Reverse selfie - Dove ad - filters, social media and self esteem

[ArabellaScott]

www.thedrum.com/news/2021/04/22/ad-the-day-dove-reverses-selfie-edits-highlight-dangers-social-media?fbclid=IwAR0OQjL0upHr9Z4fus2gwIDlnBckvTHZa0DEA-V7QbI9FacMdZ1Jv_WfOCg

A very effective ad from Dove. I do find it a bit heartbreaking how young women seem to feel they need to add filters and 'enhance' their photos. It must be a huge pressure to try and curate how one is seen all the time.

In this, are we going backwards? Yes, women and girls have always felt pressure to look a certain way - but I feel the discrepancy between highly edited SM images and real life must be exacerbating the problem - so much of life spent online, the gulf between real and curated online presence gets bigger and bigger. Plus, the parameters for what is considered attractive seem to have narrowed enormously.

It can't be good.

I think thr neediness social media compounds in general is very worrying.

The pressure to look a certain way is horrific. Its hard to know what came first though I think, the need for attention and validation from hundreds of strangers/followers / " friends" and discovering they get more likes if they look one way as opposed to another. Or whether getting the likes lead them down a path of forever chasing the approval and wanting to be looked at a certain way.

I think its definitely time we encouraged our children to be more inspired by role models who have actually done something as opposed to influencers who don't seem to do much besides compound materialistic behaviour and shallow thinking.

If that makes any sense

What a heartbreaking ad. I do think with the introduction of these filters we have let our children down.

It was bad enough when we had incredibly thin models and actresses, then the hyper sexualised clothing for girls. Now this seems to be the culmination.

I think its definitely time we encouraged our children to be more inspired by role models who have actually done something as opposed to influencers who don't seem to do much besides compound materialistic behaviour and shallow thinking.

Yes, absolutely this.

This is what is so worrying about allowing children on social media at younger and younger ages. They are trying to navigate a world that they don't understand. They see images and think they must be real, and don't have the maturity to distinguish what is real and what is manipulation.

I despair at parents giving children phones at 10 years of age with internet access.

It segues on from Disney princesses straight into the selfie standards of beauty. Ridiculous, impossible, cartoon ideals.

I despair at parents giving children phones at 10 years of age with internet access

I really really hate that they need them for school. I think the homework app has absolutely killed any organisational skills akd problem.solving abilities. No longer do they have to checks times to visit the local.library or make sure they write down their homework and get their shit together. Every thing is instant. 24/7. And we cant control what they look at while they are glued to their phones "doing homework"

That ad has made me well up.

The gap between the reality and what’s online. I know young people are all “oh, we know the difference, don’t worry”, but there’s a difference between knowing things with your head, and really understanding them that I think you don’t always get at that age.

There was a great meme a while back of girls taking their ugliest pics and putting them next to highly filtered pouty images. Really irreverent and showed the daftness of it all. I hope young girls find a way to subvert and play with this, in a way that empowers them and allows them to see their actual beauty in all its flawed lovely uniqueness, as so much more valuable than soft-focus big-eyed cookie cutter bland fantasy.

It's the flaws that make one interesting.

sad thing is that the 'real' girl does of course look so much better than the rough-as-guts, recently punched, thickly coated pic at the start. And all influencers embrace the rough-as-guts, recently punched, thickly coated look.

you know what to do. Make it clear that influencers are pointless and to be ignored.

I hate filters. A good friend always adds filters to photos she takes, which means when it's photos of us together, the filter is applied to me too.

It messes with my brain to see the slightly shinier version of myself in photograph. It's almost a reverse of how I felt in my teenage years when I struggled with disordered eating and was convinced I was fat at 8 stone.

I can imagine how quickly people could start to view the idealised photos as their correct version, and the mirror as a betrayal of who they want to be.

Gosh the girl is so young! Heartbreaking

Personally, I find the dove 'real beauty' type campaigns are full of mixed messages.
For example, they still airbrush and carefully select their real beauty models. Then there's the fact of 'what' they are selling. Anti cellulite firming lotion sends a message that cellulite is undesirable, regardless of which model you use.

Then there's the fact that the very young girl in this add very much meets beauty standards, sure not the cartoon type, but she wouldn't be out of place in a modelling agency. I'd be more impressed if they used a more 'average' looking model.
I know it seems like just taking offense for the sake of it, but I dislike that they make money by criticising the ideas and industry they perpetrate. It's non committal consumerist lampshading.
On the other hand, if it facilitates genuine conversation and change then that's a good thing.

Plus they test on animals. There are much better, more ethical brands.

www.in-mind.org/article/the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly-of-the-dove-campaign-for-real-beauty

Agreed, LadyBuff.

The whole thing is heartbreaking, really, and I feel for our girls growing up with this much pressure on them.

As for influencers, I remember the first time I heard that term thinking, 'I'll decide whether or not you influence me, thanks very much' and my view of them hasn't much changed. The idea that people set themselves up and self-define as 'influencers' just irritates me beyond belief. What a world we live in.

You raise good points. It would be better if it all came from a self care angle. Actual benefits to the individual on a health basis as opposed to cosmetic.

Agree with LadyBuff, well said.

I imagine that this problem won't be tackled with any sort of seriousness until the costs of treating the underlying self esteem issues it creates, for example mental health support through the NHS, outweighs the billions of pounds the making people feel bad about themselves beauty industry makes.
Seeing as we seem to be hurtling towards private healthcare, it's not in anyone's interest to stop a mental health epidemic worth so much money.

Cynical? Me? Never.

Aye, agree LadyBuff. I'm not promoting Dove as a brand. But I thought this ad was thoughtful and well made, very simple and very clear. I think we can separate the brand from the advert, perhaps? It's a subject that seems to be pretty relevant and in-your-face at the moment.

As for the girl, I think she looked like many of the girls I see around - most children are lovely looking, bloom of youth, etc, but many are apparently very self conscious.

Healthcare etc and political/economic issues - well, yes, it's potentially part of quite a huge topic in some ways.

Meanwhile, and pragmatically, I wonder if there are ways to help girls feel comfortable in their own skin, though? Small scale and effective ways - get the kids offline, outside, active, etc. Find new role models that aren't so image focused. Make a new narrative. Etc.

I think one thing to look into is how girls are encouraged to use their bodies in a positive way. Looking at sports and volunteering etc. For example, primary schools currently have a massive budget for pe, which some schools spend well and others not so much. I've seen it used really well- like one school that teamed with the secondary school to have a girls only gym built, or primaries that implement boxercise, or community running clubs that run to a place, do a good deed (pick up litter, read to the elderly etc) and run back again. Perhaps worth finding out what our local schools do and volunteer to help set these things up/ show interest.
Anyway, I am rambling a bit. I personally think getting girls away from the internet and back into the community is a good thing. Sorry, my personal dislike of dove hijacked the thread.

*There's no way I looked like that as a gawky teen!

Being a teenager was bad enough in the 90s, it must be hellish now. I heard a while ago about 'snapchat dysmorphia' which I can easily imagine many young people must relate to. Seeing an airbrushed version of yourself in photos vs the real you in the mirror would be enough to warp anyone's self-image.

www.health.com/mind-body/snapchat-dysmorphia

I struggle to take anything seriously from a company that has been telling women they need 'soft kissable armpits' for years. A part of the body I doubt most women had worried about much.

I have a friend who uses quite full on filters on her Instagram account. She posts very regularly as she has a business flogging pyramid scheme type face creams and vitamins 🙄. Today she posted a reel in which she has quite literally changed the shape of her face and everything is soft focus. It’s just so odd - I feel like asking why she does it? She probably would say she’s trying to pitch her products in the best possible light but people are not fools and what happens when people see her in the flesh (she sells mainly to friends and acquaintances) and realise it’s all a lot of smoke and mirrors? The safest think I’d that she’s very attractive anyway without all the bullshit!

The saddest thing (pls excuse typos!)

I was like all teenagers. I needed sooo much fixing. My family, god, sooo embarrassing, needed sooo much fixing. My school, pathetic. My inability to be a rock star, end of the world. But it was so long ago, that we hadn't all been wearing makeup since the age of two.

At a certain point, 13?, I decided to start of the fixing project. Bought some makeup. Put it on. Somebody decidedly better-looking stared back at me from the mirror, but it wasn't me.

Very weird feeling.

Never did makeup again.

I hate to think how that would have been inverted if the face I was used to was someone else's before I'd even got used to my own. Things are getting worse way too fast.

It's a superb ad. Created by a mass-market industry with enough nous to employ marketers who can sway the credulous.

I am not buying what they are selling. And I am also not buying what you are selling.