Content warning: This article contains mentions of eating disorders and disordered eating habits.
While feminist scholars and critics have long warned of social media’s regressive trajectory, recent events surrounding influencer Liv Schmidt have reignited concerns about the glamorisation of disordered eating. Under the looking glass, what does this controversy reveal about women’s value under an increasingly conservative digital patriarchy?
Overly polished aesthetics, whisper-toned voiceovers, minimalist meal journals — these elements converge in ‘wellness’ influencer Liv Schmidt’s body of content. She is known for her food diaries titled What I Eat in a Day to Stay Skinny, vlogging her meals to a predominantly female audience. Earlier this month, Meta shut down Schmidt’s private Instagram community named Skinni Societe amid accusations of promoting extreme thinness and disordered eating culture. While Schmidt has publicly denied endorsing eating disorders, screenshots from her private online community tell a more nuanced story.
In one screen recording, Schmidt ends a long statement regarding the controversy with the phrase: “for the sake of the community we’re all building, just be mindful, be respectful, and keep it Skinni.” In another message, she encourages followers to use “smaller plates for portion mindfulness.” To those who’ve experienced this way of thinking before, the lesson underlining these messages is clear. Smallness is becoming synonymous with chic, control with beauty, and hunger with virtue.
Such euphemisms exemplify what feminist philosopher Sandra Lee Bartky identified as the “micropolitics of femininity,” where women are socialised into self-surveillance and bodily discipline under the guise of voluntary choice. This internalised regulation is not imposed directly; rather, it thrives through suggestion. Through the ambiguous language in fitness programmes like Schmidt’s, we are all taught that health correlates solely to our size.
But let’s not place the blame solely on one woman. In fact, Liv Schmidt’s videos wield artefacts born from a two-decade-old online cultural movement, where women and girls are drawn into the glamorous staging of disordered eating.
Pro-Ana 2.0: the digital afterlife of Tumblr’s thinspo
For those who spent time on Tumblr in the early 2010s, the signs are unsettlingly familiar. The visual language of Liv Schmidt’s Instagram — empty spaces, visible bones, oversized clothing hanging from thin bodies — echoes the pro-anorexia communities that once flourished under floral filters and Lana Del Rey lyrics. Former Tumblr user and fashion industry veteran @machinedarine sees Schmidt as part of a troubling resurgence of that era’s culture:
“It [Tumblr in the 2010s] was glamorising being skinny over being healthy. It’s unfortunate because just a few years ago, the fashion industry was finally embracing body inclusivity. I know where this will end up because I’ve already seen it before.”
Not all observers agree with this perspective. One anonymous fan credits Liv Schmidt with helping her recover from binge eating disorder, telling The New Feminist that the influencer “gives great advice that’s just like a wake-up call for [her].”
Still, many others describe more troubling experiences. One fan recalled a “challenge set” that encouraged participants to “have a ‘liquid dinner’, aka replace dinner with a 170-calorie Corepowder shake.” After four weeks in Schmidt’s online community, another anonymous user admitted they had to leave:
“It was too upsetting. There was one girl whose picture showed all of her chest bones.”
In both Schmidt’s digital space and the haunted halls of Tumblr’s past, the aesthetic often disguises disordered behaviour. It is not overtly promoting self-harm, and for some, the sense of control and soft visuals have even supported a path toward food neutrality. But the few success stories do not erase the growing concerns. In Schmidt’s world (for many), starvation feels sanctified.
Discipline and erasure
To fully grasp the cultural significance of platforms like Liv Schmidt’s, we must turn to feminist scholars such as Susan Bordo. In Unbearable Weight, Bordo argues that slenderness has historically signalled discipline, fragility, and moral virtue. These are all traits valorised in women under capitalist patriarchy, where women become ornamental extensions of the home and family unit.
Schmidt’s universe is steeped in this visual language, even as she denies promoting such rhetoric. Take, for example, a screenshot from Schmidt’s Instagram offering “date night” meal suggestions. He is advised to eat a full bowl of pasta, an appetiser, and dessert. She, on the other hand, should share an appetiser and a pasta dish with just one glass of wine.
This gendered segmentation of food intake starkly illustrates Bartky’s concept of the “disciplinary practices of femininity”, when your value is directly correlated to how little space you take up. Not eating becomes a form of currency. Schmidt may not be explicitly handing out diets, but she is (intentionally or not) selling habits that were created to placate women through voluntary starvation.
But, it is important to remember that Schmidt’s brand does not exist in a vacuum. It is part of a movement of influencers who operate within a neoliberal logic of self-optimisation, where every bite, movement, and moment must be curated toward an aspirational ideal. The resurgence of “tradwife” content and so-called “femininity coaches” like Hannah Neeleman and Classically Abby taps into this same nostalgia for a controlled, white, domestic femininity.
A typical post from a trad Instagram reads: “A graceful woman controls her appetite.” Another features lemon water and a handful of berries, captioned: “This is femininity.”
These aesthetic signals mask a political message. As Angela McRobbie notes, postfeminist culture often reasserts patriarchal values while appearing feminist in tone. Liv Schmidt exemplifies this when she commercialises Tumblr thinspo under the banner of empowerment and enlightened wellness.
It is safe to say, then, that Skinni Societe is not the problem in isolation. The issue lies in the algorithmic and cultural conditions that enable her image of feminine discipline to flourish.
TikTok user @claud.9301, reflecting on the resurgence of “thinspo” culture, echoes this observation: “They’re very loud in an attempt to ‘normalise’ wanting to be skinny. SkinnyTok has a much wider range than Tumblr ever did, with a lot of people above 30 making being skinny their lifestyle.”
What’s at stake is not just a dress size or a meal plan. It’s a worldview. A new generation is being taught that to be beautiful is to shrink, to be desirable is to disappear, and to be feminine is to starve. All this, just fifteen years after the previous generation suffered through the same cycle.
If you are struggling with disordered eating, support is available.
UK: Contact Beat at 0808 801 0677 or visit beateatingdisorders.org.uk
US: Call NEDA at 1-800-931-2237 or visit nationaleatingdisorders.org
Liv Schmidt
Liv Schmidt