Protein Moms and the "Eating Enough" Myth
How did over 7 million people not read this viral reel as diet culture?
CW: Today’s essay requires some necessary discussion of specific disordered eating behaviors. Take care of yourself!
As someone who has been professionally identifying and analyzing diet culture for over a decade now, I’ll admit, I can get a little jaded.
Oprah producing a TV special about weight loss drugs? Not shocked.
Gwyneth Paltrow subsisting on bone broth? Do we even have to discuss it.
Ballerina Farm releasing her own brand of protein powder? Absolutely called it.
It’s not that I don’t worry about the consequences of these mega diet culture stars’ actions; it’s that I don’t expect them to be anything other than themselves. The sun must rise in the east; so too Hannah Neeleman must market the thin/fit/blonde ideal. Not only do they not influence me to buy their plans and powders, I just don’t even get all that enraged about it. I can critique them as a rich cultural text, but retain a solid professional distance.
Then I saw this viral reel from fitness influencer Breanna Cox. And felt all the things.
