Is Anorexia a Choice?

What plays to our benefit there is hopefully there'll be like some, some, uh, you know, cancel on cancel, uh, crime there. There'll be some friendly fire there where some of the, you know, the people who are saying, uh, you can't talk about this cause you're a man.

They might get it. They might get some, they might get attacked by the people who are saying, well, I know the one anorexic guy. So maybe, maybe some of our cancelers will get canceled. So like, can't like cancel inception or something.

Is Anorexia a Choice and Why the Question Is Controversial

All right, Tim, the question for today's episode is, is anorexia a choice?

I'm not sure if we're allowed to talk about this or not, because we're men.

And why did you have me? Why did you have me start up the cameras, Tim? If we're not allowed to talk about this, why aren't we allowed to talk about this?

Yeah, I don't really care if we're not allowed to talk about it.

I'm just commenting on the fact that there are, there are those that would say you are not allowed to talk about this.

Yeah.

So you get it both directions on this kind of question. So, I mean, in one direction you're going to get, I mean, it's obviously overwhelmingly a female problem and you're not really allowed to say that this is overwhelmingly a female problem though, because, um, you know, in the minds of many people, like Davis, they've adopted these egalitarian assumptions and then they're, you know, absolutely unable to generalize in any way.

So they've just utterly abandoned wisdom. They're not allowed to, they don't allow themselves to generalize. So then if you look at an issue like this, like these egalitarian assumptions, basically say men and women are the same.

And if men and women are the same, they're going to have the same kind of problems, right? And so then you look at an issue like this, which is overwhelmingly, I mean, it's overwhelmingly a female problem.

And the reason why it's a female problem is overwhelmingly is because everyone knows that women are designed for beauty and men are designed for strength. And you're not really allowed to say it, but that's just the way it works.

So, you know, all little girls growing up, they want to be beautiful. And there's some like ladies who will reject that and just go total, like, they'll reject these natural innate desires to be pretty and they'll just go full butch or whatever.

But I mean, it really is an issue that women struggle with more because women are made to be works of art in a way that men aren't made to be works of art in that kind of way.

Okay.

Uh, so now, now that most men have like 50 less testosterone than they used to, and then they've been relentlessly feminized by a culture that is built on egalitarian assumptions, it may be that there's a few men who struggle with anorexia now.

Okay.

A few, but only a few. But only allotting a few at 50 less testosterone.

Right.

Right.

So then, you know, if you were to say, Hey, like, so on the one hand, you, you know, you say, Hey, this is a woman problem. You're not allowed to talk about it. That's how they're going to criticize you.

You're not allowed to talk about it. Cause there's a woman problem. Um, and you're a man, you know, men aren't allowed to step into women problems. But then on the other hand, it's like, well, if you say it's a woman's problem and not a man's problem, some, you know, genius, smart Alex going to point out the one guy they know who, you know, is basically, uh, uh, sits with his legs crossed like a woman and, uh, you know, deeply struggles with this anorexia and his body image issues, you know, and all that.

And so they're going to point out the one guy is irrefutable proof that, you know, you're not allowed to generalize either.

So, I mean, you get hit both ways, but yeah, I mean, you know, what, what plays to our benefit there is hopefully there'll be like some, some, uh, you know, cancel on cancel, uh, crime there. There'll be some friendly fire there where some of the, you know, the people who are saying, uh, you can't talk about this cause you're a man, they might get it, they might get some, they might get attacked by the people who are saying, well, I know the one anorexic guy.

So maybe, maybe some of our cancelers will get canceled. Like, like cancel inception or something.

Anorexia as a Moral Choice and the Problem of Victim Language

Yeah, no, I mean, it's amazing. I mean, um, it's amazing how that works. And I mean, that's kind of what happens when you have a bankrupt worldview in general, is that you're asked to embrace a never ending list of contradictions.

And, you know, it's remarkable that they don't argue with themselves in their own brain, you know?

Yeah, yeah, they really, they really like that.

They can't figure out that, like, I can't hold two irrational positions at lunch, like I have to pick one, you know? And often what happens is they'll just pick whichever one they is convenient for them in the moment, in the moment.

And so you have all that where you're not really allowed to talk about these things one way or another, they're going to find a way you can't talk about it. But then if you go further and you say, Hey, uh, you know, anorexia is a choice.

So you're asking, is anorexia a choice? I would answer that like, obviously, yes, it's a choice. It's a choice, like, obviously. So, I mean, that's a statement that's meant to communicate a certain thing.

And you can press that statement in certain ways to where, you know, it's more complicated than just like a decision, obviously.

Right.

So, so meaning like, yes, like most ladies who struggle with anorexia, uh, notice what I did there. Um, mostly they struggle with it.

Yeah.

So most ladies though, like they don't just decide one day I'm going to become an anorexia or an anorexic, you know, quote unquote anorexic. So sure. It's not a choice like that, but when people say anorexia is a choice, what they mean is that you make, you, you are a responsible human being who makes decisions and you're making certain choices.

You're making a choice not to eat, you know? So if you're talking about bulimia, you're making a choice to, you know, um, you know, eat too much and then throw it up.

Right.

And so like, whatever we're talking about, uh, like if you're talking about binge eating disorder or, you know, whatever, like you making a choice just to binge, eat your food, we used to call that gluttony, right?

Yeah.

All right. So you're making choices like you can make a choice to eat or not to eat.

Right.

So with anorexia, you know, quote unquote anorexia, you can make a choice to eat or not eat, and you're making a series of choices throughout your day. So every time your stomach feels hungry, you're going to make choices, right?

So this is within your control to make. And that's the thing that's really offensive about this is, is just to say that, you know, the quote unquote anorexic. And the reason why I put that in quotes, you know, side note is just because like when you wrap normal problems in the language of mental disorders, like, you're like, these are euphemisms essentially.

And they, they force you to think about this problem in a way that is, um, different than what it actually is. So, I mean, if you would describe an anorexic woman as a person who's starving herself, then intentionally starving yourself, then that would bring moral clarity to the situation pretty quickly.

Right.

But then if you say, Hey, she's, you know, struggling with anorexia or she's suffering from anorexia in the minds of many people, then what's, what you've done is you've taken away all moral agency from her because you've given her this label.

Now she, now you must view her as a victim.

Right.

And then you assume.

She's not held responsible for her actions.

Right.

Right.

Yeah.

Now, I mean, you know, most people are not just like giving full victim license in this, um, you know, so if I were to say, Hey, like anorexic or anorexia, that's victim language. If I were to say that's victim language, then, you know, people would push back on that and just say, Hey, we, yeah, I mean, no, there obviously there's, um, there's some kind of responsibility there.

You know, it's not just like a complete, complete and total free pass or whatever.

Right.

But I mean, it is like language that's meant to train your sympathies. To coddle this kind of person, to be sensitive to this kind of person, to not like, so all the victim rules applied, you're supposed to believe them.

You're not supposed to shame them. You're not supposed to really blame them. Uh, like the best you can do is kind of gently admonish them to eat a little more and appeal to them. Like, don't like, you don't want to kill yourself here.

Right.

Um, so think it through. Don't kill yourself, like eat some food, but you can't do it with any teeth, with any more like morality attached to it. Right. You get what I mean?

Yeah.

So you can't like say, Hey, you're sinning and you need to stop sinning. Uh, and you're the villain in this story. You're not the victim, like you're the villain.

Right.

So, I mean, so like thinking about it along those lines, like, yes, anorexia is a choice, like it's a choice, meaning like that individual is responsible for it. Now, I mean, no doubt they can be, um, they can, they can make those choices, like those daily choices to not eat and to reject food.

They can make those choices due, due to the influence of a variety of factors. For sure.

Like there's still like external factors.

External Factors, Abuse, and the Limits of Causation

Yeah.

I mean, so, um, uh, if you look online, um, there's, um, there was a meme that happened at, at a certain point where it showed, um, picture of Tom Cruise and then a picture of Kelly McGinnis. Uh, and you know, the, the, our, the meme was basically saying something like men age, like wine and women age, like milk, you know, and so, so it's been, you know, basically showing a young picture of Tom Cruise and then an old picture of Tom Cruise and he kind of looks the same, right.

Give or take, and then a young picture of Kelly McGillis or whatever. And an old picture of her where she's overweight and just like, um, let herself go, you know, and then, you know, people come along and basically say something along the lines of, um, without commenting on that either way, people come along based into that kind of thing and say, Hey, she looks that way because she was.

Abused.

Right. So she was sexually abused at a certain point and that's what, but then like you take a step back and you say, did that cause her to eat all this food?

No.

Like, no, it didn't. Did it was the direct cause of that?

No.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

So no, it didn't cause her to eat all that food. So she ate all that food and maybe, maybe in response to that trial that she experienced, but that isn't like the trial didn't cause it.

Right.

So like if you put pressure on an orange, lemonade doesn't come out.

Right.

Like, like what comes out is orange juice. So that's what comes out. So like what's in the heart of man comes out. So trials can reveal what's in the heart. So she responded a certain way, but then she's a moral agent.

And that thing didn't cause her to make those series of choices every day to eat food and eat too much food. And not, so like, that's not really the way this thing works. And so in the same way, like, you know, an anorexic quote unquote, an anorexic, a girl can starve herself because she was, you know, sexually abused in the past.

Like, I mean, she can do that in response to that, but that's not causing that. She can do that because like she can do that because she's trying to exercise control over her life. So maybe like she's in a home where her parents are yelling all the time and like it feels chaotic and there's fighting all the time and like everything feels out of.

Control.

She can do that in response to that as a means of exercising control. But that's a choice she's making on how she's going to respond to life. She can do that because she's like has body image issues where she's like relentlessly assaulted, you know, assaulted to use emotional language online by, you know, unrealistic airbrushed women who she knows she's never going to meet to that kind of standard.

And she gets in her mind that, you know, any degree of fat is too much fat. And so she's never going to eat and she's going to starve herself and go for the skeletal thin kind of look because she's she has issues with, you know, how she views herself.

And so all that can happen, right? All those things can happen. Like it could be like meaning there could be a lot of heart issues that are leading to this behavior that you need to deal with and analyze.

But then at the end of the day, it's still choice. It's still choices that she's making.

God's Design for Food, Self-Harm, and the Temple of the Holy Spirit

Now, now with anorexia in general, what what exactly makes it like a morally negative thing to pursue?

So a lot of this is just, you know, related to God's design for food in general. OK, so God has created his creatures to be dependent upon food in order to survive. So if you think about like the actual design of the human race, he could have designed this in a way that did not depend on food.

So in that way, you know, anorexia is a rejection of God's design for how we are to sustain ourself and function in the same way that a person who refuses to sleep ever. They're rejecting this design feature that God has made, like God's made us to be dependent upon sleep.

And like sleep actually has biological functions that are helpful to us, right? So they reset us and give us energy and everything else. And so it's a it's it's a design feature of the human race. And, you know, the Bible says that no one like hates his own flesh, but they nourish it and cherish it in that way.

And so taking care of the body that you're given is a way of honoring God as the creator of that body. So God created you to design in a certain way. If you take care of the body that God's given you, you're honoring the maker of that body.

So you're treating the body with respect that God has given it. You're giving it the things that it actually needs in order to do the kind of things that God has called it to do. So in that way, you can abuse food and by giving it too much food.

Right. Or you can abuse food by giving too little food. And there are consequences that are going to happen either way. So so like in one sense, like those consequences, like if you don't eat enough food, you're just going to be weak.

You're not going to have any energy. You're going to pass out. I mean, I remember when I was in California going to school that, you know, girls not eating enough was such a big problem that they would just randomly pass out during a chapel.

Are you serious? Are you serious? You're not allowed to laugh here.

I'm sorry. I shouldn't laugh, but that's hilarious. Well, I mean, that's terrible. That's like that's like the mental state that you have to get to to be there is just it's so terrible that it's like you have to laugh because it's just it's like unbelievable.

Like they would randomly pass out and it would happen so often that. It wasn't even like abnormal for people, so like what you're.

Describing just sounds like a like a, you know, a deleted scene from like Mean Girls or something.

So they would pass out and then like, you know, someone would take care of them, but everyone would just keep on going.

It's like, oh, come on, Tim. Come on, man. They didn't even stop.

I mean, it was just a normal kind of thing, you know, she didn't need enough.

You know, that's that. I mean, that is legitimately sad, though, like, right, that you have a at least a portion of society, a very small, hopefully, portion of society that's so used to it, they don't even stop their daily functions.

I mean, you know, yeah, there there's there's there's there's there is a there is certainly that kind of thing to where it's like that's just become like a normal become a normal feature of society in that way.

But yeah, so I mean, I think you look at the problem is twofold. So on the one hand, the problem is if you don't eat enough food. OK, like if you don't eat enough food, you're not going to be able to perform the functions God calls you to perform in the world, so then that would be like not eating enough food, it leads to sense of omission, right?

Meaning you can't do the things God calls you to do. But then on the other end of things, in of itself, like you're abusing the temple of the Holy Spirit who is within you, you're rejecting like God's design for how like for the place of food in the world, right?

So in that way, what you and I mean, you're you're rejecting his provision for you as an individual.

Yeah, so you're engaging in kind of self-harm. And so like you're harming yourself. Right, so that would be wrong. Harming yourself leads to sense of omission. And then there's like a further component in that like you're doing so because there's certain idols that you have in your heart that you're not dealing with.

So like the harming yourself is like enabling you like these heart idols, these bad heart idols to run rampant without any check basically in that way. So it's just a multifaceted kind of problem.

Okay.

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