Through my findings, I found there
to be a broad spectrum of blogs from political to personal interests to diets
to support groups to product reviews. I find myself having mixed views on
blogging. With freedom of speech we are allowed to blog about issues that
others may find to be harming yet the bloggers themselves defend their stand
point and see no wrong.
Blogs that I found to be more
harmful than in any way beneficial are the ones found on pro ana and pro mia
webpages. Pro ana is a site that allows people that want to fight obesity with
thinspiration to share tips and tricks on how to lose weight, become/stay thin,
and stay alive. Pro mia (Pro Bulimia) providing the same services to bloggers.
The bloggers are very motivational and support each other through fasting and
will do this as a team. They give tips to help decide what your inner ana wants
and not your personal wants and needs. You will also find inspirational
readings that talk address your inner thoughts on food and tell you the
responses to have to these thoughts in a way to help one succeed.
I found these blogs to be scary and
sad for our future generations. For one of my prior papers I found a personal
account from an Anorexia survivor that had the disorder before the blogs
existed. She talked about the difficulty of the disorder in her time and stated
that she couldn’t imagine a time with pro ana and mia sites that allow fellow
anorexia and bulimia people to share stories and support for one another. She
thinks that recovering from the disorder in today’s society would be unimaginably
harder than it was for her when she was battling the disorder.
A blogging site that conflicts
with these blogs is called Medusa where they show pictures and stories of
people that suffered with anorexia and bulimia. This site allows survivors to
tell their stories and how they battled their disorder. It also shares stories
of people who unfortunately ended up dead at the hand of these eating
disorders. This blogging site I think is much needed since there is such a huge
support group on the opposing sites.
Two other blogging sites that I found
seemed harmless in nature. One of the blogging sites was BoingBoing that had
many blogs for a broad area of interests one in particular was about a ring
that branded the word married upon the wedding ring finger. On this blog I
found there only negative blogs that all seemed to come from men. The other
blogging site that I found was on Kelley Blue book website. On these blogs one
is able to see personal blogs from people that have had experience with a
particular vehicle which helps in the decision making on choosing a vehicle.
I think
that there are a lot of components that go into deciding the quality of a
blogging site and differ from blog to blog. Some of these qualities are pool
and number of bloggers, reliability of site, and references.
Before reading your entry I had always considered the emotional damage that a blog can cause, but I never really thought about the physical damage. I mean blogs can be misinformative sometimes, but I am shocked to hear that websites such as Pro ana and Pro mia exist. I am even more upset about the idea of a student, who is struggling with their weight stumbling across a website like that. On the other hand, I think websites like the Medusa one can really serve as educational tools for students, because they are real life examples of the consequences of living a life of anorexia or bulimia. How do you think these types of awareness blogs will affect students? I agree with you that a quality blog is dependent on the reliability of a site and the references I am not as sure about the number of bloggers. If Pro ana has a thousand bloggers does that make it quality? If a Yale Research blog only has three users does that make both the blog and research worth any less? Overall, I found your blog to be very interesting.
ReplyDeleteThe way they are going about their blogs has changed since I last visited the site. They seem to be defending their site more so than they used to. They basically inform interested readers that they are not condoning the "practice" but that they are simply just blogging with other members about their goals and diet plans. What gets me the most is that they are calling it a diet plan. Which makes it even worse!! This will allow one to think that Anorexia and Bulimia are OKAY.
ReplyDeleteYou raise an interesting issue about the harm that blogs can do. What role does schooling play in protecting our young people, or is it all in the hands of parents?
ReplyDeleteI think that the schools can help make students aware of eating disorders and other harmful habits. But I also know that family has a huge impact on an individuals life. So I believe that being open with your children is vital. Although there is no sure way to avoid this. Patients with these disorders come from a vast backgrounds therefore making the trigger hard to pinpoint.
DeleteYou make a really good point about how blogs can be harmful. I didn't even cross my mind that their could be blogs about things such as eating disorders. You really made me think about the impact that blogs could have on people. Great insight!
ReplyDeleteI never really thought about it either until I heard about these blogs. Since these were the first blogs that I ever saw I was initially hesitant towards the ideas of blogs. But after our experiences in this class I really find them to be helpful in a controlled educational environment.
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