Featured websites: March 2005 Archives

I have been meaning for some time to mention the Campaign for Real Beauty started by Dove. They are aiming to question conventional standards of beauty i.e. that to be beautiful women must be thin, young, conventional etc. You may have seen their ads on the tube which have captions like 'fit or fat?', 'grey or gorgeous', next to pictures of women who are often stunning looking, although perhaps not in a conventional sense. Of course the aim of the campaign is to sell more soap, but I did think it was a hopeful step which might encourage other advertisers to use a broader range of images of women in their campaigns. And it seems to provoke debate, at least judging by the number of scrawled comments on the escalator ads I've seen. Although I've often wondered how people have time to write anything as they are zooming up or down past a poster!

The website is nicely designed and opens with an online poll. Then you can get access to forums discussing beauty and body image (i.e. weight), unconventional looks and older women.