A beauty brand takes aim at the cost of toxic beauty.
This is Mary, with her mom. Mary is in recovery from an eating disorder. This beautifully crafted film opens with home movies of her as a proud, confident and happy-go-lucky kid. Then there are frames of her as a teen opening the gift of her first phone. Then there are successive scenes of her tumbling down the increasingly frightening rabbit hole of social media, which convinces her that she is fat and ugly. Finally, we see her hospitalized for anorexia.
The film is so stark that it comes with a warning: "This film features real stories about body appearance that may be upsetting to some viewers." It is upsetting to me, it made me cry. And it is brought to us by Dove, a brand that has made a sincere commitment to being very real about beauty and what it means in our culture.
"New research by the Dove Self-Esteem Project found that social media is harming the mental health of 3 in 5 kids. Join us, along with Common Sense Media and Parents Together Action, in supporting legislative change to make social media safer." - Call to action on Dove's YouTube channel
Video: Cost of Beauty: A Dove Film | Dove Self-Esteem Project