Why Dove’s “Real Beauty Sketches” Video Makes Me Uncomfortable… and Kind of Makes Me Angry
So this video started going around my facebook today, with about a dozen of my female friends sharing the link with comments like, and “Everyone needs to see this”, and “All girls should watch this,” and “This made me cry.” And I’m not trying to shame those girls! I definitely understand why they would do so. And I don’t want to be a killjoy. But as I clicked link and started watching the video, I started to feel a slight sense of discomfort. I couldn’t put my finger on why that was, exactly, but it continued throughout the whole thing. After watching the video several more times, I have some thoughts…
I watched that video, and while I’m obviously well outside the target demographic, I was bothered by something: They spent a significant amount of money to set up this photo shoot, and hire this former police sketch artist, and conduct all these interviews. And the sketches that resulted (surprise!) showed that when a sketch artist makes a sketch based on the brief acquaintance’s description, it looks more beautiful than the one based on the subject’s own description of herself.
In thinking about it, though, there’s no reason to think this was actually an “experiment”. The sketch artist clearly knew which descriptions were self-descriptions (“I think I look like…”) vs. acquaintance descriptions (“I like how her eyes…”). We’re led to believe that the artist couldn’t see the subjects, though they never actually said that, and the images look really close to their actual appearances, making me suspect that he actually looked at the subjects at some stage.
Maybe they did what actual police sketch artists do, and had the subjects review the sketch as he was making it, telling him “a little wider there”, “a little narrower here”, “the eyebrows aren’t quite right”. But if they did that, they never showed it. I think that’s probably significant. I’ll note, too, that if they did that it would have made the sketching process take much longer, and would have cost a lot more money. I mean, presumably all these people are being compensated for their time, and the interesting space they’re in wasn’t free, and the camera and sound and lighting and makeup people all cost money…
The more I think about this video, the more I see it as a scripted commercial. I don’t know that all the people appearing in it are actors working from a script, though it wouldn’t shock me if they were. But even if they’re not, it doesn’t change the basic nature of the video. Dove’s ad agency conceived, wrote, directed, and shot this video to create the exact storyline they wanted.
It feels real. Maybe the subjects and acquaintances really are non-actors, and really are speaking their own spontaneous words. You wouldn’t need to manipulate that part in order to achieve the desired result, and it might make the finished product feel more true to life if those people weren’t coached too much.
But the key eye-opening “fact” at the center of the video, heavily implied if not actually stated, is that an artist working objectively and without outside guidance will sketch less-attractive faces when basing the sketches on the subjects’ own words than when basing them on acquaintances’ words. And on that point, I call shenanigans. The artist drew their faces that way because that was what he was hired and paid to do. The whole concept of the video depends on it. He had to do it subtly, not too dramatically, or it would have looked silly. Just a touch. Just enough to be noticeable without being too over the top.
It’s like reality TV. Every time there’s a cut, an edit, dialogue that you don’t actually see being spoken by whoever is on camera at that particular moment, you are in the hands of the editor. They can craft whatever storyline they want, make us feel whatever emotions they want. They are professionals, and have spent years perfecting their ability to do just that.
Anyway, I thought all that, but didn’t want to rain on anyone’s parade. The message of the video is kind of hopeful and positive. But then I read this critique of it, and thought hm. Yeah, I didn’t really notice those particular issues at the time, but I can see them now. So I thought I’d reblog, and then I thought I’d add a few words about my own misgivings, and well… If you’ve read this far you know what happened.
Hello everyone. I’m John, and I write stupidly long walls of text.
tl;dr: If that Dove video makes you feel good, if it makes you feel like not being as critical of your own appearance as you might otherwise have been, that’s great. But I think the video is not necessarily honest, and if you read the linked-to item there’s more about what might be problematic about its message. Worth thinking about, anyway.
Reposted from http://lies.tumblr.com/post/48204578966.
Tags: tumblr lies, dove, real beauty.
