dove ads

[crowgirlb]

after looking at a set of pictures called naked people and furniture - which was really about naked extremely skinny young women and furniture - I got kind of depressed, and, as dumb as it sounds, I went to the Dove website to look at the ads they have of beautiful women with curves to try to get cheered up.

sigh.... it didn't work. I have some qualms about the campaign for real beauty - it is still about selling women a lot of products they may or may not need in order to be more "beautiful" - like they need products to be beautiful. That said I respect the way they've tried to broaden that definition of beauty, and I respect their willingness to support engaging in a conversation about our standards, even if they're just doing it to make a buck (God knows there are worse ways to make to a buck).

All well and good, but while I was on the site, I decided to check out the forums, and, while there are lots of positive comments, and some negative ones I really understand, it really distressed me to see so many people call the women in the dove ads "fat" and even "obese".

these are women who are, at the biggest, a size 14, and the smallest of the women is maybe a size 6 or 8. they are lovely, in my opinion, but even they don't come close to covering the range of what is beautiful. most of them are 6-10 sizes smaller than me, and considering the incidence of obesity in this country, I think I may be fairly average.

now I'm not saying that I'm healthy as I am - I should probably lose 30 pounds, and I'm working on it - I've worked back up to 30 minutes a day on the bike- but even 30 pounds below where I am now, I'd be a size 14 or 16 because I'm a big, busty girl with a very large frame. when I was able to squeeze my butt into a size 10 for a short while 10 years ago, I wasn't really eating, and you could see my hipbones and ribs when I wore a tight t-shirt.

now I'm reading comments asserting that a size 8 is really fat (from both men and women) and that these beautiful, curvy, women need to "get their lard asses off the couch" and start working out.

I know that people are cruel and idiotic in all kinds of ways. I know from some research I did a long time ago that what is considered beautiful in most times and places is whatever is most difficult to attain. I know models have become skinnier as average women have become heavier, in almost directly inverse proportion to national trends. I know that the people I care about define physical beauty in broad strokes that encompass a lot of differences, and that my husband thinks I’m beautiful as I am, whether or not I lose that 30 pounds.

And yet I still find myself sucked into the feeling. I feel so much sympathy for these girls that I teach - they don't have all the backing that I have, and they are insecure teenagersand pre-teens. the messages they get are frightening.

Comments

[2wanda.livejournal.com]

I agree. I am very concerned about the messages that young women get these days. I think it is much worse than even when I was younger, and it was pretty bad then. Advertisers are so much more effective these days with their psychologically manipulative tactics. The sad thing is that nobody seems to want to take responsibility for the messages that our young people, not just girls, are getting these days. I think it is tragic.

I don't know what the answer is, except to perhaps teach children the skills they need to thwart the effects of the marketing that is directed at them. But then advertisers would just think of another way to get to them.

But I do like the Dove ads. I know they are also trying to sell me products, but I do buy soap, lotion, shampoo, and deodorant. I'm inclined to buy Dove over some other brand, after seeing their ads.

[twocrows.livejournal.com]

yeah, it's a hard issue. more and more girls have eating disrders, and more and more boys are using steroids and muscle supplements, all because they think they are supposed to look like the people in movies and in magazines. Weight is the one issue where many, many people still feel no compunction about expressing their feelings right to someone's face, and people who are really dramatically obese get folks in restaurants caling out "hey, stop eating you cow". aie!

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

UGH to the comments in the forums. Geez louise.

I don't know the answer either, though my mom did what she could to shelter me from stuff like that, and I guess it worked because I've never once regretted not having been a size 4 since I was about 11 or so.

I think that the capacity to recognize what real people look like is part of that. When I see ads in magazines and on TV, they look so weird to me. (I had this idea floating around for awhile for a SF story where supermodels were actually aliens, but I think that's already been done.) It's not to say that I wouldn't change a thing about my appearance, but mostly what I want is to be in better shape in terms of strength and endurance.

This may sound weird, but I think what it boils down to is the ability to recognize bullshit. Advertising isn't the only realm where this is useful. Any area where people's thinking is at stake—politics and religion, for instance, and I say this as a person who understands the necessity of politics and has deep religious feeling—is an area where critical thought can waylay an instinctive response.

Well, it probably also has to do with getting older. I know I'm a youngun, but there are definite advantages to having passed 30!

[twocrows.livejournal.com]

getting older helps in some ways regarding self-conciousness, but I'm also finding that my metabolism slowed down a lot when I hit 30, and so it's harder to keep from gaining weight and harder to lose weight, too.

I haven't been a size 4 since I was about 8 years old, if then. I wore size 10 when I was 10 years old, and I was a healthy, normal, big-boned kid. It's just so distressing to see how many people believe the hype. I mean, you can tell that from how well magazines about the ups and downs of Oprah's weight sell, and the fact that the covers of every magazine at the check-out stand have stuff about the stars weights, but hearing regular people go on like that. gah!

since I come from a family of type II diabetics, losing weight for me is not a purely looks-based issue, but at the same time, I get hooked in by the looks stuff, too.