The Chive took their time apologizing for misusing a woman's personal photos.
(via imgur)
The Chive made a major oopsies yesterday when they published a collection of random “amazing weight loss transformations" images including, one set of a woman with anorexia.
That woman, Anne Marie Sengillo, posted a series of photos on a subreddit called r/ProgressPics to share her eating disorder recovery journey and inspire others. Sengillo's post included a photo of her before she developed an eating disorder (150 pounds) and a photo of her at her sickest (at the time that photo was taken, she was exercising for 4-5 hours a day and ate less than 800 calories) that The Chive used as part of their before/after story.
Sengillo told Jezebel:
“I posted my photos to give hope to others who may have body image issues. But The Chive is using my anorexic photo as thinspiration. My transformation from 150lbs to 70 and then 90lbs is NOT something I want anyone to see and think 'Wow! I want to look like her!'"
The Chive has since removed the photos and posted this half-assed sorta kinda apology:
“We had previously discovered the photo somewhere out there in the internet echo chamber which contained no frame of reference whatsoever. We obviously had no idea Anne Marie had anorexia but that doesn't excuse the action at all. It was a mistake, completely unintentional, and the photo was removed the second we found out about it."
Um, The Chive obviously did have an idea Anne Marie had anorexia based on the fact that her album is clearly labeled “My recovery from an eating disorder." And in case Sengillo's album title wasn't a solid enough clue, the photo caption: “I stayed around 105lbs. I was still in my disordered thinking, but I did not look as bad. I ended up being sent to a treatment center after a suicide attempt in 2013. I saw that I was over 105 lbs and freaked out. I relapsed again in 2014 after being discharged and had to deal with refeeding syndrome all over again" pretty strongly suggests the woman in the photo is anorexic.
Sorry Chive, you can't blame this one on the “Internet echo chamber" (whatever that is).
In an ideal world, The Chive wouldn't post stuff like this at all. How about writing a post filled with information about health, balanced living and exercise, eating good wholesome foods, and being nice to yourself instead of a gallery of poor-quality photos of nameless bodies? This isn't inspiring; it's lazy.
Then again, this is the top of their homepage right now:
(via TheChive.com)
You could argue that it's also up to us, the subjects of the photos, to protect our photos. The sad truth is that, the second we click “post" our images, videos, and whatever else is fair game for the wolves to attack, destroy and photoshop. This leads to a whole other anxiety-inducing issue: what da fuck are people doing with our photos?! That pic of you sipping a cocktail on vacation might currently be the face of some alcohol recovery program. Your toddler's school portrait could at this very moment be being used as a ploy in some creepy adoption scam service. Those snaps of you and your boo at dinner might be used in an ad for some swinging threesome service.
But while that may be true, it doesn't make it fair.
In an ideal world, Sengillo and all of us should be able to share our stories without that fear. I say this not to victim-blame, I say this just remind us all (myself included) that everything we share online does not remain ours and that sadly there are shitty people out there that might take something beautiful you post and turn it into something hideous. (Oh God the Internet is so scary and overwhelming someone please hold me.)
Hey, here's a cool before/after article suggestion: a series of photos of life before and after the Internet was created. Before photos could include: people talking to one another face-to-face, falling in love in person, walking down the street looking up and not at a phone. After photos could include: the world falling apart.
One nice thing about The Chive, they run a charity organization called Chive Charities that has in the past donated to veterans, children with birth defects, shooting victims, fire departments, rescue squads, and others. Maybe now would be a good time for the Chive Charities to throw a few buck to The National Eating Disorders Association.
