Week 5, Friday - Lesson 16

I have decided what notes I will be pulling from the Mirror article. I have nearly finished my treatment and my three-column script, I just need to remove some words and decide if all is necessary in the treatment or if it can have the same effect in the three-column script. I will be working on this over the weekend as it is due Monday. The following notes is what I will be including in the documentary. I will be using a range of voiceovers as well as pull quotes as this will have a greater impact than just the voiceover.

‘Thinspiration selfies almost killed me’ (25/2/16) http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/real-life-stories/thinspiration-selfies-killed-me-anorexia-5245488

India Edmonds, 17, developed anorexia at the age of 14 after becoming obsessed with ‘Thinspiration’ images, which led her to starving herself. She began making herself sick, cutting food from her diet and followed a demanding exercise regime.

After six months of dieting, India’s weight plummeted and she eventually blacked out.  India spent seven months in hospital from March – September 2013

(She said: “I love looking back at my pictures to see how my body was changing. My favourite pose was standing in front of a mirror and photographing my thigh gap and seeing how big it was getting.”  Chillingly, India received thousands of messages from girls who wanted to look like her at her lowest weight – skeletal.)

During a Mirror investigation, it found pro-anorexia Instagram pages, including 12-year old Anna who has over 2,000 followers predominately other sufferers, with some as young as the age of ten. Her profile consisting of tips and body goals to aspire to. She captions her images - 

(One like = one hour of fasting,” It has 27 likes.)

(“0 Calories today”)

These images and captions normalize these extremes to others, believing that this is acceptable and a way of living. This is evident through the comments on the images, with many of them contain shocking comments, these include:

(“WOW! How many purges?” asks on 13- year old user. “I wish I was that skinny.”)

Lucie Russell, Director of Campaign at Young Minds has dedicated her life to supporting teenagers with mental health issues. She states,

(“Seeing these girls connecting in this way is very concerning and worrying,” Russell says. “They are encouraging each other to get thinner and thinner and no one is there to stop it.”)

The majority of social media platforms require users to be of a certain age but there is no way of enforcing these rules.

A spokesperson for Instagram states (“Instagram is a place where people can share their lives with others through photographers, but anybody found encouraging or urging users to embrace anorexia or other eating disorders will result in a disabled account without warning.)

All social media platforms provide a report or block option but with over 70 million images shared Instagram per day, it is extremely difficult to control and monitor what is being shared on the Internet.