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One aspect of Dove’s new campaign challenges children and their parents to redefine the accepted definition of beauty.

Dove launches Campaign for ‘Real Beauty,’ targets self esteem

Campaign goal is to help women feel more beautiful every day by challenging today’s stereotypical view of beauty and inspiring women to take care of themselves

Nathan Farner FAR01008@BYUI.EDU Scroll Staff

Women around the world fall victim to the onslaught of negative media about the perception of beauty. Dove, along with other companies, is fighting back to help save self-esteem.

Beauty ads of petite models target women everyday on prime time television.

Super Bowl fans saw the new ad campaign by Victoria Secret at a time when more people watch TV than any other. The ad showed thin women sporting new lingerie fashions.

“Only 2 percent of thousands of women around the world consider themselves beautiful after a study was given to 10 different countries on women’s perception of beauty. More than one in four girls surveyed felt the media pressured them to have a perfect body,” according to Dove’s official Web site, www.dove.us.
After Dove’s findings, the company decided to research further.

“Girls who watch TV commercials featuring underweight models lose self-confidence and become more dissatisfied with their own bodies. As a result, girls question their own beauty: between 50 and 70 percent of girls of normal weight believe they are overweight,” according to Flinders University in South Australia in 2002.

Dove teamed up with Bath & Body Works and Wal-Mart to fight against these new statistics.

The Dove Campaign for Real Beauty was created and aired during this year’s Super Bowl, but with a new kind of ad.

“Instead of images of long locks, longer legs and incredibly lean bodies, these companies promoted their products with a message of ‘real beauty’ by encouraging women and girls to celebrate themselves as they are,” according to Theresa Howard, in USA Today.

Dove’s new mission, “to make women feel more beautiful every day by challenging today’s stereotypical view of beauty and inspiring women to take great care of themselves,” has been the motivation behind the creation of a new self-esteem fund that will help women break the barriers of the stereotypical perception on beauty.

Many mothers have tried for years to teach their daughters what Dove is showing the world with this new ad campaign.

Dove is providing opportunities for those mothers to do something about it.

Dove has created many avenues for women to get involved and make a stand. The new Web site, www.campaignforrealbeauty.com, is the headquarters to finding interactive billboards and panel discussions for women to voice their opinion. They can also get involved with the self-esteem program to help others.

The self-esteem program is in partnership with Girl Scouts of America uniquely ME! program created to educate and give hands-on training to build self-esteem among the 92 percent of women who want to change at least one aspect of their appearance, according to Dove’s official Web site.

You can find more on how to help build the self-esteem of thousands of women by logging on to www.campaignforrealbeauty.com.