Free expression and easy-to-use technology allow almost anyone to establish a website about their passions and hobbies. These sites provide information and a sense of camaraderie for others with similar interests.

In 2005, 60 Minutes interviewed Stefanie, a single mother of four who founded a website about her passion – or better put, an unhealthy obsession. It’s an anorexia information website, one that teaches girls and women how to maintain their eating disorder, rather than how to combat it.

This website, and others like it share the “trade secrets” of anorexia.  They disclose how to fool family and doctors, how to conceal your true weight, how to lose more weight, and what to eat to suppress hunger pains.

“It’s a shoulder to cry on.  We’re there to listen,” Stefanie explains.  “We want people who go to that site who have an eating disorder to know that we’ve been through that, or we’re going through it.”

Often called ‘pro-ana’, these websites are companions to thousands of videos on YouTube that feature emaciated young women and are tagged as ‘thinspiration.”

A later broadcast, introduced the world to another pro-ana website founder. This time, the advocate is a nineteen year old with a large online following of over 160,000 young anorexics. The site’s founder describes her site saying, “It just shows perfection, I think.”

In a recent report to the UK Council for Child Internet Safety, the British Royal College of Psychiatrists took a stand against the site and other websites reinforcing the same ‘bare bones’ ideology. The college advised the council that pro-anorexia and pro-bulimia sites were a threat to youth because they perversely “advocate anorexia nervosa or bulimia nervosa as a lifestyle choice, rather than as serious mental disorders.

Dr. Pat Santucci, who runs a national organization helping those with eating disorders, shares the same opinion saying, “It’s not so much the existence of the website, per se.  It’s the portrayal and misinformation.”

Helen Wilson, who has battled anorexia for over 25 years, spoke in support of the Royal College of Psychiatrists’ efforts. She warned the public that these websites can become addictive because they feed into the competitive nature of the illness.

“I can easily understand how such evil sites become addictive and the pictures of extremely thin and poorly people becomes an obsession to beat,” she states.

Recovering anorexics who have visited the sites go as far to compare the online communities as an ‘addictive cult,’ condemning the endorsed practice of calorie deprivation as a self-destructive death trap.

According to recent reports, some Internet providers are willing to block access to pro-anorexia websites, but are waiting for direction from the government. Even in legislation however, the government does not have the power to purge all blogs and websites given the unregulated nature of the web.  But laws imposing penalties and potentially jail time would deter these pro-ana supporters from advancing the trend through virtual platforms.

Sources:
1.    Morales, Tatiana. Melinda Murphy reports on battles with the dangerous disorder. CBC News. October 11, 2005. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/10/04/earlyshow/contributors/melindamurphy/main910424.shtml?tag=contentBody;currentVideoInfo

2.    Overton, Peter. Deadly seduction. 60 minutes. September 18, 2005. http://sixtyminutes.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=259339
3.    Huddersfield Daily Examiner. Holmfirth woman warns of ‘vile’ pro-ana websites. September 19, 2009. http://www.examiner.co.uk/news/local-west-yorkshire-news/2009/09/19/holmfirth-woman-warns-of-vile-pro-ana-websites-86081-24727360/2/
4.    Murphy, Claire. We can’t ban anorexia sites say web firms. Herald City News. September 9, 2009. http://www.herald.ie/national-news/city-news/we-cant-ban-anorexia-sites-say-web-firms-1881440.html

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