In most of America, eating disorders disproportionately afflict young women, rather than young men. But in Los Angeles, almost as many boys as girls are vomiting and using laxatives to lose weight. What's to blame? Uh... Channing Tatum and Twitter?

The LA Times has real data to establish the problem here: boys in LA are twice as likely as the national average to be purging and taking medications in order to control their weight. A serious problem, sure. But their analysis of the situation leaves something to be desired:

Some experts say boys are starting to face the pressures long placed on girls, as buff, bare men proliferate in pop culture. Boys today watch Channing Tatum strip as "Magic Mike" or weigh themselves against the muscular Dwayne Johnson. The nonstop chatter of Twitter and Facebook has amplified those messages, therapists say.

Some experts were reached on their cell phones by a reporter just as they were trying to put the kid in the damn bathtub and the other kid was in the kitchen trying to stick a fork in the damn socket and, Christ, some experts are not god damn psychics of the teenage boy mind, so, I don't know, maybe it's that guy—- honey, what was the guy's name, in the stripper movie?— yeah, that guy, with the abs, and the other guy, the wrestler guy, I know my nephew loves that guy, with the muscles. And they're always on the god damn Twitter and whatnot, the Facebook, all the pictures on there, who even knows what the hell they're looking at. Now look, sorry, I really have to put this kid in the damn bathtub.

[LAT. Photo via AP]