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Become a Media Watchdog to Help Wipe Out Eating Disorders

The National Eating Disorder Association has created a media watchdog program that strives to improve the way the media presents issues related to beauty and weight. The program's goal is to get eating disorder patients, along with educators, health professionals, and consumers, to pay more attention to the way body shape and beauty are presented in the media, and to make the media more responsible for the messages it creates and disseminates. The hope of the media watchdog program is to get the public to examine media images with a critical eye. By becoming more conscious of media images, their hope is that media watchdogs will encourage advertisers and companies to respond to consumers' concerns regarding how beauty and weight issues are portrayed in the media.

What does it mean to become a media watchdog? Becoming a media watchdog means that you begin to view media advertisements with a critical eye, monitoring TV, radio, magazine, and film for messages that may have a negative impact on issues of body image, weight, and beauty. Anyone who has an interest in monitoring media messages regarding beauty, body image, and weight issues can sign up through the National Eating Disorders Association website. As a media watchdog, you will commit yourself to becoming conscious of the way these issues are handled in the media. You and other media watchdogs are encouraged to send messages to the National Eating Disorders Association that either protest or praise the way different businesses and advertisers handle such issues. The association reviews these messages, and once each quarter they choose one of these messages to present to a company or advertiser, sending the message on behalf of all the media watchdogs. Each media watchdog can choose whether they would like their names signed on the final memo sent by the association. Once the final memo has been prepared, it is posted on the association's website.

Just what should media watchdogs watch for in the media? The National Eating Disorders Association suggest that media watchdogs look for how ads and other media present issues related to body shape and size. The association has recommendations for those ads that can be praised. Ads that show women of various natural body shapes, and those that look beyond physical beauty to determine individuals perceived worth. Ads that show people leading healthy lives and eating well-balanced meals are also to be praised. Ads that are considered offensive are those that portray large individuals in a negative light. They may seem to present emaciated models in a positive light. The ad may be presenting thinness as the standard of ideal beauty. The ad may glamorize unhealthy habits or way present food products as a way to relieve frustration, loneliness, or stress. When analyzing the media, consider what type of product is being sold (if any), and what kinds of images are used to make a point. Consider what the overall message and theme of the advertisement is, and decide what kind of message it sends to someone who may be vulnerable to developing an eating disorder.