How Feminism Can Help You Recover from Eating Problems

While reading a terrific book, Full Frontal Feminism: A Young Woman's Guide to Why Feminism Matters by Jessica Valenti (Seal Press, 2007), I realized that feminism could help women recover from eating and body image problems in a number of ways.

The word feminism has shadowy associations, especially from the sixties—man-hater, bra-burner, touchy-feely sisterhood. According to Valenti, feminism is a straightforward "belief in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes." That's it—so what's not to believe in? Feminism does not imply that women are better than men, but that they are equal. If you agree with Valenti's definition, then you're a Feminist, even if you've never thought of yourself as one.

Feminism is an empowering perspective that builds skills in self-reflection, critical thinking, goal-setting, assertiveness, creating boundaries, self-preservation, and challenging the status quo. As it happens, these are some of the same skills needed to overcome eating problems. Feminism says that a woman's body belongs to her—a revolutionary notion if there ever was one! For, how can a woman feed, dress, and use her body when she doesn't feel as if it belongs entirely to her? Feminism says that no individual man (father, brother, husband, boyfriend, boss) is a co-owner of your body, and that men collectively (be they in the diet or fashion industry, management, medical establishment, policy makers or politicians) may not, by virtue of their gender, try to take over your property.

Once you accept that you own the rights to your body, you are a short step away from being the best one to make food and weight decisions. Who has more at stake at nourishing a healthy body and keeping it fit? Who else can decide what clothes work best? Being a feminist means setting a personal course with eating, finding the right body size, and dressing to please yourself. It involves being on the lookout for men who will treat you with respect and not solely as a sexual object. It means using many tools—personal, professional, and societal—to reinforce the fact that women are equal to men. Here are some more ways that women can work on food and body issues by engaging in a feminist perspective:

• Quit automatically asking "him" (whoever he is) how you look. Decide for yourself.
• Eat whatever—and as much or as little as—you want in front of men. Men don't ask if they can have a second helping and neither should women.
• Wear clothes you like rather than what "he" likes and/or find items that you agree on.
• Don't let men get away with making sexist or inappropriate comments about your body or any women's body. Explain why they should keep their thoughts to themselves (or better yet, why they should change their thinking altogether).
• Ask for a raise, go for that promotion, find a new job. The happier you are at work, the less stressed you'll be and the less likely that you'll abuse food.
• Tell your male partner you want more equality around the house. While taking care of him (and everyone else), who's taking care of you?
• Volunteer for a local or national political candidate—male or female—who supports feminism. Vote only for feminists.
• Choose female friends who believe they're equal to men. Avoid women who put down other women and who don't believe they're equal to men.
• Stop buying women's magazines that use ultra-skinny or provocatively-posed models. Write a letter to the editor about ending your subscription until the magazine portrays healthier images.
• Educate women who diet about its dismal failure rate and how it causes rebound eating and even eating disorders. If every female in your group of friends diets, be the thinks-for-herself gal who doesn't.
• Turn off the negative chatter in your head about not looking good or good enough. Instead, keep self-talk positive, accepting, and empowering.
• Read about great women and seek out female role models.

Thinking and acting like a feminist goes a long way toward helping you go after what you want and feeling more satisfied with life. So much of the intensity behind food abuse is dissatisfaction and not knowing how to climb out of our passive, pleasing, second-string role. While not all dissatisfaction comes from being a woman in a man's world, much of it comes from how women are shaped by men's ideas about them. Practicing feminism means saying a resounding "yes" to all the positive, good, and healthy things you deserve—including being free of eating and body image problems.