This is just one of the new lexicons for cool today, a whole generation of teenagers whose angular, near starved rib cages are not to be read as dysfunctional parenting but more likely a terminal fashion statement. And hey, I’m talking boys, men even who just a decade ago would never be seen dead fussing with anything ‘fashionable’. Now there is nothing wrong in being thin but what happens when this obsession with looking thin substitutes as ‘hip and happening’ and young men start resisting hunger and starving themselves? My fear is serious arrested development and I don’t just mean body, soul but also brain cells.

However the medical world will inform all who care to know, that this symptom of starvation is a serious medical condition called Anorexia Nervosa, usually with distressing long–term affects. Does anyone remember Karen Carpenter? That lilting, melodious tune queen of the inimitable Carpenters (o.k. it was way back in the 70’s but so what?) died of Anorexia no less. A fashion fetish maybe but one that can grow to have serious consequences, especially when it reaches that critical point when it is irreversible. It is an eating disorder where weight loss is usually 15% below the person's normal body weight. Even though they might be shedding pounds at a dangerous rate, people with anorexia don't see themselves as thin. They are constantly living in the fear that they are looking fat or gaining weight.
As a result they develop strange eating habits such as:
· Development of food rituals (e.g. eating foods in certain orders, excessive chewing, rearranging food on a plate).
· Consistent excuses to avoid mealtimes or situations involving food.
· Refusing to eat in front of other people.
· Prepare big meals for others while refusing to eat any of it.

Excessive, rigid exercise regimen--despite weather, fatigue, illness, or injury--the need to “burn off” calories taken in, is another symptom that of anorexia.

Rakhi Sawant, an aspiring actor in Bollywood says in one of her interviews for a magazine "I starve myself and eat only on Sundays. I love biryani and dal-chawal but it's bad for my figure. I know it could affect my health. But I don't want to kill my career."

And now when men are joining the queues of ‘think thin at all cost’, its time for all, especially parents, to begin to inform themselves and their young on how long before mass and madness merge. Young boys are growing at alarming rates as victims of Anorexia. According to the Delhi Medical Association (DMA) the average age of anorexia among men, who maintain a bodyweight less than 90% of that expected, is 17 years. However, they often go unrecognized because we typically think that the fixation for a thin body image is found only in girls. Check out this data:

· In the US an estimated 10 – 15% of people with anorexia or bulimia (another form of eating disorder) are males.
· Approximately 1 million boys and men struggle with eating disorder in the US.
· Psychiatrists in Delhi, India say that they get at least one male case of anorexia every month. However many more cases probably go unreported and undetected.

Once largely a disease affecting girls, we have now in a fashion-crazed world men galloping to join the ranks. There is nothing wrong with the desire to look good. But in a body image crazed culture, which is media fuelled, young teenage boys end up trying to go against nature where a certain body fat and muscle level is absolutely integral to their development.

For instance, of late male role-models in the media have shifted from the macho, brawny muscled men to those who have smaller body frames and softer emotional personas. This would include the MTV VJs and the new brand of movie actors who sport a lazy, lackadaisical, somewhat bedraggled look. These are the youth icons, much to the disgust of parents everywhere, and fashion is about nothing if not image-cloning. More and more boys are trying to imitate their style and mannerisms and of course the first target is to look- lean, slim and under-fed. And we all know, that young men are blessed with the proverbial ‘healthy appetite’. But not these young ‘uns’. Studies show a slow, deliberate starvation pattern which arrests hunger ultimately and before they know it they are Anorexic.

But before we screech abuses at the media yet again, we have to concede that the new look has also broken some serious ‘cowboys and real men’ kind of stereotypes expanding the term masculinity to include the many who need it. But human folly being what it is, we have a whole gang out there morphing into some other distortion altogether. Now we are on another numbers game where the picture is moving to statistics such as ‘an estimated that 5% to 18% of anorexia patients die as a result of the disorder.’ and ‘25% remain chronically ill.’ Parents (the no-win game team leaders) now need to be aware of the severity of this disease. But we also need to come out of some of our stereotypical beliefs about our boys. Sons and not just daughters need to be pried away from the fashion fundas. Sons must be ‘talked to’ (gently and sensitively) about the virtues of mind over body and persuaded to shake off the lanky, bedraggled state as a disorder rather than a charm. And psychological damage of low nutrition levels must be scientifically explained and detailed to ensure enough of a scare off from the starvation cults.

No wonder, parenting is not a school of study and specialization. I mean if anyone had the opportunity to pre-consider the syllabus of ‘crisis-management’ fields and ‘fire-fighting’ muscle needed in the job, no one in their right mind would vote for procreation.