Some More of God’s Greatest Mistakes

on my old pro ana forum our admin disappeared, so the majority of the regular members decided to create a new place with new admin and moderators, in order to escape the problems that went with having a completely unregulated site. i was asked to moderate by the girl who created the new forum, and i accepted. on the old site i guess i was a fairly influential member (i was asked to moderate, afterall) and on the new site i am probably the most influential person there right now. that’s not to say people don’t or can’t disagree with me, but i think it would be hard to name someone whose opinion carried more weight on the new site- especially since my opinion can be backed up with the moderator’s power to lock, delete, and move anything anyone posts at any time.

this leads to some uncomfortable questions in my own mind…

what are my responsibilities to the people who use the forum? is it just to do my best as a moderator to deal with conflicts and rule breaking, while sharing my personal opinions and my own struggles with my eating disorder how ever i choose to do so? or do i have a larger responsibility to the members who use my site?

there are girls on my forum who are quite young. since the group was made up of people from someone else’s forum i obviously didn’t deliberately do anything to bring in these 13 or 14 year olds, but would that comfort their parents if something were to happen to them? if i share something true about myself, for example if i share the fact that before yesterday i had thrown up every single thing i’d eaten for 3 weeks straight, how will reading this impact a 14 year old reader? as an ordinary member, it wasn’t hard to tell myself that i wasn’t responsible for any body else’s problems. the site would exist without me- and besides, i was often a voice of moderation, common sense, and health compared to some of the other members. but now that i’m a mod it isn’t the same equation. i have a choice about whether or how to make the forum grow. i’m torn between wanting it to be successful and not really believing that ANY pro ana site, even the milder type, are harmless.

since that 14 year old girl can also read how i’ve lost about 15 pounds in that 3 week period, will they pay attention to the fact that i’m a bit worried about how out of control things have gotten lately? or will that girl just see that puking = weightloss? i can’t help but think that if i was the mother of a child that was on this forum i’d be horrified to find a 29 year old woman who clearly knew better standing idly by while my child discussed her plans to, say, acheive a bmi of 13 or restrict her intake to 200 calories a day or less.

i don’t think it’s my responsibility to end the proana movement. i couldn’t if i wanted to- and there are sites these children could be visiting that are so much worse than mine. but it is probably my responsibility to watch what i say and think about who might be reading it and looking up to me as someone who is in a position of authority and has lost a very large amount of weight in a fairly short time. it is probably my responsibility to make it clear what my views are about anorexia and proana. i don’t think i’ve been living up to this responsibility and i’m not so sure i’m going to start now. but the responsibility is probably mine, nonetheless. if not me, who?