Welcome to My World – The Anti-Dove

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The latest Dove ad campaign traveled around Facebook faster than a 1980’s Glam Rock groupie Chlamydia infection. You would’ve thought this short video held the message to the Meaning of Life or something. Even I became a sappy sucker and reposted it. Once the druggy effects of sappy soap opera music and emotional manipulation finally wore off I realized I have, just been like, TOTALLY violated by a soap commercial.

This might take hella amounts of scrubbing and hard core self-evaluation to remove the remains of being fondled by a slick marketing scheme. I wonder how many women (and a few still visibly shaken and tearful gay men) rushed out in their pajama bottoms and slippers to empty store shelves of all Dove products to show solidarity.

And speaking of the 1980’s – the scenario of the Dove ad sounds like it could be an eerie set up in some horror movie from that era. I mean, these women were instructed to walk into an apartment to be filmed alone with an unseen stranger sitting at a draft board who asks questions such as “Tell me about your chin” in a creepy calm voice?! Somewhere Freddy Kruger is watching Youtube and whispering to himself “I. Am. SUCH. A. Loser.”

None of the women chosen to take part in this Dove sponsored experiment were too dark, fat or old so it seems the company got its porridge just right. Most of them were Caucasian blondes with blue eyes (HELLOOO GOLDILOCKS!). And a majority of the comments heard in the commercial were made by the Caucasians, too. I’d like to think that in the final dramatic moment when these women are shown their before and after sketching, the one Asian woman and the two African American women just cackled “I don’t have time for this shit” and left.

The women seemed awkward and pressured to respond in the way the director of the ad nudged them to…y’know – just like reality TV! Even the tears seemed a bit…counted. All seemed to harshly judge the women in the first drawings – based on appearances – so was any lesson learned at all? The commercial ended with the words: “You are more beautiful than you think.”

But what if you’re not?? What if the first sketch IS you? You might’ve seen this commercial while sitting on the couch stuffing your face with Funyans and realized a forensic artist just flashed a picture of you on TV!

Then welcome to MY world.

Lana Hanson has no college degree, no awards, no “touring poet” accolades. She’s blessed to run a brush through multiplying grey head-hairs, to feel crows’ feet deepening grooves around her eyes. She’s finally started to admire herself. She aims to raise women and children up from poverty, oppression, doubt, and silence because she has faced all of these.
Lana was published at www.desertcompanion.com and also at www.hypertexts.com where she was the Spotlight Poet for two months. She is also a regular blogger at www.hormonesmatter.com.
Born in Flint, MI, Lana Hanson now lives in Las Vegas, NV, with her two sardonic sons, 13 and 17, three perpetually vomiting cats, one farting dog and a 72-year-old boy-toy in our Crazy Quilt House.

3 Comments

    • Thank you for catching this. It was Lana who wrote this, I uploaded it for her. I am not nearly as funny!

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