<p>I go to a relatively expensive private school, so there is definitely no shortage of tanorexic girls here. Though my friends and I protested, my roommate has gone a couple times to tanning salons, and one time we accompanied her. I was absolutely appalled by what I saw. There was a TV screen that was extolling the vitamin D that one gets from salon tanning, and there were all of these donation tags for the cause of researching into using vitamin D to prevent breast cancer. Not only was I disgusted by the salon’s attempt to promote tanning as healthy, but by the money wasted going to yet more research into vitamins, after I had just read an article in the Times about how despite how much vitamins have been touted to boost health, actual research has failed to provide empirical evidence for significant health benefits in the long run. I’m all for breast cancer research, but not when a tanning chain is using it as a stunt to try and convince people that the product that they’re selling won’t kill you. If a cigarette ad tried to promote them as healthy there would be public outcry.</p>
<p>People are just vain to the point of self-destruction, I guess. I know a woman who survived cancer that required her to have a hysterectomy. She would still insist on going tanning, and would make light and joke that she was willing to risk dying to look good. Shortly thereafter, she had to have several cancerous skin lesions removed, and while it didn’t kill her, I don’t think she goes tanning anymore.</p>