Why are women ' dying' to be thin?

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To be sure, female suppression of our suffer from one of these disorders, and "The Famine Within," a documentary appetites and needs, even as we provide that is only one end of a long continuum.

AUL ULCID, IS UCEPtY JUICU u Juucu- Chris All, the heavier sister of super- symbolize only negative characteristics Gilday. Christian culture, beginning with Eve model Carol Alt (she of the Sports "l'd rather be dead than be fat," asserts the Garden of Eden. Medieval women Illustrated swimsuit issue), described how and lazy." an emaciated young woman in "The starved themselves as a gesture of piety. she felt when she saw a picture of Karen Famine Within." This new film exam- And who can forget Scarlet O'Hara eat- Carpenter shortly before the singer died of if fat were a moral characteristic instead Wing before she went to a party in "Gone anorexia: "I thought she was lucky to be of a physical one," cultural anthropolooppression-the expectation to look, if With the Wind," and then stuffing herself that skinny when she died, and I wondered gist Margaret MacKensie says in the into a corset so that she wouldn't eat any- how I could get that thin without dying." film.

Every day, people are bombarded by thing when she was actually with other Any number of female role models The recent spate of interest in women's thousands of images of svelte, slim, 110- people? Girdles, brassiers, garter belts, have acknowledged that they too were complex relationship with food and the pound, beautiful women. On TV and in and heels, besides restricting women's anorexic or bulimic to fit into their stereotypes that feed it (Henry Jaglom's films, billboards, and magazines, the movement, are all designed to make us assigned roles. They include actress Jane recent "Eating" and the comic strip images purveyed of women are all based look taller and thinner than we naturally Fonda, gymnast Nadia Comaneci, and "Cathy") have given new meaning to the ballerina Suzanne Farrell—who reports in old phrase "fat is a feminist issue." As her autobiography that the dance world is social and political barriers fall for only role models proffered to young An explosion of eating disorders a breeding ground for bulimia, and that women, we are still imprisoned by a culFor centuries, women have been social- North American ballerinas are on average tural ethos that enjoins us to change just a culturally imposed ideal that is unrealis- ized to think of ourselves first and 10 Ibs. lighter than their European coun- ourselves, and not the society that has tic and unrealizable for the vast majority. foremost as a "sight" for others. But terparts.

According to the film, the prevailing despite, and perhaps because of, women's "I'm always going to eat later, and later When high-profile men like Gandhi and cultural misogyny is so virulent that mil- changing roles and aspirations, there has never comes," says Linda, a 27-year-old Bobby Sands starve themselves, it's conlions of women are suffering and dying been a 30-year trend towards an ever-slim- anorexic interviewed in the film. Linda, sidered a political event. But when mer ideal. This has led to an explosion of like 15 percent of all anorexics, is dead millions of women do it, they're consid"The cult of the body is the only coher- eating disorders that are as common today now.

"The Famine Within" explores not just and unknown. That may be difficult to offered," says a cultural historian in the The average five-feet, eight-inch Miss the pathology of eating disorders; it tries stomach, but it's certainly food for film, and this amounts to a "brilliant America contestant weighed 132 1bs. in to put them in a cultural context. Like thought.

Operation Rescue fails in D.C. attacks Hundreds of enthusiastic clinic defenders mobilized at 5:30 a.m. in Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia, prepared to confront Operation Rescue's "Capitol Project" attacks on Washington-area women's health clinics Jan. 20-22.

Operation Rescue (OR) had announced its campaign to make Washington, D.C., "another Wichita" during the week of Jan. 22, the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion throughout the United States. (This summer OR carried out several weeks of massive blockades of abortion clinics in Wichita,Kan.)

However, reality was far different than Operation Rescue's plans. Although OR had announced three days of activities, no blockades took place on Monday, Jan. 20. On Tuesday, three Washington clinics were blockaded by anti-abortion fanatics.

Two remained open throughout the attack due to well-organized pro-choice escorts and clinic defenders, who were able to ensure that patients could safely enter. The third clinic was closed for 15 minutes, but quickly reopened for all patients.

On Jan. 22, which was supposed to be the culmination of their activities, OR found itself outnumbered by militant pro-choice activists. The less than 300 "rescuers" who attempted to shut down two clinics were met by approximately 700 defenders. OR was also stymied when their plans to transport themselves in the back of U-Haul trucks was disclosed by pro-choice shadowers to the police, who declared their attempt illegal and removed them from the trucks.

When Randall Terry, founder of Operation Rescue, arrived at one of the clinics, he was greeted with chants of "All the clinics are open!" and "Operation Failure!"

Michele Douglas of the Maryland Clinic Defense Task Force, explained afterwards: "We are much more galvanized and able to outsmart and outnumber them.

They have proven by yesterday's actions that they are the fanatical extreme. That is why their numbers are dropping. Our numbers continue to increase, as through outreach, the pro-choice community—which we know is the majority-understands 1954 and 117 Ibs. in 1980. The average North American woman is five-feet, fourinches tall and weighs 144 Ibs., while the average model is five-feet, ten-inches tall and weighs 111 Ibs., or 23 percent less alam unan average.

In Gilday's film, a modeling agency executive describes a contest they held to turn up "new talent." Forty thousand women applied, and only four were thought to have possibilities.

The film then considers the extent to which even young girls are subject to society's mania for thinness. A recent study found that 80 percent of fourthgrade girls in California had already been on their first diets. Another survey found that 75 percent of young women thought themselves too fat, even though 45 percent of them were actually underweight.

Over half of North American women are on a diet at any given time, and they are happier about losing weight than about success in their careers or in love.

This debilitating physical ideal has enriched the pushers of diets, weightreduction drugs, fitness centers, and liposuction. At the same time, it has engendered an epidemic of anorexia nervosa (self-starvation) and bulimia (eating, then throwing up or using laxatives). It form of political oppression." is estimated that 25 percent of women eating the apple getting us kicked out of ines a little-talked-about side of female not act, in a preordained way.

on what we look like, rather than what are. we do in the world. These models are the women, and many become obsessed with from eating disorders. they will not re-open.

So far, no arrests been made, and Springfield police claim to have no suspects or even a firm motive for the assault.

hospitalized in fair condition a week after the attack.

Planned Parenthood of Southwest Missouri. accessible abortion services. the need to oppose the fanatical fringe." famine, millions of women starving themselves is a social phenomenon, not just an individual psychological aberration.

The film's title describes the inner empuness tnar women reel inat can never • I=-1 at be satisfied with food, and how, given the lack of viable role models and opportunities, women's energy is absorbed by the one thing we think we can control-the size and shape of our bodies.

Taking the die out of diet In the film, we learn that women are naturally predisposed to be fatter than men, and that a certain amount of body fat is necessary for both menstruation and childbirth. The trend towards an everskinnier ideal is seen as a backlash against women's growing power (if not their size). Roundness is identified with femininity and passivity, and leanness with competence and success.

The film goes on to explain that there isn't a strong correlation between calories and ovuy sint, did wal yo-yu woung vau and hadi arin and thnt in in dintina nan actually cause you to gain weight because it slows down the rate of metabolism. (Witness the public examples of Elizabeth Taylor and Oprah Winfrey-who lost 67 Ibs. on a liquid diet, only to gain it all back).

In polar opposition to thin (you can never be too rich or too thin") the social stigma attached to obesity has come to e.g., "fat and ugly, ," "fat and stupid," "fat "We've created a morals of biology, as given rise to such misbegotten attempts.

ered fashion casualties and die unnamed fails in D.

By JULIA STEINBERG

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into a metal cell, with a concrete floor chess or other games to pass along the Currently I share a squad bay with 30 I've lived in isolation-even from famconfined to the brig, and my new address other men, and I'm required to keep my ily, friends, and supporters-for the last 563491139, Building 1041, Camp Leje- er. My living situation is best likened to ed freedom, being at Camp Lejeune halanninna indor mir hunt in a fantlart. eioht months and have exnerienced limit[the] Spartan living conditions of a recent without transportation. So, incarceration think. I've been on active duty at Camp recruit to the army, minus the constant in a military prison is not that great a Lejeune since March waiting for my harassment of a drill instructor.

By and large, time goes pretty quickly what I've already experienced in boot on the weekdays, because of the work camp and on active duty.

Regimental military life in general is details prisoners are assigned. Working in I don't regret one bit standing up for like prison. You can't do what you want, the workshop making tables or picking my beliefs and speaking out against the and there is someone always looking over up garbage on a base work detail, for United States' imperialist policies. I'll be example, keeps one's mind busy on a out of prison before I know it and back I've been assigned to the sewing shop economic and social justice. exists between the guard and the prisoner. to repair torn sleeping bags and other ser- Thank you for all your support. It is Do as you're told, and don't question viceable military items.

Free time starts at 1800 hours [6:00 that I've been able to beat down the Unlike the active duty Marine, though, p.m.] on the weekdays and at 0900 19:00 Marine Corps' ridiculous threats of seven if I disobeyed orders, I would go into a.m.] on holidays and weekends. It con- years to life and end up only being solitary (segregation), get a diet restricted sists of a five-minute warm shower, a charged with unauthorized missing of a to 700 calories per měal, and lose privi- few hours of watching TV or listening to troop movement. leges, such as reading or writing the radio, and plenty of time to read and I'll see you all in five months! materials. The worse punishment is write. Some of my fellow prisoners In solidarity with the other resisters. going to Q Row, which means being put enjoy playing backgammon, spades, Dear friends at Socialist Action, Thank you for the latest issue. I'm is the following: Erik Larsen, une, N.C., 28542.

Doing time isn't as bad as some might court martial, so in a sense I've already been marking time.

your shoulder to keep you in line.

The power relationship between the task. sergeant and the private is similar to what authority, or else! That is the maxim. and no clothes and a blanket. hours. shock to me. It's not much different from out organizing for a mass movement for through the work of folks like yourselt Erik Larsen