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A new podcast promises to provide insight into ­Gen Z life – but proves an infuriating, outdated listen

Although it covers important and sensitive issues, Chloe Combi’s “You Don’t Know Me” can feel exploitative in its approach.

By Anna Leszkiewicz

A new podcast series hosted by the journalist and youth expert Chloe Combi promises to give an insight into contemporary ­teenage life. Each episode is themed around a different issue affecting young people – sex, work, popularity, porn – and contains frank interviews with teenagers as well as reflections from adult experts.

There are some important and sensitive subjects considered, such as intimate partner violence (which is more likely to affect teenagers than 20-somethings), in an episode that features moving testimony from a young survivor. I’m glad that young people were given a platform to voice their own concerns about these subjects, which makes it all the more disappointing that one such issue is handled so clumsily.

The second episode, “Body Image”, focuses on eating disorders including anorexia and orthorexia, but its approach feels exploitative and sensationalised. The episode begins with a clip from a 16-year-old (who, we later learn, is severely unwell and undergoing outpatient treatment) who tells us her current weight, height and goal weight, admitting that she knows reaching that goal could kill her. As the episode continues, she makes a ­number of explicit disclosures about her eating, her efforts to hide her illness, ­graphic descriptions of her body, and other troubling confessions.

[see also: Life Skills by Rookie is a sensitive self-help podcast]

It makes for uncomfortable listening. Reporting guidelines from the eating disorder charity Beat advise against mentioning past goal weights, specific details of disordered behaviour or images of emaciation, as such descriptions are potentially triggering, and eating disorders are uniquely competitive illnesses. But this podcast includes such details, and I found myself hoping that any teenagers concerned about their own body image were not listening.

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There are other missteps, too: Combi searches for simple causes (social media and Instagram peer pressure) for what is a complex mental illness. A teenager further into her recovery offers a rare thoughtful voice, but this is an otherwise infuriating, outdated listen. 

You Don’t Know Me 
Podimo/Podcasts/Spotify

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This article appears in the 03 Mar 2021 issue of the New Statesman, Humanity vs the virus

Select and enter your email address Your weekly guide to the best writing on ideas, politics, books and culture every Saturday. The best way to sign up for The Saturday Read is via saturdayread.substack.com The New Statesman's quick and essential guide to the news and politics of the day. The best way to sign up for Morning Call is via morningcall.substack.com Our Thursday ideas newsletter, delving into philosophy, criticism, and intellectual history. The best way to sign up for The Salvo is via thesalvo.substack.com Stay up to date with NS events, subscription offers & updates. Weekly analysis of the shift to a new economy from the New Statesman's Spotlight on Policy team. The best way to sign up for The Green Transition is via spotlightonpolicy.substack.com
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  • Arts and Culture
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  • Facility / Grounds Management and Maintenance
  • Finance Management
  • Health - Medical and Nursing Management
  • HR, Training and Organisational Development
  • Information and Communications Technology
  • Information Services, Statistics, Records, Archives
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  • OH&S, Risk Management
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