What is your opinion on teenagers joining MFP?

Well I'm 18 as well, and I think that people under my age can join the site if they really need to lose the weight due to health issues. But unfortunatly I've seen girls that are 15 and 16 years old and they are already so thin that it is ridculous that they are even considering losing weight. It's a sad thing.

I'm 27, and I wish I would have been concerned when I was younger about what I ate. Unfortunately, I did not care until I was 22 and now I feel like a blimp. I think as long as the younger girls can be realistic about their weight and only want to be healthy (not anorexic looking), then good for them.

If they are under the supervision of a doctor and really do need to lose weight I see no problem with it.
But I mean really under the care of a doctor. When I was 16 I went on WW for the first time but my doctor approved it first.

I'm not a teenager, but I think teens should be able to have a MFP account. After all, it's important for people of all ages to live a healthy lifestyle. It's good for kids to learn how to eat right and exercise before their health becomes a problem. Maybe they could be allowed to sign up but have some way other users can notify the site owners of any signs of anorexia or anything that looks suspicious/dangerous.

Calorie counting while your body is still developing/shaping up is probably not a good idea. At 18 I would say yes to monitoring what you eat but not trying to force your body down to a size zero, some people just aren't meant to be a size zero, even if they want to be. I speak from experience, my sister was a teen anorexic and almost died, all due to her dance instructor commenting she was "looking a little chunky!"

I was definitely eating poorly all through my childhood, though I was still not terribly fat all of the time, because I was still growing, and was involved in many physical activities. Some aspects of MFP wouldn't have been terribly useful before moving out and shopping / cooking for myself, but keeping an honest food diary for a couple of weeks might have opened my eyes to all the crap I was eating (and how many extra calories that involved).

On the one hand, my heart goes out to the teenagers who think they need to be here, especially if they are doing the "I want to be popular and losing 3 pounds will help" thing. On the other hand, my heart goes out to teens who were never taught about proper nutrition, who ate too much junk food, etc. (I fell into that category.)

Maybe I would feel better if there were a tutorial that a teenager had to walk through to help keep them safe and give them information about the proper way to lose weight? Something that would go off for them if they are not eating enough calories, etc or to try and teach them better nutrition to go along with just logging calories.

I remember having to watch my weight in high school ... (and before) ... and I did it with a calorie book, pen and paper to try and keep a journal for my calories. All I looked at were the calories. I still have my journal from back then ... and I was so unhappy as I tried to lose weight and beat myself up. No matter how much weight I lost (and I lost about 25 pounds in high school) I felt fat. I couldn't get around it in my head ... I remember a "skinny" girl having to loosen the headset belt at McDonalds after me ... but in my mind I was still fat.

I guess my inclination would be to hope that they didn't need a site like this and I hope they don't go through the same struggles I have with my weight loss over the years.

If you suck, I will taunt you. The end.

I think I joined here before (different account) around 16.
This site helped me because I was eating 800 - 1000 calories before coming on MFP and then I learned I should be eating at least 1200 calories.

I didn't really think eating 800 calories would have been bad for me - and this was on top of working out 2 hours a day.
Yes I lost a lot of weight (50 in 3 months) ... But I am SURE I lost a WHOLE lot of muscle too.

I don't see what's so wrong with it. I always believed adults are adults because of their maturity, not because of their age. Regardless of what people say, a 400 lb teen who wants to lose weight should have the option to use the site, despite the opinion that "they're still growing." So long as they're not using it to support cases of anorexia. Perhaps teens just want to maintain the same weight, or want to gain weight, such as a high school wrestler. Kids these days are unhealthy anyways. What's so wrong with them keeping track of what they eat? Interests in their health while they're young can definitely lead to good habits when they're older.

I've been dieting since age 8 or so, so yes.

Calorie guidelines here are set up for adults so they can do themselves major harm following them.