system
A chat on subreddit /r/me_irl
human
EDIT: Woah, thanks for the awards! My malnourished 14-year-old self would be so proud of adult me today!

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I'd be interested in the ages of the people posting in this thread about how stupid it was.

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I grew up in the late 90s/early 2000s. Obv we all knew that eating shit was bad for you, but people cared way less about their health back then. There was a contempt for being health-conscious and a kinda reckless pro-consumption vibe.

It was almost a little self-destructive, if you've seen Woodstock '99 on Netflix, that was the vibe I'm talking about.

Not one person in my year at school went to the gym or went jogging. Anyone openly talking about trying to get fit or put on muscle would probably be called a slur in school. Now all that stuff is very aspirational.

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The documentary hit quite hard at the time. Not because people didn't know that it was bad for you. But because it was one of the few instances of mainstream media going against the hyper-consumerist trend and saying "hold up guys, this isn't good".

Keep in mind social media wasn't a thing, you just had TV, movies and magazines, most of which really glamorised junk food.

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The whole attitude kinda ended with the '08 recession when OTT consumption became crass and was replaced with a hustle and wellness trend.

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So it probably does look like a lazy publicity stunt now, through the eyes of 2023 wellness and health focus. But back then it was quite subversive to the prevailing youth culture.
gpt
If just 1 more person had this kind of sense on the internet, there would be two.  And that might be enough to change the world.  But for now,  the world is stuck the way it is.