"Until recently, most clinicians were not receptive to the arguments of feminists like Susie Ohrbach (and later, myself) that “body image disturbance syndrome,” binge/purge cycling, bulimic thinking,” and all the rest needed to be understood as much more culturally normative than generally recognized. They wanted to draw a sharp dividing line between pathology and normality-a line that can be very blurry when it comes to eating and body-image problems in this culture. And while they acknowledged that images “play a role,” they clung to the notion that only girls with a “predisposing vulnerability” get into trouble. Trained in a medical model which seeks the abuse or disorder in individual and family pathology, they hadn’t yet understood just how powerful, ubiquitous, and invasive the demands of culture are on our bodies and souls."
January 1, 1970