The Dove Self-Esteem Fund

The Dove Self-Esteem Fund is a national resource established as a link to Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty, a program aimed at changing the current, narrow definition of beauty. We believe that to make a real difference, we must take action and contribute in ways that will help women and girls celebrate their individual beauty.

The goal of the Fund is two-fold:

1. Develop tools and resources to help Canadian women and girls build stronger self-esteem.

2. Support organizations in Canada that foster a broader definition of beauty and positive self-image among women or girls.
   

I spent most of my life feeling ugly and worthless. I have always been a particularly naive and sensitive individual. Because I never felt that I lived up to the standers set by society, I have always been very self conscious and had a negative body image.

In more recent years of my life, I have tried my best to find myself and love my uniqueness for what it is. With that I have tried to make other girls, in the same situation as me, find the same thing. When I was 16 I even tried to make a documentary about this. I ended up having technical difficulties and all my footage was lost but I have always been interested in finding some sort of method to prove to women that they are beautiful no matter what society thinks.

This is why I am happy to see that society is trying to change itself with Dove's Self-Esteem Fund. Sure, it might be some sort of corporate ploy but it's a good one at that. Even if they are just trying to make money, at least they are promoting something pure and right.

My hope is that with campaigns like this one, in the future, women will see through the lies that the media sends them and realize their true beauty or as Dove would say, real beauty.

Works Cited

"The Dove Self-Esteem Fund". Dove. 2007. Available: http://dove.ca/doveselfesteemfund/

Participatory Culture: I guess the world is a strange place...

I am a relatively unproud member of the most popular social networking website of my time, 'Facebook'. There are some reason why I am fond of 'Facebook' and a thousand reasons why I'm not.

I like 'Facebook' because it makes it really easy to communicate with my friends, it's free and it's convenient. There are also fun little things that keep me entertained on it, like the 'Graffiti' application their version of messenger and some of the different games.

One of the reasons why I don't like 'Facebook' is because I am forced to use it. Because my friends rely on it to plan and invite people to outings and to report what they are doing on the weekend, if I don't use it, I'll never know whats going on with my friends and I'll never get invited to anything. My choice is to use 'Facebook', or lose my friends.

Another thing I hate about 'Facebook' is that, using the information it has collected from me without me realizing it, it can now target me with the perfect advertising it has formulated from it.

I recently changed my profile so that it does not give away any information about my political and religious views, who I'm interested in, or my relationship status, but simply based on my age and gender I still get millions of advertisements targeted at me everyday.

Things like diet plans, makeup and birth control are ones that I see quite often. I feel deeply offended when I think about all the young girls on 'Facebook' who are forced to peer at a diet plan called 'The Model Diet Plan' every day, more than once. Why doesn't 'Facebook' just put up an add that says “YOU'LL NEVER BE WHAT SOCIETY WANTS YOU TO BE, GO ON A DIET AND BUY SOME MAKEUP.” That's what I feel like they're telling me anyway.

On a similar note, I would like to talk about another social networking site that makes me want to throw up. This is an online dating service called, “Beautiful People”.

The purpose of the website is to create a dating environment where all of the members are 'beautiful', so that they can all be confident that they will be dating 'beautiful people' like themselves. If this doesn't make you sick enough, I conducted an experiment to see how you actually get accepted as a member. I submitted a picture of myself and they told me that I would be critiqued for 48 hours by members of the opposite sex on the website. If they thought I was fit to be a member, they would notify me.

So, I was going to have unknown, supposedly 'beautiful' men rate whether I was beautiful enough for their tastes and if I was not, then I would be rejected. The first thing that went through my head was, “Why would I care what someone on this website thinks of me? If they are on here they must be a superficial asshole anyway.” I then immediately deleted my profile.

I don't understand why things like this exist. Are human beings really this shallow and insecure? I guess the world is a strange place.

Works Cited

Beautiful People.com. 2001-2008. Available: http://beta.beautifulpeople.com/Splash

Facebook. 2008. Available: http://www.facebook.com

Culture Jamming Sexploitation – Would yah?

In my opinion, the perfect definition of culture jamming was described in the documentary, “Culture Jam”. In this film, an unknown character says in a voice over, “take the classic expressions of the corporate culture, add a little twist that redefines their meaning and send it back in their faces.”

One of my favourite culture jams is one available on 'Youtube' called “Culture Jamming Sexploitation – Would Yah?”. In this two and a half minute video they go through film clips and magazines showing all different examples of the sexploitation of young girls and women and describing its effects.

The first thing we see as we are watching the video is a picture that says the words “My body is my own” it then quickly cuts to a picture of a female toddler holding a high heal shoe to her foot. It slowly closes up to her face so that the audience can see her expression. It then says the words “The American Psychological Organization Reported,” and cuts to clips of young girls dressed in skimpy clothing and caked with makeup in beauty pageants. At this time it says, “sexualization of young girls is linked to common health problems.”

The video then takes a different tone cutting to a magazine picture of what looks like a normal young girl and then zooming out to show an older woman in the background. It then says “in girls, and women.”

Take note of the difference that these simple captions make. If you were simply looking at a magazine that included these images you would get a way different idea from them. This is exactly what a culture jam is. Taking the meaning from media and giving it another to prove your point.

The video then cuts to a page in a teen magazine with a picture of a smiling girl and a few articles. The caption on this image says, “including, eating disorders, low self-esteem and depression.” At this point we can see where the video is going and clearly what they are trying to say.

The video then shows us a short montage of pictures of lips, legs, clips of women dancing provocatively and clips from girls gone wild. As we go through each clip the video defines the meaning of sexualization, “sexualization is defined as occurring when a person's value comes only from his/her sexual appeal or behavior to the exclusion of other characteristics and when a person is sexually objectified e.g. made into a thing for another's sexual pleasure.”

At this point the viewer is really learning something from the video and realizing a different side to the images they see every day.

The video then cuts to a picture of an eye in a magazine with the title, “Whats inside”. They then close up on the eye and linger there to create a certain a effect and make the viewer think. They then cut back and forth to pictures of girls in magazines and back to the close up eye, really sending a message to the viewer.

It then shows images of women in American Appeal ads naked or dressed in almost nothing with the words, “Selling sex is illegal, but using it to promote economic growth is not!” It then cuts to a black screen with quote from Albert Einstein, “The world is a dangerous place to live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people that don't do anything about it.”

We now understand that like any other culture jam, these people are advocating social change, and looking to the people in everyday society to help them fight for their cause.

The video ends with the words “Respect yourself. Resist conformity. Boycott the “sexpolitation” economy.”

I feel as though I have been a victim of this sexploitation. Looking at magazine ads has at times made me feel worthless because I didn't fit their standards. This is why I try my best to avoid advertising like this at all times and more importantly avoid putting money towards this with the purchase of magazines and the like.

In his book “Free Culture”, Lawrence Lessig really spoke to me when he said, “Common sense must revolt. It must act to free culture. Soon, if this potential is ever to be realized.” (Lessig, 271) Although he was talking about a different subject, I think this quote applies to this situation too. If we are going to change the way the world looks at women people need to realize what needs to be done and revolt, fast. We need to get together and fight for what is right and culture jamming is one huge step in the right direction.

I'll leave you with this piece advice; go home and create something, you have the power to change.

Works Cited

Adbusters; Journal of The Mental Environment. Available: http://www.adbusters.org/

"Culture Jamming Sexploitation- Would Yah?" Youtube. December 2nd, 2007. Available: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qp6gjxCRuxs&feature=related

"Culture Jam- Documentary". Google Video. March 7th, 2009. Available: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1777885894535257561

Lessig, Lawrence. Free Culture; The Nature and Future of Creativity. New York: Penguin Group, 2004.

Buy Nothing Day

Suddenly, we ran out of money and, to avoid collapse, we quickly pumped liquidity back into the system. But behind our financial crisis a much more ominous crisis looms: we are running out of nature… fish, forests, fresh water, minerals, soil. What are we going to do when supplies of these vital resources run low?

There’s only one way to avoid the collapse of this human experiment of ours on Planet Earth: we have to consume less.

It will take a massive mind shift. You can start the ball rolling by buying nothing on November 28th. Then celebrate Christmas differently this year, and make a New Year’s resolution to change your lifestyle in 2009.

It’s now or never!

Buy Nothing Day is a day that was originally created by artist, Ted Dave in Vancouver, British Columbia in September, 1992, to advocate the problem of mass overconsumption. It began to grow to become a large event and in 1997 was moved to the Friday after American Thanksgiving or the weekend before Christmas which, at that time, was the biggest U.S. shopping day of the year. Outside of the U.S. it began to be celebrated on the following Saturday.

Buy nothing day has now gained great popularity and is celebrated in over 65 nations some of which includes, the U.S., U.K., Israel, Germany, New Zealand, Japan, the Netherlands and Norway.

This year, Buy Nothing Day will be held on November 28^th in North America and 29^th in all other countries and is being advertised vigorously on many websites such as Adbusters.org and Treehuggingfamily.com.

The main two things that But Nothing Day is trying to advocate is that consumerism is leading to great environmental damage and that shopping from large corporations has negative affects on developing countries.

How the environment and developing countries come into play when it comes to overconsumption is like this; the supermarkets import most of their products from developing countries. This transport causes incredible pollution. Also, all of these products have extreme amounts of packaging. This packaging ends up in landfills or on the ground causing damage to wildlife and other types of environmental destruction. Most large corporations have their products made in developing countries where the workers are paid very little and treated poorly.

I agree entirely with this campaign. I try to do most of my shopping at independent shops but I know I have bought way to many Starbucks to try to justify myself. I will definitely be participating on the international Buy Nothing Day.

You would think that this is a campaign that most people agree with but in my research I found someone who thinks otherwise. Jenn Farrel wrote an article on 'Thetyee.ca' called, “Why I shop on buy nothing day: This kind of activism is the problem, not the solution”.

In this article she proclaims, “Buy Nothing Day's biggest proponents must be the well educated and well fed, who can certainly afford to take a day off from their conspicuous consumption. While it's laudable to want to do something about the problem, I question the potential influence of a bunch of people standing in front of a suburban Wal-Mart and harassing some mother of three who just wants to get in there and buy some darned detergent. Don't lecture her about over-consumption and globalization -- she just wants to get a load of the baby's sleepers through the wash while supper's cooking.”

While Jenn has a point, I still stand by the fact that the mother of three that she's talking about could have bought her detergent the day before and it is in her interest to support Buy Nothing Day for these activists are only trying to assure that the future is bright for her three children.

Works Cited

"Buy Nothing Day; Frequently Asked Questions" Buynothingday.co.uk. 2000-2008. Available: http://www.buynothingday.co.uk/?page_id=2

"Buy Nothing Day". Adbusters. Available: http://www.adbusters.org/campaigns/bnd

Jennifer. "November 2008 Green Challenge: Buy Nothing Day". Tree Hugging Family. November 1st, 2008. Available: http://www.treehuggingfamily.com/november-2008-green-challenge-buy-nothing-day/

Farrel, Jenn. "Why I Shop On Buy Nothing Day; This Kind of Activism is the Problem, Not the Solution". The Tyee. November 24th, 2008. Available: http://thetyee.ca/Views/2006/11/24/BND/

Net Neutrality

About a year ago a friend of mine told me not to go to the “Virgin Festival” on Toronto Island. He told me that if I went I would be supporting one of our generations biggest evils, being the loss of net neutrality. Of course I ignored him because I was too busy thinking about Explosions in the Sky, but I am now realizing just how right he was. Now, in University it is a topic being discussed in a number of my classes and I'm sure that it will continue to be discussed as I move forward.

Network neutrality or net neutrality is a term used to describe our Internet freedom. This is our freedom to navigate any website we want at the same speed and convenience no matter if it is corporately or independently owned. It also prevents our Internet providers from having any control over the speed and convenience of the Internet.

The issue is that the Internet providers, that we have trusted all of our Internet using years, are now trying to formulate a new and completely different Internet. One where we are not free to surf without discrimination but one where we will have to pay and the more we pay the more we will get.

Telephone and Cable companies such as AT&T, Verizon, Comcast and Time Warner, want to control the speed of each website based on who is paying them more, as 'Gatekeepers' they make these decisions and if you refuse to pay, your website will no longer load.

The biggest concern here is that the only websites that will be able to afford these fees are the corporately owned ones. There will no longer be any independently owned websites, no more freedom of speech, no more open communication. The future of the Internet would be lost and the present Internet we know and love will be nonexistent.

This may sound like a conspiracy theory but there is clear evidence supporting it. The advocates at, popular net neutrality website, 'Savetheinternet.com' say, “The CEOs of all the largest telecom companies have made clear their intent to build a tiered Internet with faster service for the select few companies willing or able to pay the exorbitant tolls.”

'Savetheinternet.com' stresses that it is up to the little people to fight for net neutrality and demand their Internet freedom. They suggest many strategies of doing so like, spreading the word using blogs and websites, calling a government official and asking them to support net neutrality and signing the 'Savetheinternet.com' petition.

Now that I am informed I will surely follow this advice. I can't even imagine life without the Internet.

Works Cited

"Net Neutrality". Youtube. April 21st, 2006. Available: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9jHOn0EW8U

"Frequently Asked Questions". Savetheinternet.com. Available: http://www.savetheinternet.com/=faq

Media Hegemonies/Mapping Who Owns What

On 'Answers.com', the word 'hegemony' is defined as, “The predominant influence, as of a state, region, or group, over another or others.” When we talk about media hegemonies we are referring to just that. The media owners that have predominant influence over the now and future of the media.

Today we see large corporations that own most of the media here in North America as well as the rest of the world. Some of the largest and most recognizable of these include, News Corporation, AT&T/Liberty Media, General Electric, Disney, Sony, Viacom, Time Warner and Seagram, plus Bertelsmann, the Germany-based conglomerate.

Each of these media rulers owns a number of well known media firms, companies and organizations and have done many things to change the media for eternity. For example, lets look at Time Warner, the largest of all.

When Time Warner described as 'old' media, banned together with 'new' media, AOL, in 2000, this changed the media drastically because it made all other 'old' media corporations feel as though if they didn't sign with Internet companies their methods would, in the future, become obsolete. Three years later Time Warner dropped AOL, but it still stands as a huge checkpoint in media history.

Some of the various companies that Time Warner owns are, CNN, Warner Brother's Studio, AOL Instant Messaging and Sport's Illustrated so, one way or another, we have all come in contact with them.

Not only do companies like Time Warner run almost all of the media in North America, but they also own little portions of each other's companies. This is called “cross media ownership”.

Cross media ownership is a unique strategy that is used within large corporations to ensure success and profitability by preventing competition between corporations.

At this rate the corporations will only become stronger and stronger owning more and more of the media. Maybe they'll even come together to form one all powerful corporation and then “take over the world” as The Brain would say. Wait a second... wasn't he a character from Warner Brother's “Animaniacs”?

Works Cited

"Hegemony". Answers.com. Available: http://www.answers.com/topic/hegemony

McChesney, Robert W. "The New Global Media". The Nation. November 11th, 1999. Available: http://www.thenation.com/doc/19991129/mcchesney/3

"Who Owns What? Part Two". Youtube. November 5th, 2008. Available: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLoraYMYQNw

The Importance of Indymedia

On Indymedia.org, Indymedia is defined as “a collective of independent media organizations and hundreds of journalists offering grassroots, non-corporate coverage. Indymedia is a democratic media outlet for the creation of radical, accurate, and passionate tellings of truth.” Right now there are more than one hundred and fifty Independent Media Centers (IMCs) that are all free to create their own goals and prospects, control their own funding and make their own decisions as a unique organization.

The Indymedia organization started when a group of long time independent journalists got together in Seattle, to report on protests of the World Trade Organization. They posted their articles on the first founded Indymedia website and soon after created their own Independent Media Center. The idea began to spread and more and more communities wished to open their own IMC and they have been popping up all over the world ever since.

The Indymedia has many goals but the three that stand out the most are their desire to print truthful and accurate news, their vision of a world with as much independent media as possible, and their wish that all citizens realize that they have control over their life and environment and that they have the freedom to impact it.

Indymedia is important because it allows the public to speak their minds and show their community what is important to them. You get a different point of view on stories and they are easier to relate to because they are written my actual citizens.

Because corporate media is so flawed due to bias public relations firms and so on, you can no longer trust the information you see on television, read in the newspaper and hear on the radio. “Public relations firms are them-selves corporations which exist to serve the propaganda interests of their clients,” states Stauber and Ramton in their book, “Toxic Sludge is Good For You”. With Indymedia, you don't have to worry about corrupt corporate policy so it is easier to have trust in what you are reading.

I am truly greatful to the Indymedia organization because they give real people control over a small but very important aspect of the media and in a way grant us a certain craved freedom.

Works Cited

"Indymedia's Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)", Indymedia Documentation Project. July 12, 2007. Available: http://docs.indymedia.org/view/Global/FrequentlyAskedQuestionEn

Stauber, John and Rampton, Sheldon. Toxic Sludge Is Good For You; Lies, Damn Lies and The Public Relations Industry. Maine: Common Courage Press, 1995.