one another. They're competing on set. And given how dangerous anorexia is, it's essential that we point it out. It's essential that we make this the most important conversation taking place around the film. You do not want to look like these women. You should want to look a little bit heavier, but not that much heavier. You should be like two sizes bigger than these women.

[Katie]

That is what is so funny about it. When. And it's. We are talking about such marginal changes to people who are already extremely thin that where is the threshold? Is it when you can see a collarbone? Is it when you can see a sternum? When is the eating disorder bell going off in your head that you feel confident that you can assert that this woman is either unhealthy or struggling in some capacity?

[Caroline]

Right. So, Katie, what do you know about eating disorders, specifically anorexia nervosa, which we will refer to just as anorexia.

[Katie]

What do I know about anorexia? Really, my experience with anorexia stems from somebody that I was very close with in high school who was diagnosed anorexic. And all I really knew from being friends with somebody who was experiencing that and struggling with it was that her relationship with food became very all consuming and very restrictive. And she kind of became increasingly withdrawn. And when confronted about it, kind of would always, oh, I had a big breakfast, or, you know, oh, I, I'm gonna eat a big dinner. But it was really about calorie restriction. And I remember that for her, the impetus was that she had recently been an athlete who was going to essentially pursue like a D1 level of athleticism in college and because of an injury was no longer able to do that. And that was sort of the event in her life or the change that then. I don't want to say kicked it off, but like, that seemed to be. And I think she would probably say the same after that happened, she became anorexic.

[Caroline]

So I had my shit thoroughly rocked when I began to look into this. I spoke to over 10 clinicians and psychologists and eating disorder specialists related to this. I even got to get coffee with someone who lives where I live, which was really fun. She works at the local university clinic. I had my understandings and my assumptions changed to the degree that I would compare to like a Lily Phillips episode of how I thought I understood what was taking place entering the conversations, and how much my mind was changed.

[Katie]

So, oh, my gosh, I'm so excited to learn.

[Caroline]

Yeah. So there are many forms of eating disorders. A lot of them are very recently coined, but today were focusing almost exclusively on anorexia. People believe it's the most deadly mental health disorder or the second most deadly, if you're counting opioid overdoses as an indications of deaths Related to disorders. So, quick history. A little speedrun of anorexia through the years. Throughout the historical record, you can see countless examples of what now appear to be textbook anorexia. But in those early time periods like 1400s, 1500s, 1600s, these incidents of starvation were often attributed to religious facts. Fasting. So like 9 times out of 10 people just thought that they were fasting as. As a means of religion. And this was like the cultural context that those people would cling to as well. So they would just say, yeah, I'm fasting because of religion. In 1689, the doctor Richard Morton wrote the first medical account that attempted to understand this condition. Which he coined as nervous consumption. In this description he thought that both men and women could be afflicted by this condition. And so I would like you to read a little section from his writing. And this is a description of a man that he believes to be suffering from what he called nervous consumption.

[Katie]

The son of the Reverend Minister, Mr. Steele, my very good friend, about the 16th year of his age. Fell gradually into a total want of appetite. Occasioned by his studying too hard and the passions of his mind. And upon that into an universal atrophy. Pining away more and more for the space of two years without any consequences. Cough, fever or any other symptom of any distemper of his lungs or any other entrail. As also without a looseness or diabetes. Or any other sign of a colloquiation.

[Caroline]

It's tough to make you read. It's so not natural.

[Katie]

Or any other sign of a colloquation or preternatural evacuation. And therefore I judged this consumption to be nervous. And to have its seat in the whole habit of the body. Body and to arise from the system of the nerves being distempered. I began and first attempted his cure with the use of anti sorbutic bitter and shall Chowbi ate medicines as well, natural as artificial, but without any benefit. And therefore, when I found that the former method did not answer our expectations, I advised him to abandon his studies, to go into the country air and to use riding and milk type it. I'm going to start. I think I just need some riding in a milk diet. And especially to drink ass's milk. No, no way.

[Caroline]

Ass milk.

[Katie]

Give me that ass milk. Hey baby, can I get some of that ass milk? For a long time, by the use of which he recovered his health in a great measure. Though he is not yet perfectly freed from a consumptive state. And what will be the event of this Method does not yet plainly appear here. What the. What did I just read? What was that?

[Caroline]

So, long story short, we were starting to identify even at that point, that what is happening to you physically is actually a disorder of the mind. Right. And I think that that was kind of a little bit of a light bulb, the idea that this has to do with the nerves. Right. But it wasn't until 1873, so, you know, over 150 years later, that the term anorexia was coined by two doctors, like, kind of simultaneously. Interestingly enough, there was a French doctor and a British doctor, Sir William goes Gull. And Gull said it happened to women and men and that it was a medical disorder that was often caused by, quote, ego perversion. So I think that that was one of the earliest examples of body dysmorphia. Right. Like you're unable to see yourself clearly.

[Jamila Jamil]

Oh.

[Caroline]

I also think it's interesting that Gull first called it anorexia hysterica because this was the time period where we medicalized hysterical ladies. Yeah, don't be too hysterical. But because he thought it happened to men and women, he didn't want to use that. That term. So very shortly after that, physicians start to believe that this actually only happens to women. And for several decades, the prevailing cultural belief was that this was a mental disorder that impacts women. It is caused by vanity, by a desire to be beautiful, to be thin. And to cut to the chase, physicians no longer think that that is the case. So I just want to give, like, a summary of the most up to date theorizing on how eating disorders like anorexia operate, because a lot of these discoveries are very recent and have not yet been coded into, like, the medical diagnostics and into our healthcare system. So, number one, research increasingly indicates that anorexia has a genetic component. Not that there's, like an anorexia gene, but there are a series of genes that can come together to impact how a person responds to social and psychological issues. So I think this gives, like, a slightly different perspective on the stories we hear so often about an anorexic young woman growing up with a mother who is obsessed with counting calories, too. Like, I think part of that could be cultural, but it also.

[Katie]

Almond mom syndrome.

[Caroline]

100%. This is a term that someone called biopsychosocial to me, which I'm kind of obsessed with.

[Katie]

Biopsychosocial.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

Oh, that is a good one.

[Caroline]

Yeah. So just like a combination of factors that when they come together, every person responds to them differently. So, like, yes, you might be triggered by a cultural or social event. We will get to those events shortly. But it might be your biology that impacts how you respond to those triggers.

[Katie]

Well, that makes sense because, I mean, at the most basic level, we are all living in some version of the same popular culture.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

And respond to it differently.

[Caroline]

Right. Another expert I spoke with told me that there's a neurochemical component, so, like, clients with anorexia often have abnormalities with serotonin and an overproduction of dopamine, while actually, patients with bulimia often have lower levels of dopamine. So you see these chemical differences with people who suffer from these disorders. So realization number two. Research increasingly indicates that eating disorders have little to no relationship with vanity. This really, like, started to rock me. So patients don't want to be beautiful. They want to be in control. So the story of your friend is very on par to me and Katie. It makes me think about the conversation you had with Tressie McMillan Cottam and how she talked about beauty. So I want you to reread this sentence she said to you when you had that great interview with her.

[Katie]

Beauty is the only power that women are allowed to legitimately use but never own. It's the only political power we are allowed to pursue without being stigmatized. Yeah. So good.

[Caroline]

So I think it's true to say, and people that I've spoke with have confirmed that eating disorders are connected to the beauty standard, but only insofar as the beauty standard teaches women how to retain control.

[Katie]

Oh, that's really smart.

[Caroline]

I think about what you said in one of our earliest episodes about how for men who don't reap the real rewards of patriarchy, which is, like, wealth and control, what do we give them? We give them wives. What do we give women? We give them the beauty standard. That's what they get to control. They get to control their bodies and their households, and that's how we sell to them. We tell them to buy things for their homes and for their bodies. And so I think when I started to think about this, as was the eating disorder connected to control. And, like, how does that connect to the beauty standard? It became this kind of chicken and egg thing to me, right? Where it's. They're associated with the beauty standard, but not the way we think. Both are about discipline and the rewards of maintaining that discipline. Right. Like, your life will be better, your mind will stop racing, your friends and family will love you more. People with anorexia have all those goals, but they really have nothing to do with how they look. It's about this type of ecstasy and feeling of accomplishment when your body feels as disciplined and as empty as you want your mind to be. I would love for you to read this comment that someone left on our Skinny Talk episode.

[Katie]

In physically suffering through the initial pain of separating the mind from the body, the early stages of anorexia, where you are just starting to restrict, you eventually reach a sense of enlightenment and the baseness, the carnality, the animalism, the traumatic experiences of the body which we deem so disgusting, are finally conquered. It's very carceral and fascistic. This is where the sexlessness of it all came in for me. Me. By disconnecting from the most basic needs of humanity, literally sustenance, I was personally able to experience feeling something I thought was better than sexuality or sensuality or embodiment. I was able to experience feeling correct and utterly untouchable. Oh, my God, that is so resonant. The sexlessness was something that felt paradoxically, incredibly sexy to me because for the first time, I could escape the body that had been deemed inherently sexually promiscuous by society. A body that I felt made me incredibly vulnerable. I felt like a piece of art, something that was so beautiful that it inspired awe and respect rather than a desire to touch. I felt autonomous and experiencing being in control of the perception of your sexuality and sensuality by punishing the body into a vision of a specific physical presentation that we associate with power, not actually sex appeal. Feel was intoxicating. Wow.

[Caroline]

Can you believe that? If someone just, like, wrote that in our comments. Someone?

[Katie]

Lifetime comp. Do you want to co host?

[Caroline]

If you're not a paid subscriber, you're literally missing out on, like, PhD level theories that someone just, like, whips out in our comments section. Thoughts, Katie?

[Katie]

That's unreal. Okay. Yes. Okay. I'm trying to.

[Caroline]

Katie. Katie's just looking at me with both of her hands up in the air.

[Katie]

I just. I don't know what to do with my hands or. Right now. I'm just. I'm. I am amazed rereading that back because I don't want to project my experience onto all of humanity. But I. What I will say is that I.

[Caroline]

That's kind of the point of the podcast.

[Katie]

I do. As a human who's going to now speak for all of us, it does feel like control is a basic human desire. And I think we all a kind of strive for that or struggle with how we feel in control. And like, I think it manifests differently for everybody. I think for me, the way that I like self punish and like exercise discipline is work ethic. That's, that's how I live out my sense of control.

[Caroline]

Wait, tell them about your puppy schedule.

[Katie]

Guys. I'm getting a birdie's mountain dog puppy and I, I made a little schedule for him that is like down to.

[Caroline]

It's not a little schedule schedule.

[Katie]

Okay. It's incremental 15 minute blocks of what he. So he hits his development milestones. I have a Google Doc of his development milestones. He's gonna do puppy kindergarten anyway. Yeah. And there is something about that way of exercising control that, yeah. Makes me feel like I can bear the existence of being alive.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

Like I can bear being alive. And I think that when I hear someone describe the way in which restricting food gives them that sense of control, it's not a hard jump for me to make because I think the. To complete this analogy, we look at somebody who has anorexia and we say, that's about vanity. That's about they want to look a

[Caroline]

certain way, they want to look that way.

[Katie]

I think the equivalent for me would be you could look at somebody that approaches work or life the way I do. Say, well, she wants to, to have money, she wants to have success, but it's really not about those things. That's like collateral.

[Caroline]

Yeah.

[Katie]

But what I really want is the feeling of being in control of my life and, and being safe. And being safe. Right. And so I think that we are all looking for that same outcome and our brains just try to achieve it in different ways or we find that different approaches to that which can become self destructive tend to give us that feeling more poignantly than other things.

[Caroline]

Yeah. There was an eating disorder specialist that I spoke with who kind of characterized it this way where she said, look, these are significant mental disorders, but that doesn't mean that these people are not responding to something. Very true about our society and the rewards that we give to thinness and the confirmation that we societally give to the ideal of thinness being a higher version of control is very real. Like you write about this in Rich Girl Nation in your book. Like, thin people are more likely to be seen as organized, they're more likely to be promoted, they're more likely to be perceived as type A. Fat people are more likely to be seen as lazy. No willpower, you have no control over your life. Right. And so every single clinician I spoke with emphasized that their anorexic clients had a very high predisposition for perfectionism. A lot of them have a likelihood of also having obsessive compulsive disorder. They often recognize that their eating habits aren't healthy for them, but they can't stop. And so there. There is a recognition of what they're doing. But the idea that people are choosing to starve themselves is, I think, a gross mischaracterization of how eating disorders work. And moreover, the barriers to access for recovery, which is what we're about to talk about, like the money, the effort, the signing over your life, they are so hot that it is very easy for anyone over 18 with this disorder to be like, nah, I'm good. I'm not doing that. So it's. It's very hard to get help. This is where the social media component came into it. One of the assumptions that I went into this conversation was like, I don't think that celebrities are the problem, but I think social media is the problem. I think algorithms are the problem. And I no longer feel that way. So I brought up the question of social media and these algorithms.

[Katie]

Is the. Is it capitalism?

[Caroline]

Let me.

[Katie]

Is it.

[Caroline]

So I brought this up and I, like, tested my hypothesis with a bunch of people, and all of them were like, ooh, that was a really awesome shot. But no, they were like, that's so cute. That's great.

[Katie]

This is so spot on, though, because every single episode that either one of us do, where I go, it's capitalism. You go, it's the Internet. So that's really fun that you were told no. Yep.

[Caroline]

It was not being true.

[Katie]

Really?

[Caroline]

Yeah. So one person said to me, and I thought this was really interesting, she was like, not only is social media not like the top 10 of issues that I deal with with my clients, but if social media were to disappear, if social media networks were to totally disappear and tabloid magazines were to go away and actresses were no longer to exist, she was like, I think that we would probably still have 95% of our eating disorder clients. I don't think that the population would change whatsoever. She was like, in a world where everything was completely abundant, I think that there is a certain genetic component that certain people respond to stress a certain way. And the question is, what triggers that into becoming an eating disorder? And so the most common factors that led to these tipping points for these people's patients are kind of similar to what you talked about with your friend Katie. So someone's parents get divorced, an athlete can no longer pursue sports or go to practice. Your friend group is being mean to you. You're a straight a student who starts getting B's and C's. The idea that anorexic people are obsessed with fame, famous skinny women is just, like, wildly overstated. And no one told me that the initial trigger or primary trigger was another thin person. And I want to be clear that, like, anorexia is one of three disorders in the dsm, which is the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which is like the reference point people have for these. There are three disorders that can be given to you, and they are borderline personality disorder, post traumatic stress disorders, and eating disorders. And all of these disorders impact women more than men, which I think is really interesting. Shout out to the psychologist who spoke with me, who literally brought that up to me, because she listens to diabolical eyes, and she was like, I feel like you'll like this. So that was awesome. So it's true that anorexia can be contagious, but not in the sense that you look at a famous person on the screen and you decide you want to be anorexic. The contagion element often happens after a person has developed the disorder, and then they become competitive.

[Katie]

Oh, interesting.

[Caroline]

If you're in a room with three people who have disorders or who have predilections for disordered eating, you might start competing with one another to see who can be the best, in the same way that three competitive people can try to get the best grade in class. But even in that circumstance, a lot of people reminded me, like, when you get treatment for anorexia, you're surrounded by other extremely thin people. Part of your recovery, which is lifelong, you. It never goes away, is learning to live with other really thin bodies, learning to see other thin bodies and find ways to cope with how that triggers you and how that impacts your desire to restrict eating.

[Katie]

I do think something that you said, and I. I don't know exactly how you phrased it, but I appreciated it because you bridged the gap for me between obviously there is a societal component to this.

[Caroline]

Sure.

[Katie]

But the societal component is not what people think it is, which is like, you see a thin person and then start restricting your calories to the extent that you are becoming emaciated. That it's. Thinness is equated with contract. In our society, thinness is seen as a virtue that represents the control that you have over your life. And therefore, in seeking control, you are seeking that physical state. I think that is really, really fascinating because it doesn't understate the social role of thinness, but it also, I think, contextualizes it. To say that if you were to strip away all of that social context, the thinness itself is not. Not the goal.

[Caroline]

I want to complicate the idea of the social and cultural influence even further by acknowledging that it is true what we are talking about when we talk about thinness and our understanding of how thinness confers power, it's true that that plays a role into eating disorder culture in modern day. There are plenty of studies that show that our fixation and deification of thin bodies impacts how young people see themselves, how they understand their own bodies. It's also true, though, that eating disorders like anorexia have prevailed in societies all throughout human history, when our understand of thinness was vastly different. Why? Because at the end of the day, caloric consumption is one of the only tools at a person's disposal that is completely in your control. And obviously, this isn't true for someone who is suffering famine or in a similar situation. But I even had a clinician who told me that they had multiple anorexic patients who were on the poverty line who developed an eating disorder to help cut down on grocery costs for their parents. So when you think about how our long history of fasting and hunger strikes plays into this conversation, Food is and has always been a tool of control, and it's often one of the only things in a person's life that they can have autonomous decision making over. I think the same goes for extremely wealthy people. You can be a billionaire, and it can still be true that caloric restriction is like the only thing in your life that feels fully under your control. And I think that that's just one of the many ways in which eating disorders are so beguiling, honestly. And. And the ways in which they often defy our attention attempts to simplify them into a boxed cultural understanding. So I think the most interesting element of this is when you consider what appears to be the gendered element. So one of the biggest arguments people give for why the beauty standard plays into this is the gendered element. Right? Like most patients, the vast majority of patients are adolescent women, specifically adolescent white women. So if eating disorders have so much less to do with beauty than we think, why do they impact women so much more than men? Katie, do you have a guess?

[Katie]

I think my best guess would be that it has something to do with something that we've talked about before, which is that the closer you are to a standard already, the more that it appeals to you. Could that have something to do with it?

[Caroline]

It could.

[Katie]

You're like, good try, but no. Such a good head pat. Such a good guess. Such a good guess.

[Caroline]

You and I have both, like, monkey brained each other into shared thoughts that,

[Katie]

like, I could hear fucking slamming our foreheads together. Do something.

[Caroline]

Here's what I'm going to say. Katie, I wonder if this will blow your mind the way that it has blown my mind. Okay, so from 1952 to 2013, which is when the majority of studies were done on anorexic patients that have since informed the guidelines, as seen in the dsm, there were two requirements which defined who would enter a study, who would enter treatment. One of them was amenorrhea, which essentially means that you no longer had your period. And the other was the bmi, which means that almost every single study that informed the DSM did not include fat people and did not include men. Any fat person who came in with the symptoms that were identical to anorexia was rerouted to another condition, probably told to try to lose weight, ironically enough. And any man who came in was rerouted to another condition.

[Katie]

Oh, my God. So it's like a statistical error, I would say.

[Caroline]

I didn't talk about this specifically with every single person, but every person I did talk about this said the same thing. We don't think anymore that women have more eating disorders than men. Women are just getting treated for it. And the way that men present their symptoms shows up kind of differently. Like, anorexic male patients will often fixate on muscular growth. They'll take steroids, they'll be less likely to take diet pills. And again, for people who are fat who come in with the other attributes, they're not eating, they have a low heart. Heart rate. They're told that that is because they haven't lost enough weight. And so would you consider trying to lose weight a little bit harder? And if they die of a heart attack, which is often how anorexic patients die, they will be told that they died because they were fat.

[Katie]

Holy. Oh, my gosh, dude.

[Caroline]

So as of, like, 2013, the number of male anorexic patients was at around 10%. The physician I spoke with about this said it's now at 25%. And she expects it to just keep growing until we get to, you know, 50% parity, essentially. Wow. To kind of double down on the bmi, one clinician said that you have to weigh less than 75% of the ideal weight to your height, essentially 75% of your BMI in order to be admitted, which means that you essentially have to already come in profoundly Profoundly thin. If you come in as straight sized, which is like a term we use just for like a quote unquote average body, you're not going to be admitted for care, you don't fit the diagnostic. And if you come in as a fat, you don't met the diagnostics for care, you will not be admitted, your insurer will probably not cover you and you will not be able to get recovery help.

[Katie]

It kind of reminds me honestly of like the abortion laws in Texas where it's like you have to be actively dying before they will and you still

[Caroline]

have to look a certain way. Even if you're actively dying. They will say that you're, you're dying because of something else. They will say it's not possible. And a lot of physicians and specialists that I spoke with are very frustrated by this because, because they have information that they now know kind of disproves this. Like we have these new studies, we have these new theories, but you're still operating under very dated hospital guidelines, DSM guidelines, health insurance guidelines for coverage. And so for these clinics, the people who get care are by and large adolescent white girls because those are the ones whose parents are going to pay often out of pocket tens of thousands of dollars for treatment. And so everyone else, else is basically ignored. And that leads to this reinforcing of this idea of visibility, this idea that you know who has an eating disorder, you know why they have an eating disorder.

[Katie]

Yeah, cuz the qualifications are selecting for people who look that way.

[Caroline]

Exactly.

[Katie]

That's crazy.

[Caroline]

It's a self reinforcing mechanism. So we see the same people get treatment because they're the only ones who can afford it and they're the only people who fit into the diagnostics that we have set up for them. And as such we are then rewarding people, people for reaffirming just like misinformation about eating disorders.

[Katie]

Oh my gosh. I think what this highlights for me too, or where I would bring back in like the perversity of incentives in the health care system and, and just how, you know, if you want to understand what kind of outcomes you're going to get, look at the incentives of the system. It reminds me a lot of the flip side of this conversation which is that if you are fat and go to a doctor, they're going to chalk up anything that is wrong to your weight.

[Caroline]

Right.

[Katie]

And again it, for me this is really just underscoring that that that works both ways. The extent to which not just we, the lay people of the public look at a body to deduce what is wrong with it or whether or not it is healthy and that we know what a healthy body looks like or what a quote, unquote, unquote normal body looks like. But that in many ways that might actually be downstream of the way that the medical institutions have defined some of these things and their understanding of them. And it sounds like not everybody's understanding of it. But changing this sort of stuff takes time, Particularly in a system where you have like a private health insurance schema where like they are going to determine how bad something has to get get or how narrow those conditions have to be in order for them to pay for something.

[Caroline]

And when you think about the fact that this disorder has been feminized and that it impacts men and fat people, which are both very politicized groups, like the incentives for anyone to open up our understanding of this disorder are really non existent in Congress or these massive health insurance companies, like these places are, do not want to help open up coverage for fat people in any sense of the word. Like denial of coverage to fat people is very foundational in this country. And I would also say the idea of allowing men to be feminized by associating them with an eating disorder that is coded lady is very unattractive.

[Katie]

Did women ruin the workforce? Part two.

[Caroline]

Exactly. It's very important to me that we highlight this because I think that one of the grounding arguments for this thing about wicked and this thing that happens every 18 months about a famous person is, is that you can know someone's health, you know what it looks like. And that pointing out that it is unhealthy is essential to prevent other people from getting eating disorders. That is not how eating disorders happen. They are genetic. They are biopsychosocial. I love saying that and sounding smart. They are going to happen. And again, every person I spoke with was like, yeah, social media isn't great. It makes everyone feel depressed. It makes everyone feel alienated. But those feelings are the ones that contribute. Not seeing your friends at a bowling alley is every bit as impactful as scrolling through and seeing a picture of a skinny celebrity. It's just whether or not you have all of these combining factors that will take that anxiety, that feeling of helplessness, that feeling of depression, that feeling of desire for perfectionism, and whether you are going to be the person who channels that into calorie restriction and a lot of that is out of your control. Katie, we've kind of unpacked the two stools, which I also realize is A stupid way to describe a stool. Like two. Two. Two.

[Katie]

The.

[Caroline]

Like, it's two legs. Wouldn't keep his stool up.

[Katie]

I'll workshop it. It's fine.

[Caroline]

Maybe I'll keep doing the metaphor and say that there's a third surprise leg, and that's the one we're talking about now.

[Katie]

So a secret third leg.

[Caroline]

Okay. So we've talked about the body positivity movement and discovered that, like, the return of the skinny apocalypse is not as drastic a shift as I think some people are claiming it to make. We've talked about eating disorders and, like, the real myth, and I think profound damage that comes with assuming that someone who. Who looks really thin has an eating disorder, that we know what eating disorders look like, that it is associated with vanity, all these things. I want to open a third door here for this conversation about what is happening with Wicked and why Wicked was so overtaken at the Release of Part 2 with this conversation about these women and why they were not good role models. So, Katie, have you heard of the feminist theory coined by Rain Fisher Kwan about what it means to be one woman?

[Katie]

Oh, okay, sort of, but refresh my memory.

[Caroline]

I'm just going to have you read it. So this is such a thrilling time to be alive that we're seeing feminist theory develop in the form of a tweet. This was shared in June 2022, and it, like, is now very central to my understanding of modern feminist theory. So congrats, Rain.

[Katie]

Okay, so Rain says Otessa Moshfegh is on the verge of getting womaned. I can feel it. Woman is what I call it when everyone stops liking a woman at the same time. Oh, yeah. Okay.

[Caroline]

So Kwan further developed this theory in an article for ID and I would love for you to read it for me, please.

[Katie]

Like wild animals and recycled plastic, women in the public eye have a life cycle that most of us know it by heart. It starts with adoration. She lands starring roles. She writes hit songs. She goes viral. She's new and young and profitable. Then the idolatry begins. Wins. Maybe magazines start selling copies by calling her the voice of a generation or the next Marilyn or Eartha, even though she's barely college age. Maybe they'll label her a feminist icon because she went to a woman's march. Maybe she gets too many fans too fast. Either way, she's well on her way to overexposure. The jokes that people found charming six months ago are starting to get old, and you're being force fed her face through every algorithmic channel. Your phone can handle. Handle. And wasn't she always kind of annoying? Anyway, now she's being discarded. Sometimes it'll be a rude comment on a rough day that pushes her off the pedestal. Sometimes it's a genuine mistake or wrongdoing, the response to which rarely seeks to genuinely or meaningfully address the problem at hand. It might be a mental health episode. Sometimes she simply receives too much praise, appears to have just a little too much power, and faces a wave of backlash for daring to be perceived as good at what she she does. Most often, the public seems to just get tired of her. If she's famous enough, her life cycle might include a narrative shifting documentary a decade down the line. Or a social media resurgence.

[Caroline]

Ms. Americana. Yeah.

[Katie]

Which? Sidebar. By the time this comes out, we will already have the first two episodes of the Heiress Tour documentary, the next

[Caroline]

documentary immediately after she Was Woman. Okay, keep going.

[Katie]

Yes.

[Caroline]

It's incredible. Incredible.

[Katie]

And I am locked the fuck in. Everyone.

[Caroline]

Okay?

[Katie]

Or a social media resurgence when everyone figures out she's still hot. Either way, her image is still not her own. Her life and her perceived virtue is still being used for profit by powers much larger than herself. It's a system that builds women up into untouchable fantasies just so we can watch in glee as the facade inevitably crumbs, crumbles. It's a perpetual cycle of ritualistic idolization, degradation, and redemption that serves only to entertain the masses and generate profit for the powerful. Oh, my gosh.

[Caroline]

Thoughts, Katie?

[Katie]

Sounds about right. Sounds about right. I am thinking of the Jennifer Lawrence interview right now when she.

[Caroline]

It's on the outline. It's on the outline. It's on the outline. Don't bring it up yet.

[Katie]

Okay? Okay. Banging our heads together. Banging our foreheads together. I'm gonna give your forehead a little tick.

[Caroline]

Three minutes for now.

[Katie]

Go ahead.

[Caroline]

Your turn, bro. No. Okay, so you said earlier in this conversation that you were talking about how in the body positivity movement, the thing that changed was our language, Right? Like, instead of saying you need to be skinny, you needed to be healthy. Instead of saying you need to lose weight, we say you need to lift weights. This kind of therapy speak is present all over the place.

[Katie]

Or you had, like, Pilates body. That was. That's another one.

[Caroline]

Pilates body. Exactly. And so, as we've discussed, the central goal never changed. And I think a lot of people, frankly, fell for it, thought that that language was more empowering, when in fact, it wasn't. People are still trying to be thin. The representation has never really changed. We haven't made any visible steps towards equity under the law in terms of your body size, but it feels better the way that we talk about it. Right? And so something that has happened is we have essentially replaced tabloids with social media. And so when we talk about entertaining the masses, we are now the generators of tabloid culture. But it doesn't feel like tabloid culture. Right. Because we use new language for to talk about it. And so something that I find really interesting is that this process of womaning often feels very lefty. And it is often people who, in all other senses of the word, identify as progressive and want to call out perceived progressive failures.

[Katie]

Call in.

[Caroline]

Call in. Call in. Thank you. Thank you. It is something that is very often fueled by the right, but just as often fueled by the left and is often a moment of radicalization, of political radicalization, where someone moves. Moves from the left to the right. You have this rabbit hole of misogyny where you go in saying, amber Heard is a bad representative of domestic abuse. And you come out on the other end going, and that bitch is so annoying, and can't she just leave us alone? And you end up surrounding yourself with people who are conservatives.

[Katie]

Just the Candace Owens content.

[Caroline]

Yeah, the Candace Owens content. So an example of this would be that you start with a very legitimate form of criticism, right? This famous woman steals from black culture. This famous woman is rude in interviews. This famous woman is too rich. She is too skinny. She's going to make it harder for other insert survivor type here to be believed or to be respected. And as such, and this is the critical component, this woman is a bad role model.

[Katie]

Hmm.

[Caroline]

When a woman is a bad role model, we have a dog whistle, and all of a sudden people start saying, and also. And also her fashion so sucks. And also she hooked up with a married man. And also her friendships feel fake. And also she's cringe. And also she's too emotional. And also she's vain and manipulative and cares about her beauty and reputation more than she cares about others.

[Katie]

I mean, this was Blake Lively101.101 when the Baldoni lawsuit happened. This. This descended so quickly.

[Caroline]

Yes. Nine and a half times out of ten. Something I noticed is that the famous person in question, who is being woman, is of a childbearing age. Okay? So I issued a call out for resources related to this topic, and I was recommended a book called Damned Whores and God's Police. Have you heard about this, Katie?

[Katie]

No.

[Caroline]

This is a book by the Australian feminist Ann Summers, and it takes A really comprehensive look into the idea of the Madonna whore complex, but about the implications of that of how we see women and what we expect of their roles in society. You are not just a virgin or a Madonna. You are either a bad role model or a good role model. Okay? And the term God's police first came from a letter written by a woman named Caroline Chisholm in 1847. And she was an Australian humanitarian who was arguing for the value of white women in the colonies in Australia as a way of like, taming the indigenous population and keeping the men there in check. So I'm going to have you ready read what she wrote in the name of these women serving as role models in these early Australian colonies.

[Katie]

An activist for Karen's.

[Caroline]

The Christy Gnome of her time. Oh my God.

[Katie]

Karen's for nationalism.

[Caroline]

Okay.

[Katie]

If her Majesty's government be really desirous of seeing a well conducted community spring up in these colonies, the social wants of the people must be considered. Considered. If the paternal government wish to entitle itself to that honored appellation, it must look to the materials it may send as a nucleus for the formation of a good and great people. For all the clergy you can dispatch, all the schoolmasters you can appoint, all the churches you can build, and all the books you can export will never do much good without what a gentleman in that colony very appropriately called God's police wives and little children, good and virtuous women in thoughts. Yeah, yeesh. Is the first thing I would say. I don't know that I've thought so much about that passage as I do just about the concept of the role model and how it does seem to be a very feminized concept. Like, you don't hear male actors or artists being judged on the spectrum of like, but are they a good role model for little boys? But I do think it's funny that like, that is kind of of the direction that the Scott Galloway inflected male loneliness discourse has taken where it's like men need more role models or boys need more role models. So to that degree, I guess I would say I think we are.

[Caroline]

Because they can't look up to female role models.

[Katie]

Oh, and that's circle gets the square. They obviously can't look up to women, of course. But I don't know. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm thinking about the, the feminization of it all right now. I think thing.

[Caroline]

Yeah. We have numerous credibly accused men in Hollywood who have been accused of violent acts like very Violent. Like, I'm not talking about like, oh, you said something and that was off color. I'm talking about like, you beat the out of your wife. And these men are not dogged by accusations of being role models because men get to be human. Women are role models. And that's very important here. So now we're going to watch a little clip that you and I both loved where Jennifer Lawrence actually talks about what it's like to be one of God's police.

[Jennifer Lawrence]

I feel it when it's time for women to be the morality police. You know, it's easy for me to see it when it's happening. You know, when somebody does a Woody Allen movie and they only ask the women, you know, well, how do you feel about working with Woody Allen? You know, and you can just watch it. You just watch not one male actor get asked that question. And I see that play out a lot of just like women being the examples, women being the morality police. And also, I think there is something. I don't know what it is. It's really easy to hate women viciously in a way that it's almost like we have this ire in us that specifically there's like an extra pocket for it. And the ire that people are capable of, I think is different. I never at any point felt like this is unfair because of my gender. I felt like this is unfair because you created this. Like, you know, you ask and you ask and you ask and you want and you want and you want and then you don't want it anymore. And I felt like, rejected. But that's as. Now that I'm older. That is a natural push, pull of the process. And I have to be in control. Control of how much access is given and how much isn't.

[Caroline]

Okay, we can stop there. Thoughts?

[Katie]

Do you have a theory for why women are the morality police? I'm also curious how you found that excerpt where she's talking about God's police. Where did that come from?

[Caroline]

Because I. I was really interested and I have been really interested in this theory of being woman and, and to be totally hon. Went into this episode trying to figure it out myself. Like, what is happening here? Is it true that we are having this skinny apocalypse? Is there value to looking at these women and saying, don't look like them, don't be them, they are bad role models? Or are these women being women? And I really didn't know the answer to that. Like, I didn't know how much value there is in pointing out someone's flaws. And so I, I really wanted to better understand it. And so I sought out resources related to that. And so then when I found out about damn tours and God's police, I started to learn about the history of this. And I'll give a little context and this might answer, I think, what your question is, which is like Ann Summers, who talks about this term, the idea of God's police, her argument is that this really, really kicks into throttle in moments of like profound change. So the colonies is a great example, but more specifically post birth control, post sexual revolution. So you had women who were able to find validation and happiness outside of home. How do you bring them back to the home? Well, they have to be a good role model. And you're a bad role model if you're being promiscuous. You're a bad role model if you are prioritizing things over your family. Which is why I started to key into. Oh, the famous women that we get mad at are all childbearing age and they are all women, whether they have children or not, who can be accused of being selfish. And selfishness when it comes to, to being a woman is the greatest connector to doing something for yourself. I mean, Kristen Stewart just had a great New York Times interview where she says, sorry for being selfish. I'm sorry for wanting a self and it's so perfect. And so that was kind of what I was thinking about. When you think about this feminization of the idea of a role model, it's really just reminding you to, to be a mother and a wife and to not be prioritizing or to be representing the alternative of option making the alternative

[Katie]

choice look in any way appealing or preferable, really.

[Caroline]

Right. And virtuous wives were essential for what you've talked about, which is the nuclear family. You have to create these like, psychological and spiritual claims for the importance of the nuclear family. And you have to create gendered responsibilities within the nuclear family. And so men are workers and women

[Katie]

are role models and a system of reinforcement. I think what, what you're hitting on here, that is making these dots connect a little bit more clearly for me is like, like there is actually quite a bit of buy in required to make the status quo continue functioning. And I think religion used to really serve that purpose.

[Jamila Jamil]

Right.

[Katie]

What it sounds like you're saying is that the constant threat of getting woman, even if getting woman is something that we're saying happens to very famous women or celebrities like that can happen on a smaller scale within your own own life and social circles where your Family might judge your choices. If you're making choices that don't really abide by that standard status quo, or if you are extremely successful or, you know, doing something that is considered radical, those bumper lanes are kind of erected socially to keep you on the path that allows the status quo to continue. I actually think quite a lot about something you said earlier, which you've said to me before, which is basically, men get to be people. Women are women, but men get to be people. Men get to have flaws, they get to make mistakes.

[Caroline]

It makes that attractive. You know, Ottessa Moshe has written many a Hollywood puff piece about the tortured artist. Men have made whole careers off of that. And for a woman, it's disqualifying.

[Katie]

Well, and Kristen Stewart talks about that, too, which is like.

[Caroline]

Yeah, so you listen to it.

[Katie]

Yeah. When that interview where she says something to the effect of, do you know any women who are method, like, men who act a fool on set? It's kind of chalked up up to, like. Like, a man who is being difficult to work with and who is commanding a lot of attention and essentially, like, needing to make himself kind of like the. Who's the. The guy in succession? Jeremy something.

[Caroline]

Jeremy Strong.

[Katie]

Jeremy Strong. He, I think, is method or, like, went method to play Kendall Roy. But really, like, typically, I think the point Kristen was trying to make is, like, if a woman behaved that way way, people would be like, she's insufferable. Right. But when a man behaves that way, it's like, a sign of genius and his unique brilliance and approach to his craft.

[Caroline]

I think another element of this is that there is. If women are meant to be submissive, like you talked about in our most recent episode, like, the desire for men to communicate dominance through masculinity requires an imbalance of power. Right. And so the problem with giving women, like, credit cards and bank accounts and, like, making it illegal to murder them is that you have fewer recourses for making them submit.

[Katie]

It's not fair, man. You should be able to kill your secretary after you put her in the trunk of your car. Okay, I'm sorry. Okay, I'm sorry.

[Caroline]

So if you can't kill a woman.

[Katie]

We used to respect men in this country. The grunt. You go,

[Caroline]

I'm smiling like an idiot. So if you can't kill a woman for having sex out of wedlock or having sex for pleasure or not spending her life in service of a husband and a child, how do you punish her? Ideally, punish her to the point that she disappears into the role you want to play and ideally punish her such that she is a warning for others. You have to destroy her reputation. That's really the only avenue that's left that's available to you.

[Katie]

Oh, because she becomes the example. You want to make an example of her. So, like, other women will not do what she did.

[Caroline]

Exactly. You want to make other women afraid to basically, basically succeed. So I want to remind everyone what this conversation is about. Okay, it is about the Wicked co stars, but it is, what,

[Katie]

two hours, 20 minutes in, just to reorient us back to what we're talking about here,

[Caroline]

Katie, I said it was a Homer's Odyssey. I. I was very clear. So to remind everyone what this is about. This is about the Wicked stars, but this conversation is really about Ariana Grande. Because she is not only accused of. Accused of being a bad role model to the point that she shouldn't be on screen, she is accused of causing the eating disorders of the other women on set. So she is the person who has received the most fury, the most ire, a level of disgust in these videos and articles. That has again, was why I started writing this out. One is because I was so struck by how angry people were at someone for allegedly having an eating disorder. So I would remind everyone, Ariana is the source of all of this. Eye higher for being too thin. This is what she has done. And for those who think she has an eating disorder, and I'm going to be honest, a lot of clinicians have said, yeah, it looks like she could have an eating disorder. We should also remember this is a clinical mental disorder, a lifelong condition that is incredibly deadly and incredibly hard to overcome. You have one of the most accomplished singers of our generation who trained for over a year before her Wicked audition so that she would achieve the type of operatic soprano that she needed for the role, who gave five years of her life to this franchise, who succeeded in the level of acting demanded with her, who has just succeeded in transforming herself from a pop star into an Oscar contender. But that doesn't matter because the most important thing a woman can ever be is a role model, and she is not one. Okay, why? Because she's too thin. She's dangerously thin, Katie, and she's glorifying thinness to a TR generation of fans. And also she culturally appropriated. And also she was tanner before and now her skin is lighter. She has weight cycled, gained and lost weight.

[Katie]

She was.

[Caroline]

She used to have a Tumblr account that revealed an obsession with dieting. She has dated the wrong men. She has allegedly broken up a marriage and now she's too thin. And also she's weird with Cynthia Oro. And also she acts so fragile at these movie premieres. And also she seems to sell celebrate these photos of her that show how thin she is. And also her voice is so high now. Oh, and now she's saying publicly that she doesn't want people to comment on her weight and that it's not healthy or productive for people to make assumptions about other people's health. What a. She's trying to censor us. And also, and also, and also Rain Fisher Kwan said, and I quote, the ideal public facing woman is a product with plants and obsolescence. Never mind the fact that in order to become famous it is a requirement to be extremely thin. Never mind the fact that those who pursue this level of fame are often described as inherent perfectionists who are supremely ambitious and supremely goal oriented. Never mind the fact that the advent of fame itself, with all of its disorientation and all of the power that it both bestows upon and takes from you, seems like the perfect trigger for a singer or an actor or a model to define develop the lifelong mental disorder that is anorexia. Any woman who chooses to build a life outside the confines of wife and mother, if she fails, well, honey, of course she fails. You weren't supposed to do that to begin with. And if she succeeds, she will eventually be woman. In the 2000s, I think this looked much more blatant. But now that we talk in therapy speak, it sounds really, really good. It sounds really, really social justice warrior to say this woman is a bad role model and bad things are going to happen happen if we do not stop her, if we do not eliminate any conversation about her talent and elevate the conversation about how healthy or not healthy she is. And so instead of getting upskirt photos and all caps headlines about how fat Jessica Simpson is, we now have a self care language about how insert latest celebrity here is a bad role model. Not because it will help young women with eating disorders, because it won't. And not because we even understand what eating disorders are or how they work or what they mean. Because it doesn't seem like the Internet conversation seems to. Not because we're rapidly backsliding from a world where young girls knew what healthy bodies look like. Because we never actually had that. We need to do it because we need to destroy her reputation and we need to use her as a warning for other women who dare to succeed to the extent that Ariana Grande has succeeded.

[Katie]

Hmm.

[Caroline]

Maybe we get mad about an eating disorder, maybe we get mad about a personality disorder. Maybe we get mad about cultural appropriation or conservative dog whistles or bitchy past interviews or political incorrectness or saying too much or saying too little or being too capitalistic. But I think the point is that we will find something to get mad at. I think it's very fair to see hyper thin people and feel concern. And the clinicians that I spoke with were actually really torn on this. Some of them are like, hey, I understand why people want to talk about it. And some of them were like, yeah, I don't think it's productive for people to talk about it. But all of them agreed that talking about it isn't going to solve anything. Like, if you want to feel like, yeah, is it hurting much? I don't know. This is kind of the water we switch women. But, like, is it doing anything functional for how people see themselves? No, it's definitely not. And so I just think when you think about Wicked, this was a billion dollar franchise about female friendship. This was a billion dollar franchise with two unmarried, childless women who chose to ferociously support and uplift one another in the face of the public who were so moved by the experience that they had together that they often cried. And this was a billion dollar franchise in which two high performing, perfectionist women were thrust into a pressure cooker scenario of international expectations and visibility. And it would not surprise me if either of those women, either the pop star who has been under the microscope for decades, or the indie, up and comer black queer artist who is suddenly a household name, might have resorted to disordered eating as a way of trying to survive and to control the experience. And I just want to note, if a set of men went into this experience with any type of mental disorder, they would be celebrated for what they accomplished in spite of that fact. But when women do it, they are disqualified for what they have accomplished because of that fact. And I think that that is by and large why these women have been picked apart the way they have, and why Wicked has been consumed by this conversation about how thin they are.

[Katie]

Oh, my God. Caroline.

[Caroline]

I have a little bit more, but I want to leave room for your thoughts. Fuck my thoughts.

[Katie]

You don't need me for this podcast. I'm worthless. Wow. Just wow. I think the thing that's coming through most powerfully for me right now, and I'm so happy that we started the episode where we did did watching that clip and, like, understanding the power of that message and just like, what it means to this moment and then to journey all the way here, where you're telling me that the only thing people are talking about online with respect to these films is, like, whether Ariana Grande is too thin.

[Caroline]

And I also just want to say, like, a lot of people have talked about the movie. I think that it's just there is, again, this massive conversation taking place center. It's like a swirling heart hurricane.

[Katie]

But I think what's coming through most powerfully to me is this pretty clear discrepancy in how a woman like Ariana Grande, who is by all measures pretty exceptional in her talent, is allowed to be celebrated for that talent only insofar as she is also a morally upstanding person and how we don't demand or expect that of exceptional men. There's some wide receiver for the Dolphins who has been arrested for domestic violence, like, several times, but he's really fast. Like, he is really good. And it's kind of trippy to, like, watch a football game where, like, you hear the announcement, dancers celebrating somebody for being so talented, while you at the same time know that, like, they just posted bail for, oh, sure, like, beating the. Out of their pregnant girlfriend. And you're like, how is that not part of what we're talking about right now? Like, how are we able to, like, separate these things?

[Caroline]

Men are people. Men have nuance.

[Katie]

Oftentimes, the mistakes that these men are making are, like, actual crimes. They're not just, like, had enough fake fair or was bitchy in an interview or was a little difficult on set

[Caroline]

or has a mental disorder.

[Katie]

Or has a mental disorder. Right. And so I think it's. It's just I. You have sort of reframed for me in this conversation the prerequisites that we have for celebrating women's talent. That you can be talented, but you also have to be good in order for us to celebrate and approve you. And. And that's gonna stick with me for a long time. I think that is going to change the way that I interact with this sort of, like, celebrity content moving forward.

[Caroline]

I think we started this conversation with me saying the point of this was to kind of ground us in a conversation about, like, how do we live? How do we live right now in a world that is not defined by body liberation, that we are very far from being embodied. We're pretty far from even feeling empowered, as fraudulent as that may be. And I also said at the beginning, the goal is not to say whether or not these conversations should happen, because they are always happen happening. The Question is, like, what they mean and what we do with them. And so a lot of the people I spoke with talk about this stuff. Virginia Soul Smith, she and I kind of commiserated over, like, well, we can't tell other people not to talk about this. We talk about this. You know, I'm talking about Wicked. She wrote about Wicked. But I think that what I found really important was that every person I talked to about these topics was able to talk about the dangers of eating disorders and the toothless body positivity movement without transitioning to end all also. And I think that that is the line in the sand where, you know, that we are no longer having a good faith conversation. We are having a conversation about someone who is being woman. I would also say, you know, there were a lot of elements of what it means to be trauma informed that I learned on this journey. And I think that when you look at how not trauma informed these conversations are online, I think that that can be a little hint for you about how much these people know. And I don't mean that in a condescending way. I'm just like, if someone's using before and after pictures about a celebrity, they are not informed on how to talk to people about eating disorders. And so that's a good kind of red flag. I think we've learned that eating disorders can happen to anyone, any gender, any size. And if we all agree upon what an eating disorder is, which is like a clinical, potentially inheritable mental disorder that causes immense suffering to the person who has it, then I think that we should all be able to agree that a person can suffer from an eating disorder and still have value to offer offer and still feel able to walk down the street or sing on stage without being ostracized for being a bad role model. The Oscar front runner right now for the best male actor is Timothee Chalamet. He is also Skin and Bones, and no one has ever accused him of representing body image poorly for men.

[Katie]

So have you seen that TikTok? That's like Wonka. No. They're like, I don't want my Wonka as Tillame Shillime. That's the. That's not Willy Wonka. That's the kind of guy that has Jersey. Jersey sheets. He hasn't changed in months and, like, text you in the middle of the night. Oh, man.

[Caroline]

So we've talked a lot about how people talk about Ariana Grande. I want to give, like, a final recap. Ariana Grande started her career on Broadway. She then became a Child Disney star who transformed into one of the most successful pop stars in modern history. Before she was even 18, she suffered a terrorist bombing attack at a concert that killed multiple people, including children. She watched an ex boyfriend die of a very public drug overdose. She had a then fiance lock himself into an apartment and threatened to kill himself. In live streamed tweets to the public. She has openly discussed her battles with depression and post traumatic stress disorder. She has acknowledged having to often medicate to cope often with drugs and alcohol. She has asked the public to stop speculating on her private life across the spectrum. She has told people in interviews that the time in her life that they represent as having the healthiest body, quote unquote, was the most unhappy in her life. Do we know what is and is not true of these statements? No. Does it matter? I do not think so. Do we hold men to these standards? No. Men are not role models. They are people. We have to stop viewing women as role models. And so when I think about like living in the world that we live in, that is so far from body liberation. If you want to have a conversation about eating disorders, the number one element to this that stood out to me is access, access to recovery. Fat people should have access to eating disorder recovery. Men should have access to eating disorder recovery. And the number one way to approach that conversation is to end the stigma around assuming that you know what anorexia looks like. And that is like the biggest change that I think that you could make, but by posting a video or by having these conversations is by saying, hey, maybe this person has an eating disorder. She could. But like, just to be clear, a lot of people can have eating disorders and they don't necessarily present at it. So maybe we should stop talking about how it's obvious when someone has an eating disorder and the way that you talk about famous people will not reach them, but it will impact everyone around you. And I have been thinking about that a lot in the last year. I have tried to start talking to my friends without using like physical signifiers. And. And it has changed my life and how I think about myself.

[Katie]

It's very corny, but I think without using physical signifiers. Yeah, like instead of being like, oh

[Caroline]

my God, she's gorgeous, or like, well,

[Katie]

please still continue to call me gorgeous. I would ask her if you continue to talk to me.

[Caroline]

Well, yeah, that's because you're so intellectual that I actually exclusively use physical words with you because I have to balance it out. But I think that when a child or a friend or a Parent makes comments like the ones we've talked about today. I think it's really useful to remind people that other people's health is not theirs to speak, speculate on. That health is not a zero sum game. That's a very capitalistic thing that we have, that some woman's poor health is our problem and we have to pay for the bottom line. And the health care industry is buckling from all these premiums. That is not real. Someone can be unhealthy and not prioritize that. And that's okay. That's not something that we have to accept that everyone has to be striving for perfect health and that if they don't, you pay for it. And I think that we have to remind people that people with eating disorders, as well as people who are extremely thin, as well as people who are extremely fat, are still worthy of love and respect and can still achieve things, even if they don't ever overcome what you think that they need to overcome.

[Katie]

I'm so happy you said that because, well, it has become a little bit of a trope now where it's like, oh, Ariana Grande won't see the video where you are saying that she's a terrible person for being so skinny. But, like, your friend who has an eating disorder will.

[Caroline]

Right.

[Katie]

And, like, it's going to affect her or him.

[Caroline]

Right?

[Katie]

Yeah. And I think what you've also done for me today is highlighted just how absurd it is to be angry at.

[Caroline]

Right.

[Katie]

A public figure for having an eating disorder or to hold them responsible for a mental disorder.

[Caroline]

The condescension. Yeah, the anger that we have at women, like Jennifer Lawrence said, is really something to behold. And I will also just say I'll kind of end this conversation by saying that, like, this was a journey that I needed to take. I think that at points I have participated in this kind of womaning without realizing it and without always being totally aware of what's taking place. And I think that I still sometimes will have a knee jerk impulse to be angrier at a woman than a man. And I think that for a podcast that spends so much time, I think righteously talking about women and women's issues, it is really important to hold ourselves to those standards and to always be trying to get better at that, at being like, how do we learn about this? What does this tell us about the world? And how. How do we stop short of. And also. And also. And also.

[Katie]

Except for Kristi Noem.

[Caroline]

Except for Kristi Noem, I am going

[Katie]

to exclusively apply misogyny When I talk about Kristi Noem and that's it.

[Caroline]

That's the conversation.

[Katie]

I reserve the right. I have a list of four women who I can be virulently misogynistic with.

[Caroline]

Yeah, okay. That's the end.

[Katie]

Wow. Brava. That was excellent.

[Caroline]

Thank you. I hope you had fun.

[Katie]

You absolutely killed that. I like am in awe. That was your best one ever.

[Caroline]

The entire movie you can see like her jowls.

[Katie]

She had to stop doing press for Wicked because of her ed and how physically unwell she was.

[Caroline]

You can see her face caving in.

[Katie]

How do we make sure this doesn't happen to our next generation of young girls?

[Caroline]

Somewhere over the Rainbow Taylor Swift is a covert narcissist and says that a lot of these moments that seem playful between her and her collaborators are actually a means to humiliate them.

[Katie]

Haley Bieber is a means mean girl. She is actually just as petty as everyone thinks she is. She doesn't do anything all day. Like she is just sitting at home

[Caroline]

and she does have the time to

[Katie]

be as petty as we think that she is. Bella Hadid went from showing us herself

[Caroline]

hooked up to IVs and medical devices

[Katie]

to partying, drinking and allegedly using substances the following week.

[Caroline]

Bella Hadid uses Lyme disease as an excuse and a cover up for her substance abuse. That's the way you find

[Katie]

me.

[Jamila Jamil]

The Amber Heard and Johnny Depp trial.

[Caroline]

She got diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder. The complete lack of remorse. If you watched her on it, she

[Katie]

was constantly like looking at the jury

[Caroline]

and it was the women trying to

[Katie]

get them on the side.

[Caroline]

Blake Lively is gross. Blake claims that Justin Fat shamed her by asking people how much she weighed and joking that he could never lift her. If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow why oh why can't I? I am a big, big fan. I love Hillshrin.

[Katie]

For years I listen to a lot

[Caroline]

of her music literally every day. I was literally just concerned about her. But let me know what y' all think in the comment section below and make sure to follow me for more pop culture content.