Thin is In

CATEGORY: Censorship, Anorexia, Celebrity Worship

DIVISION: Modern Evil

COMMENTARY: No matter who you are, your body will always mock you. And that's not necessarily a bad thing. You probably deserve to be mocked. But outright censorship of that body's voice - via blog banning - is the weakling's response. So now, not only are you fat but you're a wimp too. Take that!











France Bans Websites Promoting Anorexia 'Cult'

By John Lichfield in Paris

Internet sites and blogs which peddle the gospel of an "anorexic lifestyle" to teenage girls were outlawed by the French parliament yesterday. The law is the first attempt anywhere in the world to stamp out the "pro-ana" movement, a cult-like attempt to promote anorexia as a lifestyle which began in the United States eight years ago.

If, as expected, the legislation is also approved by the Senate, it will become a criminal offence in France "to encourage another person to seek excessive thinness... which could expose them to a risk of death or endanger their health". Offenders risk two years in prison or a €30,000 (£24,000) fine.

Although the law would also apply to magazines, it is mostly aimed at internet sites and blogs which have sprung up in France in the past two years. These sites, which also exist in the UK, worship extremely thin female celebrities, including Nicole Richie and Victoria Beckham.

The French Health Minister, Roselyne Bachelot, told parliament: "Giving young girls advice about how to lie to their doctors, telling them what kinds of food are easiest to vomit, encouraging them to torture themselves whenever they take any kind of food is not part of liberty of expression. The messages sent out here are messages of death."

A typical French blog, Be Perfect, Be Pro Ana, carries a long letter signed "your future best friend Ana". It encourages teenage girls to refuse food, to make themselves sick and to take laxatives in order to match the body shape of their "thinspirations" such as Richie and Beckham.

"I am the only person who can tell you the truth," the blog says. "Everyone else lies to you because they love you but I'm going to tell you a secret: in the depths of their heart, they are disappointed with what has happened to you. Their talented girl has become fat and lazy. But I am going to change all that!"

The law's author, the centre-right deputy Valérie Boyer, says that between 30,000 and 40,000 people in France have anorexia. Most are girls or young women aged between 12 and 13 or 18 and 19. Anorexia, she says, kills more people in France each year than any other mental disorder.

At the same time, Mme Boyer and the Health Minister have drawn up a "voluntary charter on bodily image and anorexia". French advertisers, model agencies and prêt-à-porter fashion houses have agreed to sign the charter and to "refuse to publish images, especially of young people, which could promote an ideal of extreme thinness."

But will the globally influential French fashion industry respect the charter and how will modelling and fashion professionals define "extreme thinness"?

About a dozen blogs pop up in a search for Pro Ana. Be Perfect, Be Pro Ana suggests that the ideal of ultra-slimness has become a subject of obsessional pride among some girls and that fashion magazines are their inspiration and bible.

"Stop talking with your stomach!" the blog orders. "You're nothing but a fat, bloody cow! If you eat, all discipline will be lost. Is that what you want? To return to the fat cow that you are? I will force you to read fashion magazines and look at those perfect bodies which mock you..."

Reincarnation Banned in China

CATEGORY: Reincarnation, Government Censorship

DIVISION: Education, Products

EDITORIAL: Regulating reincarnation is a brilliant idea. In fact, the entire afterlife needs organizing. Reserving your place in the afterworld of your belief will bring you the comfort and security of knowing where you're going.

Coming Soon - Our Afterlife Reservation Service. Secure your spot for eternity NOW.









Reincarnation Banned

By Matthew Philips

Newsweek

Aug. 20-27, 2007 issue - In one of history's more absurd acts of totalitarianism, China has banned Buddhist monks in Tibet from reincarnating without government permission.

According to a statement issued by the State Administration for Religious Affairs, the law, which goes into effect next month and strictly stipulates the procedures by which one is to reincarnate, is "an important move to institutionalize management of reincarnation."

But beyond the irony lies China's true motive: to cut off the influence of the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual and political leader, and to quell the region's Buddhist religious establishment more than 50 years after China invaded the small Himalayan country. By barring any Buddhist monk living outside China from seeking reincarnation, the law effectively gives Chinese authorities the power to choose the next Dalai Lama, whose soul, by tradition, is reborn as a new human to continue the work of relieving suffering.

At 72, the Dalai Lama, who has lived in India since 1959, is beginning to plan his succession, saying that he refuses to be reborn in Tibet so long as it's under Chinese control. Assuming he's able to master the feat of controlling his rebirth, as Dalai Lamas supposedly have for the last 600 years, the situation is shaping up in which there could be two Dalai Lamas: one picked by the Chinese government, the other by Buddhist monks. "It will be a very hot issue," says Paul Harrison, a Buddhism scholar at Stanford. "The Dalai Lama has been the prime symbol of unity and national identity in Tibet, and so it's quite likely the battle for his incarnation will be a lot more important than the others."

So where in the world will the next Dalai Lama be born?

Harrison and other Buddhism scholars agree that it will likely be from within the 130,000 Tibetan exiles spread throughout India, Europe and North America. With an estimated 8,000 Tibetans living in the United States, could the next Dalai Lama be American-born? "You'll have to ask him," says Harrison. If so, he'll likely be welcomed into a culture that has increasingly embraced reincarnation over the years. According to a 2005 Gallup poll, 20 percent of all U.S. adults believe in reincarnation. Recent surveys by the Barna Group, a Christian research nonprofit, have found that a quarter of U.S. Christians, including 10 percent of all born-again Christians, embrace it as their favored end-of-life view. A non-Tibetan Dalai Lama, experts say, is probably out of the question.