This is what it sounds like when doves condescend.
If you were faced with two doors to a shopping center, one labeled “Beautiful” and the other “Average,” which would you walk through?
In its latest inspiration-via-advertising campaign, Dove set up labeled entrances in Shanghai, San Francisco, London, Sao Paulo and Delhi, and filmed the results.
--Time magazine
Two doors labeled BEAUTIFUL and JUST KIND OF OKAY. WOMEN approach, hesitate, proceed.
MAN: Excuse me! Why did you choose the door marked "Just Kind of Okay?"
WOMAN 1: It's closer.
MAN: But don't you see how beautiful you are?
WOMAN 1: If I don't get this dropped off and make this call and pick up my kids in the next twenty minutes I'm screwed, so --
MAN: But beauty is a spectrum...
WOMAN 1: Dude seriously if you don't move I will end you.
MAN: Go ahead. --But you're beautiful. --Never mind, didn't say anything. --But you are.
* * *
WOMAN 2: I choose neither.
MAN: You have to choose one.
WOMAN 2: Why?
MAN: -- Dove says so.
WOMAN 2: Dove--? Is this like, what, a soap commercial?
MAN: It's -- no, it's a consciousness-raising kind of --
WOMAN 2: That's like a big corporation or something, right? Who makes that, Procter and Gamble?
MAN: Noooooo!... Unilever.
WOMAN 2: This is bullshit, I'm going in one of those doors over there.
MAN: --They're out of order.
WOMAN 2: That person just went through one.
MAN: Well. She -- is not beautiful. On the inside. That is her cross to bear.
* * *
WOMAN 3: Those are the only choices?
MAN: They are!
WOMAN 3: What about other stuff, like "smart" or "powerful" or "resourceful" or "funny?"
MAN: That would be, uh, too many doors. We're operating on more of a binary--
WOMAN 3: I'm going to a different building.
MAN: But you're -- you're so beautiful!! Why can't you see that like you're supposed to??
* * *
WOMAN 4: Do you have a door labeled "Unwitting Pawn in a Calculated Marketing Scheme?"
MAN: That... would not fit on the sign.
* * *
The Man has a table set up with two choices: a beautiful doll or a pile of shit.
MAN: Excuse me! Take a look at these choices... which one would you say most resembles you?
WOMAN 5: Neither.
MAN: But if you had to pick.
WOMAN 5: I don't.
MAN: But if you had to.
WOMAN 5: I guess -- the doll.
MAN: And... congratulations. You... have acceptable self esteem. I mean: you passed the test.
WOMAN 5: Who are you people?
MAN: We're people who care about how beautiful you should think you are. ...And, and what soap you use.
* * *
The doll and the shit are hidden under boxes.
MAN: Just pick one. No peeking.
WOMAN 6 picks -- they remove the box; it's the shit.
MAN: Ohhh, oh no, no! How poignant and achingly sad! Why did you pick the pile of shit? Do you not know how beautiful you are?
WOMAN 6: It was under a box, I didn't know what it--
MAN: You have so much unconventional beauty and you owe it to society to recognize that.
WOMAN 6: Yeah, I know, I look pretty good. Why do you have a pile of shit? Who had to go and collect that?
MAN: I'd rather not say.
* * *
Man with a SKETCH ARTIST.
MAN: Excuse me, miss, would you do me a favor and describe yourself to this man?
WOMAN 7: Why?
MAN: So he can draw you.
WOMAN 7: Why?
MAN: So you can see how you're a failure at feeling good enough about yourself and get a little cry-y and change your ways.
WOMAN 7: How long is this gonna take?
MAN: Not long.
SKETCH ARTIST: About forty, fifty minutes.
MAN: Not that long.
WOMAN 7: And you're, what, a portrait artist?
SKETCH ARTIST: Naw, I mostly draw people who've disappeared violently or who are suspected of crimes.
Woman 7 leaves.
MAN: Crimes like HURTING US ALL BY NOT BEING CONFIDENT ENOUGH, OF YOUR, YOUR BEAUTIFUL, Y'KNOW --
SKETCH ARTIST: You still want me to draw them like piles of poop?
MAN: There's gotta be a better way to sell f'ing soap.
