Do you feel passionate about the self-esteem of your child? If so, please share your thoughts with the Dove Self-Esteem Project (DSEP) – and you could win a £200 voucher - NOW CLOSED

[AnnMumsnet]

The folks at Dove would love to hear your thoughts on their new Self-Esteem Project and the launch of their new online space packed full of resources, specifically designed to help parents build their girls' body confidence and self-esteem.

The new website is here: selfesteem.dove.co.uk/

Dove say, "Do you notice your daughter comparing her looks to others? While this is a normal part of adolescence, it can also be a slippery road for her self-confidence."

"Our ambition is for beauty to be a source of confidence, not anxiety. The DSEP was founded in 2004 to ensure the next generation of women grows up to be happy and content, free from misconstrued beauty stereotypes and the burden of self-doubt."

"Dove's aim is to improve the self-esteem of over 15 million young people by 2015. It is well on the way, having reached more than 11 million so far, but there are lots more girls to reach. And with more than half (54%) of girls citing their mothers as their primary role model*, Mumsnet is working with the DSEP to give mums the information they need to help raise their children's body confidence".

"In addition, Dove has also been doing a lot of work directly with schools - the DSEP made a donation of £250,000 to Beat (Beating Eating Disorders) to deliver free self-esteem workshops for 11-14 year old school children. Already, 152,175 lives have been reached and Dove wants to reach thousands more this year, so get your school to book a free workshop now by visiting www.dove.co.uk/en/".

School student, 14 year old Emily, shares her views on the workshops: "My view of beauty has changed massively - I now realise that nobody's perfect and everyone has flaws"

So have a look and let Dove - on this thread - know what you think. They are finalising the website now and want to use your feedback to help make it better. Please note your comments may be used to help shape future edits of the site and the programme.

Please state the age of your DD(s) when you respond.

~ What's your general feedback - is it user friendly? Is it helpful? What is good about the site, what's appealing to you/ your DD? Is it something you think you'd use? If so, how? If not why not? What's missing? What self-esteem issue do you think is not covered so well?

~ On the activities which are on this site, including (but not limited to) My Mosaic and Retouch Roulette - what are your favourite/ least favourite activities - and why? All activities can be viewed on the website.

~ Generally talking about self-esteem and girls - how - if at all - has this affected your DD? How do you and your family deal with it? What age did any issues start? Do you think the website would help your DD?

~ Parents of boys: whilst the DSEP focuses primarily on girls, it understands that boys are also affected by self-esteem issues. The DSEP will be working on dedicated materials for boys so Dove would love to hear your thoughts on how boys are affected by self-esteem or body image issues.

All comments welcome.

Add your feedback on this thread and you'll be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £200 voucher to spend at //www.experiencedays.co.uk

Thanks
MNHQ

• Source: Real Truth About Beauty Revisited - Dove Global Study 2010
  Please note your comments on this thread may be used by Dove elsewhere.

[MarshaBrady]

We're probably in the corner labeled cynics, perhaps with a pic, in ad land. Perhaps we can reverse this trend for duplicitous marketing which grabs younger customers under the guise of education.

Yes what tools are there? I use a lot of my education when I talk about this stuff, but what else hmm.

[MarshaBrady]

Ha swallowed. I loathe Dove now . All those 'real' women lined up yeuch

[MarshaBrady]

Listing things is probably just giving more ideas. I didn't look at the site, am just going to ignore it and hopefully it will go away.

[KatieScarlett2833]

No I won't for all of the reasons stated above.

[lurcherlover]

I didn't know about the skin bleach

Well done, Dove - you've just lost a loyal customer. I've used your soap and deodorant for years but won't be buying either any more. To peddle this website to British women whilst promoting skin bleaching to those in other countries is disgusting. Or is it only us Brits who get to feel confident in our own skin?

The FB crisis damaged your brand, but what has damaged it more is your pitiful response. Those pictures are "insulting"? And I suppose domestic violence is just a bit of slapping around, is it, and you don't really see why it's such a big deal?

I have a daughter and I will make sure she knows about this campaign as a lesson in the duplicitous marketing practices of big corporations. You remind me of Aptamil giving breastfeeding advice.

[MardyBra]

Oh dear Dove. This isn't going well, is it?

[swallowedAfly]

it is actually very good for that purpose lurcher - i do a values tutorial in FE and as part of it examine what the advertising and marketing industry tells young people matters (re: looks, thiness, stuff etc) and what it's basic message is to people: you are fat, ugly, smelly, etc but if you buy all this crap you will be slightly less repugnant. i may actually use this website for showing what the same message looks like in a more sophisticated and in some ways even more cynical format and get them to unpick what they see there.

we got that the women and girls all looked like models, all slim, mostlly white etc etc so they'll pick all that out too.

it may also comfort me to know that at least a small cohort of teenage girls who i get to see will be encouraged to pick apart the bullshit manipulation of multi million pound advertising.

it's a bit of a mission of mine to teach youngsters media literacy - and to read the values, beliefs and solutions marketed to them and criticise them and determine to choose their own.

[swallowedAfly]

so thanks for the resource dove

i also run a project group that is currently making a film on diversity but for our next project may tackle the stuff i've talked about above so maybe you'll even see yourselves on youtube.

[ashesgirl]

Interesting response to the Dove campaign

www.sparksummit.com/2013/04/22/real-beauty-real-talk-the-sparkteam-responds-to-doves-latest-campaign/

[ashesgirl]

www.sparksummit.com/2013/04/22/real-beauty-real-talk-the-sparkteam-responds-to-doves-latest-campaign/

[swallowedAfly]

ooh i like this quote from there:

"What if instead of marketing the effect their product is supposed to have, they actually marketed the product. So, instead of implying ?Dove will reveal your ?true? beauty? they could say ?Dove will make your hair soft? or ?Buy dove if you want to have nice smelling skin.? This puts the focus back on the product and it doesn?t assume the consumer is insecure about how they look or that they want to be more beautiful or that the soft-focus, glowing white world of Dove commercials means anything to them. That is a campaign I could get behind.".

seriously agree with this. market your products and what they actually do instead of trading in insecurities and false, dead end aspirations.

and it would be wonderful if everyone stopped peddling pseudo science transparent non-jargon too.

i think a brand that actually credited women with a bit of intelligence and savviness would do great.

[swallowedAfly]

i want to say also that they don't just trade on women's insecurities - they actively create and groom them. so starting on kids and expecting mummy to hold their hand and think she's doing a good thing as she takes part in that grooming process by using this website is grotesque really. seen straight it is utterly grotesque.

[Salbertina]

If anyone esp with dds is a Times subscriber, can thoroughly recommend Melanie Reid's Spinal Column today. V sobering and frank about what matters and what doesn't esp re body image!

[CabbageLeaves]

What's your general feedback - is it user friendly? Is it helpful? What is good about the site, what's appealing to you/ your DD? Is it something you think you'd use? If so, how? If not why not? What's missing? What self-esteem issue do you think is not covered so well?
Hard to navigate. Tampon leaflet sums it up well. So hard to navigate I gave up so cannot really comment more.

On the activities which are on this site, including (but not limited to) My Mosaic and Retouch Roulette - what are your favourite/ least favourite activities - and why? All activities can be viewed on the website
Didn't find them

Generally talking about self-esteem and girls - how - if at all - has this affected your DD? How do you and your family deal with it? What age did any issues start? Do you think the website would help your DD?
Knowing about Dove's links to Lynx and skin lightening puts their marketing campaign in a whole new cynical light. I will probably never buy Dove ever again because of the hypocrisy.
What do I teach my DDs about self esteem? Not to believe any advertisers because they are all trying to sell you something...which means convincing you, you need it.

The whole FB debacle shows how little integrity there is amongst big business. I wasn't a great user of Dove previously but this thread has reminded me to actively boycott them rather than just 'not select'

[Nerfmother]

Just had a quick look and especially at sticks and stones. Why do Emily's friends have adult voices if they are meant to be teens? And as she is in a jumper throughout when do they see the bra? It must be visible then! Plus, hate to say it, but knowing some. Of dd's 'friends' if they knew what she was thinking, they'd be even crueller - girls aren't unkind because they don't understand each other, quite the opposite!

[Nigglenaggle]

So broadly speaking many peoples views are similar. Will be interesting to see if anything changes as a result...

[Madamimadam]

Completely agree with SwallowedAFly and similar posters on here. Wish companies like Dove would credit us with some intelligence. This campaign is mendacious tosh. Wtf are Dove doing in schools?

Didn't know it was the same company that made Lynx. Now, there's a product that's marketed to raise children's self-esteem

Live your values, eh?

[AnnieLobeseder]

Given that Dove is made by Unilever, who are not only responsible for the appallingly misogynistic Lynx marketing but who also tested their products on animals until the EU made them stop, I don't for one minute believe that they give a toss about women. They also sell skin-lightening products and don't use women of could in their Real Beauty campaign, from which I can only conclude that they are racist.

I have boycotted their products for years and would never use a resource produced by then too teach my child about positive self-esteem.

[AnnieLobeseder]

Oh yes, and the appalling response to the FBrape campaign too.

Do they really think women are so stupid that we swallow this "we believe you're beautiful" guff without looking beyond the hype?

I would love a real campaign that promoted self esteem in women and taught them to worry less about their looks, but from the viewpoint that looks are irrelevant rather than that every women is supposedly beautiful, and not from a company with a vested interest in selling beauty products.

[AnnieLobeseder]

Sorry, autocorrect fail. That should be "women of colour", not "women of could".

[CoalDustWoman]

Similar question that I asked on a Boots thread recently:

Don't you feel even a teeny bit hypocritical at attempting be seen to be solving a problem that you have a vested interest in actively creating?

You wouldn't have much of a business if it weren't for insecurities. This is a sop - but to whom?

[2gorgeousboys]

I agree wholeheartedly with previous posters that this should not just be about girls. I have a 13 year old boy who is extremely self conscious about his body image. He's small for his age (in age 10/11 clothes) and skinny and gets upset by all the negative comments made about him.

[PoppyAmex]

"Oh yes, and the appalling response to the FBrape campaign too."

Agree, the hypocrisy is terrible.

Shame on you, Dove - even Nissan UK reacted quicker and more positively than someone who purports to care about Women's Rights.

[PoppyAmex]

Second picture down next to a Dove ad.

And you address that with that vacuous, meaningless press release to MN'tters? Shame, shame, shame.

[DoctorAnge]

I think Dove think Women must be totally stupid and despise their bodies; news flash - some of us think we look fine and don't confirm to the standards YOU as a corporation are bombarding us with. Also their stance in the FB ad was.... Unsurprising.
We don't need Dove to help Women with their self esteem when their one goal is to convince us we would be smelly, wrinkly and hideous without their glorified bloody soap!