@gardenhead: If you stitched "I want to stop being viscerally terrified of men" on a pillow, I would buy that one too.

@MissPsychette: Or, since the plural of anecdote is now apparently data, my totally self-sufficient 93-year-old grandmother who lives on her own, eats a moderate amount of processed sugar, and has never been in a hospital except to give birth. I'm sorry. I just don't want to run a hundred miles when I'm 70. I want to…

@MelissaMahoney: Surely being able to celebrate every part of one's human self, including insecurities and vulnerabilities, means an acceptance of what women really are, rather than a conditional acceptance based on reaching some kind of unassailable ideal?

@florabore: Thanks so much for the linkage. I think I have a teensy crush on Johann.

@MissPsychette: Given that our current life span is longer now than at any of the previous times in history when our diets were, according to you, better for us, how long do you think the optimum human life span should actually be? Endless? Like, dying sucks and everything, but it is kind of supposed to happen at some…

@rhubarbarin: It's not a mistake to think "you can eat junk non-stop". In fact, it's perfectly possible to do that. It might not result in the longest life-span possible, with as few health complications as we'd like, but if the alternative is eating few or no calories, eating junk food is on balance pretty good.

@Elopingthemilieu: But surely the association already taking place between this attack and the attacker's mental illness means it's a good time to point out that people suffering from mental illness are actually on the whole not violent? That's certainly the overwhelming impression this article gave me, far from…

@SarsDoesn'tSave: See! Sugar can be useful and totally not evil! Also, I think the phobia of calories seems to be based on an assumption that everyone is either an ideal weight already, or slightly overweight, meaning extra sugar consumption is going to kill them. Some people are actually, like, underweight and stuff.…

@deeemer: And they've got vitamins. Which are essentially pretty good.

@SarsDoesn'tSave: Exactly what I was thinking. How does sugar "negate" something? Sugar isn't a negative food value. It's just energy with no extra nutrients. Surely adding vitamins makes it a source of vitamins? As the name would suggest? And "healthy" is pretty subjective to begin with.

@CC: I completely understand your point about the environmental and labour costs of food production, and that's something my original post didn't consider, so I take it on board. As far as "bad long-term effects on our bodies" goes, my point was that "not eating calories" tends to have worse long-term effects on our…

@geekgirlliz: Fo sho. I'm sorry for bracketing off the morality of food production like that, it was way simplistic, and you're totally right. Also, yay potato chips.

@regazza.di.lupo: I'm not making any excuses for my "shitty eating habits," because as a matter of fact, they do help someone. Me. I suffered with an eating disorder for a some time. I am now provably healthier, and also, helpfully, alive enough to write this comment. Maybe I will fuck up my body. Maybe I will die at…

@PrisonBreakShaker: Isn't that somewhat simplistic, though? I mean, human control over the genetic attributes of future generations is a very well acknowledged ethical minefield. I'm not saying this woman's case is a slippery slope, or that a slippery slope argument is even relevant, but it's worth discussing without…

@PrisonBreakShaker: Very well said. And I agree with this thread wholeheartedly.

That was a brilliant post.

@SarsDoesn'tSave: But if the meal recipes on the website are genuine suggestions, surely the average user partaking in the challenge is going to assume that those suggestions are healthy and not dangerous to eat? Like, sure, someone could go ahead and and have a Big Mac instead, but once the Special K people make…

@rellaa: Ah, I'm sorry! I guess I misread you. I think the honesty value is good if it turns people off the whole idea of using kids as models. I mean, if it's confronting people with their own fucked up aesthetic to the point where that aesthetic isn't acceptable anymore, then it's disturbing and brilliant and…

@rellaa: Right, I mean, I get honesty. But does that make it okay that children are being presented as adults? Could you argue that perceiving children as adults could blur a really important social boundary that would have ramifications in terms particularly of consent? Do you think it would be dangerous if younger…

@MargaretMoony: HOT. Just sayin'. That would be hot.