Hi, I’m fat. I’m over a size six.

If you are a twitter user, you might have seen the recent drama involving an account belonging to some idiot called Kenneth Tong. In case you missed it, this ex-Big Brother contestant who seems to have done absolutely nothing (including that) of note, began promoting his magicalicious super fun happy pill that could make even the most disgusting fatty into a desirable size zero.

A size zero is a UK size four. My skinniest, boniest friend is a size eight. In the modelling industry, despite many rumours of the pressure put on young girls to achieve unrealistically small figures, the standard sizes are between a six and a ten. Sample size garments for runway shows are often on the smaller end of this scale.

A size four is so small that only a tiny handful of highstreet stores even stock it, and even when they do, it is only in their petite range. (Namely River Island, but only in jeans, as well as Miss Selfridge and Topshop).

I am veering away from the point, but I wanted to give a little perspective as to what Mr Tong was promoting. Along with his miraculous skinny pill, he called for admiration to be given to the emmaciated models who serve as “thinspiration” – a term thrown around within pro-anorexia circles to describe images and people so thin their bones protrude, their periods stop and their hair falls out. How desirable.

Mr Tong today retracted his statements made recently, and claimed that they were made as part of a hoax. They were an experiment of how to become globally famous within a week, he claims. He apologised in the same paragraph as he boasted proudly of the publications that have chosen to feature him in response to his recent comments and the outrage he caused. He said he was going to make all the offence he has caused all better by donating to an appropriate charity, like kissing a booboo makes the nasty wound go away.

Except it really doesn’t.

I am not saying anything new, here. The internet has its gameface on with regards to this man and his various words. Basically everyone who has an ounce of sensitivity and a twitter account is pretty appalled by this hideous man and his bullshit. But it did prompt me to look up some stats about anorexia and how the media influences body image, because I think calling this crap a “hoax” is an insult to anyone with body image issues, and letting Kenneth Tong apologise and fuck off back to obscurity is like forcing a playground bully to apologise under duress.

• Studies show that girls as young as five years old report being concerned about their body and wishing to go on a diet.
• 30% of anorexia sufferers continue to experience the disease long-term. Only 40% of sufferers recover completely. 5% are fatal.
• A history of sexual abuse is present in 30% of cases of anorexia.
• 92% of people with eating disorders do not feel like they can tell anyone at all – not parents, not friends, no one.
• An estimated 90,000 people are being treated for anorexia or bullimia at any one time. Often, only the most serious and extreme cases result in treatment. This figure does not even come close to the number of people suffering from these illnesses.

This website provides further terrifying reading. All in all, what I am trying to present here is that this is not, in any way, an acceptable subject for hoaxes, jokes or publicity stunts. While this shit, unfortunately, doesn’t seem to qualify as a crime (fuck you, freedom of speech!), a media career is clearly what Mr Tong is aiming for, and I would hope that his method of attaining it is never forgotten.

Sources