Skinny Tok: Let’s get into it
By: EyeForFashion
She’s back.
Not with a bang, not with a tabloid scandal or a Calvin Klein campaign, but with a whisper. She’s sipping bone broth at 11 a.m. She’s lighting her “clean girl” candle. She’s skipping lunch because “I just wasn’t hungry.” She’s quietly sliding into TikTok For You pages with oat milk in hand and a suspiciously hollow glow. She’s calling it self-care.
If the early 2000s were defined by “heroin chic,” the 2020s are ushering in “wellness thin.” It’s less brash, more curated. Less party-girl collapse, more morning routine reels. But it’s just as dangerous—maybe more so, because it wears the illusion of health. This isn’t diet culture being reborn. This is diet culture going to therapy, getting a rebrand, and launching a Substack.
2000s Nostalgia, With a Side of Disordered Eating
We’ve seen this before. The sharp bones in fashion magazines. The low-rise jeans without room to breathe. The size 0 normalized in boardrooms and bedrooms alike. If you lived through the early aughts, you remember the tyranny of the scale and the dominance of the thigh gap.
Only now, the messaging has evolved. It’s no longer “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.” It’s “discipline is self-love.” It’s not skipping meals—it’s “fasting for gut health.” It’s not hating your body—it’s “biohacking your ideal self.”
The language has shifted. The obsession hasn’t.
The TikTok Renaissance of Disordered Ideals
On TikTok, the new frontier of body image culture, thinness is trending again—but not in the obvious ways. It’s buried in day-in-the-life vlogs from influencers with 1,200-calorie days and pastel planners. It’s hiding in “What I Eat in a Day” videos that mysteriously skip dinner. It’s most visible in communities like Liv Schmid’s “Skinny Society,” where “aspiration” means calculating how little you can consume while still appearing productive and polished.
These spaces sell you an identity: You’re not starving—you’re “on your grind.” You’re not tired—you’re “disciplined.” And if it hurts? That’s “the price of glow-up culture.”
Creators like Abby Sharp are trying to cut through the noise. A registered dietitian with a refreshingly evidence-based voice, she’s one of the few calling out the dangers of these trends. But on platforms fueled by algorithms that reward thinness, perfection, and instant transformation, the odds are stacked against nuance.
Because truth? It doesn’t trend as fast as fantasy.
EyeforFashion says: “I highly recommend to go watch her content and podcast she is incredible!”
The Role of Patriarchy in a "Wellness" World
It’s tempting to individualize the blame. To point fingers at creators selling diet subscriptions or glorifying skeletal aesthetics. But as someone who battled anorexia long before social media’s grip, let me be clear: this isn’t just about creators. It’s about systems.
It’s about a society that still teaches women and femmes that being desirable means being small. That “taking up space” is metaphor, not permission. That shrinking is success. We are conditioned—groomed, even—to aspire toward absence. And the patriarchy has just learned how to market that with ring lights and “clean eating” aesthetics.
Even in “body-positive” spaces, the algorithm subtly rewards a certain kind of body—one that’s technically “curvy,” sure, but still thin in all the right places. Visibility is conditional. Worth is curated. And health? It’s reduced to optics.
Recession-Core and the Aesthetic of Scarcity
We’re also living through a unique cultural convergence: a return to 2000s fashion, economic instability, and climate anxiety—all of which create a perfect storm for disordered eating to masquerade as a lifestyle.
This is the era of recession-core. Neutrals. Frugality as aesthetic. Luxury framed as “minimalism.” And what is minimalism, really, but the aesthetic of controlled scarcity? We’ve been sold the fantasy that withholding—whether it’s consumption, calories, or even emotion—is a form of elevation.
But if you're skipping meals not by choice, but because groceries are too expensive? That’s not a diet. That’s survival. And when culture aestheticizes survival, it becomes even easier for disordered eating to embed itself unnoticed.
But I Want to Be Skinny. Is That So Wrong?
Here’s the nuance that diet culture doesn’t want you to touch: it’s okay to want to lose weight. You are not immoral for desiring change. Wanting to feel confident, strong, lighter, leaner, different—those are not crimes.
But ask yourself: Where is that desire rooted? And what are you willing to give up to achieve it?
There is a world of difference between pursuing health and performing deprivation. Between wanting strength and chasing erasure.
The latter is rarely sustainable. Worse, it steals your joy, your presence, your power. The “discipline” that’s sold to you in wellness packaging often translates to long-term metabolic damage, emotional burnout, and complete disconnection from your body’s actual needs.
So What Now?
You don’t need another 5-step plan. You don’t need to “glow up.” You don’t need a new wellness tracker.
You need to eat. Sleep. Move with joy. Unplug. Speak kindly to yourself. Choose food that nourishes you. And if you can? Work with someone who sees you as a whole person—not a problem to be fixed.
Here’s what real power looks like:
Setting digital boundaries. If a creator makes you feel like you need to punish your body, unfollow. Immediately.
Understanding food as fuel, not moral currency. Carbs aren’t a sin. Hunger isn’t weakness. Nourishment is your right.
Moving your body in ways that make you feel alive—not in pain. It can be lifting, walking, dancing, resting. You don’t need to suffer to be worthy.
Sustaining joy. That’s the hardest part. But it’s the most rebellious.
Final Thoughts: You Are Not a Trend
Bodies will always go in and out of style if we let them. The same way baggy jeans replace skinny ones. But your body isn’t fashion. It’s not content. It’s not an aesthetic. It’s your home. And it’s the only one you get.
So as “Skinny” slides back into cultural relevance—this time dressed like Hailey Bieber, sounding like a wellness girlboss—just remember: you don’t have to participate.
You can opt out. You can choose presence over perfection. Substance over scarcity. You can be more than a silhouette in someone else's vision board.
And if that makes you radical?
Good.
