I love the Internet. I really do. I’m able to waste hours of my time watching videos of cats wearing tights and pinning recipes I know I will never use, all in good fun.
However, the Internet can also be a place where the inner demons of millions come to play behind the anonymous keys of a computer. Our worst thoughts and fleeting fantasies can be shared with the world with just a few strokes of a keyboard — usually for the worst.
For every inspiring post or website you stumble across online, you’re sure to find twice as many that make you stop and question the state of humanity. I came across one such post this week.
This article comes from a website called Return of Kings. The title of this horrific piece of opinion writing is “5 Reasons to Date a Girl with an Eating Disorder.”
You read that correctly: five reasons to date a girl with a serious medical condition that is in no way a joke — a medical condition that takes the lives of some people each and every day.
Like many major news sources that reported about this vile web posting, I hesitated before choosing to discuss it here, as the backlash has only heightened traffic to the Return of Kings website and is likely what the article had intended to do all along.
Still, to even have the audacity to write such material in a supposed jest to encourage revulsion and boost website views is beyond my comprehension. The Huffington Post reported that Return of Kings declares on its homepage that “women and gay men will be banned from posting,” clearly establishing itself as a sexist, homophobic and overly ‘masculine’ site—and therefore not qualified to be recognized as anything along the lines of legitimacy.
The reasons given for dating girls with an eating disorder include such statements as, “she’s fragile and vulnerable…she’s eager to please and wants nothing more than your approval.”
I know several women (and men) who have struggled with or are currently fighting an eating disorder, and though I can’t claim to be able to speak for them or their own personal circumstances, I can state that eating disorders are all consuming and mentally debilitating, with the target of the disease being your own body and mind.
Stating that girls with eating disorders “cost less money” because she’s likely to “just eat a side dish, if that” is not in the least way charming, witty or sly. It’s psychotic and hurtful.
Women and men with eating disorders are human beings who each and every day struggle on a level most of us can only imagine. They need support, not web posts by a cowardly author too ashamed to use his own name in publication, spouting off jokes (if you can even call them that) about a serious condition.
Regardless of the intent of the initial publication, “5 Reasons to Date a Girl with an Eating Disorder” deserves every bit of venom being hurled its way. Tasteless, offensive and destructive media such as this proves the Internet can be an awful, awful place. I only hope the body acceptance responses can override this article and spell the end for Return of Kings as a website.
