by Helena

Helena is a 21-year-old woman who identified first as nonbinary, and later as a transgender man, from 2013 through 2018. In 2016, she began medical transition by taking testosterone, and detransitioned two years later. During her teen years, Helena was an avid member of several Tumblr “communities”: trans/gender identity, eating disorders, and self-harm.

This piece is the second in a series of articles that analyze aspects of Tumblr Helena has observed as detrimental to the massive numbers of youth who call the site their virtual home. The focus of this article is the self-harm and pro-anorexia Tumblr worlds. Part 1 is here.

Helena can be found on Twitter @lacroicsz and is a member of the Pique Resilience Project, a group of four detransitioned/desisted women creating multimedia content about their experiences.

In Part 1, I described a few elements of Tumblr’s design that compromise the perception and communication of its users. Now we will take a look at some of the ways Tumblr’s unique atmosphere has given life to dangerous subcultures that have engulfed the lives of countless young people, mostly girls, in the last decade.

Introverted, angst-ridden, struggling adolescents across the globe are now faced with the risk of becoming inundated with content from self-harm blogs, pro-anorexia blogs, social-justice blogs that encourage self-diagnosis of mental illness, the use of mental illness as social currency, and gender identity ideology that is even more logically flawed and emotionally driven than in the mainstream. In this piece, I will discuss the self-harm community, and the pro eating-disorder community, both of which I have had personal experience belonging to. The community surrounding gender identity and dysphoria, the one with which I am most familiar, will be discussed in depth in Part 3.

Self-Harm Tumblr

The community of bloggers that filmed and shared photos, gifs, and written glorifications of self-harm behavior, often called “self-harm Tumblr” or “self-harm blogs,” was nearly eradicated when Tumblr prohibited the practice in 2012, but the long-term impact of such a dark and abnormal presence on the character of the site–and the teenagers who use(d) it–are still very evident. During their heyday, these blogs permeated Tumblr with graphic, slow motion, black-and-white gifs of razors slicing through flesh or dramatic quotes about suicide that were available simply by typing “self-harm” or “suicide” into the search bar.

Here’s how it worked: Imagine you’re a sad teenage girl circa 2012. Maybe you hate your body, or you’re conflicted about your sexuality, or you don’t fit in with your peers, or your home life is disordered. You’ve started using Tumblr a lot; you love that you can search anything you’re thinking of in the moment and instantly be gratified with awesome fan art of your favorite characters or updates on your favorite TV shows. But on this day, it’s not your teen idol or some BBC show that’s on your mind. Instead, it’s painful thoughts of self-hatred or even suicide. Maybe it’s the crushing feeling that your parents don’t love you. Maybe they’re too busy fighting to reassure you they probably do. Whatever it is, it’s not good, and like with everything else, you don’t have many places to turn to with this kind of thing. Your parents won’t understand, you don’t want to bother your best friend with your complaining for the umpteenth time that day, and listening to emo songs isn’t hittin’ like usual. So you do what you always do when you’re lonely and stimulated: you go on Tumblr. You type “depression” in the search bar, and a thousand posts like this come up:

Feels good. Feels validating. All that energy vibrating in your chest is matched by the black-and-white moving picture on the screen in front of you. You scroll down, and what do you know, there’s more. An infinite supply, always updating, because thousands of people just like you are posting more and more of these depression-aesthetic memes every day.

Now let’s say that at some point you do begin to self harm. Maybe you saw it in a music video, or your best friend started doing it, or you even saw it in a Tumblr gif, but through whatever means, the thought of venting your feelings into your own skin with a razor blade finds its way into your head. Or maybe you want to self harm, the desire is burning within you, but you’re scared. Not to worry, go back to Tumblr and type in “self harm” or “cutting.” You’ll get another infinite supply of addictive, dopamine machine guns. But this time, they’re bloody. A lot of them are matched with captions that strike you as relatable. The gore is mesmerizing, you can’t look away. There’s something about watching blood pour or ooze (whether from your own self harm or from one of these gifs) that feels analgesic. Before you know it, you’ve been lying there in your bed for hours, body limp except for your thumb stroking your smartphone’s screen as you scroll through these countless images.

If you’ve never self harmed before, this might make you wanna try. Click here to view some examples of Tumblr self-harm posts, but be warned–they are graphic. These images, and the act of self harm, will make you feel better for a moment by flooding your body with endorphins as it resonates with and then tries to cope with the  stinging pain, but the second another stressor, another hopeless thought comes your way, you have to go back again. It’s a deal with the devil, but there’s a reason so many kids have been seduced into shaking his hand.

No one is born with the desire to slice their flesh every time they feel upset, and previously, self-harming behavior was seen only in the most severe psychiatric cases. Ordinary teenage girls were not cutting themselves to the point of hospitalization a few generations ago, and the statistics reflect that. According to a study released in 2017 which evaluated ER visits for nonfatal injuries amongst adolescents from 2001 to 2015, rates of ER visits among youth “showed no statistically significant trend until 2008, increasing 5.7% annually thereafter and reaching 303.7 per 100 000 population in 2015. Age-adjusted trends for males overall and across age groups remained stable throughout 2001-2015. Overall age-adjusted rates for females demonstrated no statistically significant trend before 2009, yet increased 8.4% yearly from 2009 to 2015. After 2009, rates among females aged 10 to 14 years increased 18.8% per year—from 109.8 per 100, 000 in 2009 to 317.7 in 2015. Rates among females aged 15 to 19 years showed a 7.2% increase on average per year during 2008-2015.” (Mercado et. al.)

Note the statistic that the rates of female self-injury hospitalizations were stagnant until 2008, when they suddenly began increasing. Keep in mind that correlation does not equal causation, and cultural phenomena seldom have one clear explanation, but the fact that Tumblr was launched in 2007, and really picked up speed in 2008, should not go ignored in this discussion.

These self-harm blogs were not simply the online diaries of depressed teenagers, but a thriving community in which mental illness became identity. The images, and the captions that accompany them, often reinforced depressive ruminations, such as: No one cares about the self harmer, the self harmer will be depressed forever, and suicide and self harm are justifiable ways of coping with negative emotions. It is this way of thinking, this immersion in depressive thought, and the resentment and alienation that results from suffocating yourself in this maladaptive coping mechanism on a constant basis, that paved the way for later subgroups surrounding mental illness.

Pro-Anorexia Tumblr

“Pro-Ana” culture existed years before Tumblr, with the first pro-Ana websites emerging in the 1990s, when the already existing real-life pro-Ana movement moved online. The issue was brought to public attention in 2001 when Oprah Winfrey discussed it on her television show, and the world was shocked to learn that not only was anorexia a prevalent threat to young girls, but that many of these girls seemed overjoyed to be suffering from it.

Since the pro-Ana movement has been so widespread for so long, there’s actually quite a bit of literature and research on the topic of social contagion and eating-disorder “symptom pooling,” that is, when sufferers of the same mental illness band together and form an echo chamber that exacerbates the symptoms of the illness. This article from the Social Issues Research Centre gives a good introduction to the inner workings of popular pro-ED websites, and much more information is available online. Pro-Ana culture is known for its users’ belief that they are not sick, but simply being themselves and making a lifestyle choice to be more “disciplined” than people who do not choose to be anorexic. The name “Ana,” as opposed to using the terms “anorexia” or “eating disorder,” personifies the illness almost as a goddess to be worshipped.

Pro-Ana ideology is one contradiction after the next, with users glorifying the illness, how it has empowered them, how in-control and serene they feel when they starve, how much better their life is since finding their pro-Ana friends, and how they “trigger” each other to victory–yet, in the next breath, advising that “if you don’t have an ED, turn away now. You don’t want to be like me.” It is a highly addictive formula of community, purpose, coping mechanisms, and a simultaneous god and victim complex.

While all of this is pretty standard for pro-Ana communities, the Tumblr pro-Ana community is unique. It doesn’t (and never did) have the same degree of vitriol, and has always been heavier on victimization. While some pro-Ana communities see themselves as a quasi-political class who have the right to starve themselves because that’s what they believe is right for them, the Tumblr pro-Ana community treats anorexia more like the mental illness it is. This doesn’t come close to solving the problem, though, since Tumblr has some twisted attitudes towards mental illness in the first place. Whereas other pro-Ana communities focus on the sheer act of starvation as fulfillment through self-mastery, the Tumblr pro-Ana community sets its sights on the end goals of the perpetual diet. Many of them view it less as a lifestyle choice for the rest of their lives, but more as a necessary evil to achieve a standard of living that is tolerable to them. They focus on what they will be able to do when they are thin, how they will look, and how much better life will be. Then, they can stop starving (or so they believe)– almost as if their anorexia is a transition to a different existence, a new body, a new life (the parallels with the trans/gender dysphoric Tumblr communities are quite obvious here).

There is a heartbreaking air of hopefulness in the anorexic community on Tumblr. They are not pro-Ana because they chose it to feel superior, they are pro-Ana because they feel they must be. They cannot survive another day seeing their reflections, and the fat they see on their bodies (even when there is none left) is more than aesthetically displeasing to them: it contains the very cause of all of their suffering. Every moment of pain since birth has been because they are too fat, they eat too much, they’re too out of control–as if losing a dangerous amount of weight would resolve the mental patterns that drove them to take such self-destructive measures in the first place.

Tumblr pro-Ana is a much more hopeful, naive pro-Ana culture than others online. It was born of the original culture in the 1990s, but influenced by the unique attitude Tumblr has developed towards self-harming behavior and mental illness. Users will repeat again and again, “no one chooses to be anorexic…” “if I could stop being this way I would…” and to a certain extent, this is true. No one can “snap out” of an eating disorder, but the Tumblr culture goes beyond acknowledging the difficulty of recovery. Anorexia is viewed not as a lifestyle choice, like in other pro-Ana communities, but as an inescapable battle bestowed upon these girls that they must fight, else they will never be happy. They were born to be redeemable failures, out-of-control gluttons, and every miserable moment traces back to the pounds that could be lost. Their only hope at survival is to beat their bodies into submission to rid themselves of the visible, tangible, evidence of their curse: fat. This is how anorexia ceases to be defined as a mental illness, ceases to be defined as a “lifestyle”, and begins its definition as an identity. It transcends the material and becomes spiritual. Some people are just born to suffer like this, and they have to learn to love it.

To an outsider, it seems convoluted. Unbelievable, even. It is so far removed from sanity that it is difficult for me to explain in a way that will convey even a fraction of the many ideological layers that have developed within Tumblr’s pro-Ana community. But to them, at least to the extent they are able to convince themselves, it’s not that crazy. It makes sense: you’re a fat ugly failure and you have to do something about it! Extreme normalization of this truly dangerous behavior has always existed in pro-Ana circles, where anorexics even go so far as to see their path as superior to a non-anorexic existence. On other pro-Ana sites, this looks like intense competition, purposefully “triggering” others by being heartlessly demeaning and catty, and exchanging tips on how to hide the severity of their illness from parents, friends, and doctors (including within inpatient psychiatric facilities).

On Tumblr, the approach is similar but less aggressive. “Meanspo” (meaning something to the tune of “mean thinspo,” a type of post in which the writer purposefully writes triggering, mean, messages but warns the reader beforehand) is distinguished from other posts, because as opposed to other communities’ competitive, vicious nature, the Tumblr pro-Ana community is soft and friendly. They understand themselves as a large congregation of friends, helpless in the face of the symptoms they share, and the only way to help each other is to be very sweet and lose as much weight as possible, to stave off the demons.

And if you’re not in the mood to be called a fat pig, don’t worry, there’s “sweetspo”: thinspo that is kind and loving, something these girls might not usually experience. Or if they do, they don’t feel worthy of accepting this love from anybody but Ana. But don’t get it twisted, Ana is only nice in the context of getting you back on track to lose weight. No “you don’t deserve to do this to yourself,” no “you don’t have to torture your body to avoid suffering.” There is no option presented by the pro-Ana community that does not fit within the confines of the ideology; rather, comforting sentiments are used to strengthen the sense of emotional isolation and dependency members of the community feel.

Something that has always been intriguing about the pro-Ana movement is its propensity for viewing itself almost as a minority group of sorts. On the original forum platforms for pro-Ana discussion, this manifested in members believing anorexia is a “lifestyle”, and that their choices deserve to be respected. A “good Ana doesn’t die”, and doctors or loved ones who attempt to intervene are violating the autonomy of the anorexic. With this came a militancy designed to keep girls in line and constantly living and spreading the lifestyle, because an easygoing, accepting atmosphere would not achieve results. This is why the pro-Ana social contagion reached the levels it did in the 1990s and early 2000s; it was a fierce battleground where the narrative proclaimed that only the strong survive, and the strongest will place first. But really it was the resulting group belligerence that emerged from this narrative, rather than the any truth to the narrative itself, that carried so many young women and girls through years of self destruction.

Other ideological groups on Tumblr are also popularly associated with a similar militancy, but the core dysfunctions of these groups, including the Tumblr pro-Ana community, are unique in the way they create psychological dependence. Other pro-Ana communities would create this dependence by fostering a competitive atmosphere in which it would be unacceptable to fall behind. Members were expected to display their starting weight, current weight, progress, and goal weights on every post and comment in the form of a signature. There would be daily threads requesting Anas to post their food intake diaries, and it would be an absolute disgrace to answer that you had Granny Smith apple slices, chicken breast, and 2.5 tootsie rolls when other girls only drank cucumber icewater all day. If you couldn’t run with the Alphas, the whole pack left you behind, it was that simple. In contrast, emotional dependency is created on Tumblr more through curating the pro-Ana community as a (conditionally!) loving and accepting oasis where everyone can feel “included” as an Ana, even if they aren’t underweight and even binge sometimes! Isn’t that nice?

Like pathological groups elsewhere on Tumblr, everyone is valid and included. You don’t need to lose any weight to be anorexic, it’s the thought that counts.

Now, don’t get me wrong, you can have a pretty severe eating disorder and not be stick-thin and struggle to lose weight as quickly as you would like, but it wouldn’t clinically be anorexia. Combinations of symptoms from anorexia, bulimia, avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder, and binge eating disorder are considered an Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (or, EDNOS), and the concept used to be reasonably acceptable on other pro-Ana sites. Being hardcore anorexic (avoidant of food) or, to a lesser extent, bulimic (compensating for food not avoided by purging) was preferable (as long as it showed results), but the attitude that everyone must be included or else they won’t feel like they have a real eating disorder fundamentally contradicts the competitive nature of the ideology. On the non-Tumblr pro-Ana sites, girls who were overweight were encouraged to take up the lifestyle, but they were essentially second-class citizens compared to the veterans who had managed to maintain a low or underweight BMI, and they would not be considered sufficiently anorexic until they had proven their disorder. On Tumblr, young girls have managed to reconstruct mental disorder into a family just as complex, passionate, and loving as any real one can hope to be.

As of this writing, the self-harm and pro-ED cultures online have been forced to withstand quite a bit of censorship. Tumblr blogs that post gory content are deleted, and pro-Ana content is monitored, though to a lesser extent; explicit pro-Ana content can still be found. To evade Tumbler censorship, users employ special tags to find each other, like #not pro just using tags, or #anarexya. The culture has morphed to encompass “thinspo” that is less about skeletal, sickly bodies and more about conventionally attractive, slim Instagram models, and lots of memes (see the tag #proedmemes). Memes and aesthetically pleasing photos of pretty women (and in some cases, trans men) motivate this new generation of eating-disordered females, without showing off the glaring red flags of past generations, where the disordered behavior was purposefully exaggerated, rather than hidden away for preservation. When explicit visual content is impermissible, the disordered females must rely more heavily on emotionally based community interaction to motivate themselves to engage in painful, unnatural behavior like starving or purging; in way, it makes these communities even more inviting.  For more examples, see the below gallery of current pro-Ana content.

I hope everyone is now sufficiently disturbed by the goings-on in the online communities comprised of teenage girls, and the disorders they have manifested in our society. The risk of being devoured and digested by these poisonous digital chambers and their respective ideologies extends to your daughters, sisters, granddaughters, and cousins. They lie open in waiting for any unsuspecting, naive young girl whose emotional terrain is still unknown and unfamiliar. The similarities between the self-harm, eating-disorder, and gender-identity ideological communities cannot be overstated, and we would be fools to ignore the role of Tumblr.com in the shocking and drastic increases in adolescent female gender dysphoria that have presented over the last five or so years.

In Part 3, I hope to do some measure of justice to the labyrinthine ideological shenanigans of this virtual community. Something in our culture has created the perfect storm for the explosion of gender-identity ideology, and as a detective would prioritize searching a suspected criminal’s bedroom, Tumblr may as well be the first place we look for clues.