I Think I Feel More Confident...

Bad advertisements. The failure at charisma and transparency; those faked, or at best, sub-par emotional vulnerabilities that trudges into the TV screen to get you to buy out of fear.

Must be a new beauty commercial! Dove is at it again, playing with one of their recent beauty campaigns using fake patches that are supposed to make you pretty. Media blogs pounced like hungry kittens at how the advertisement portrayed women as dumb, I however want to pull out one particular component of the promo.

"I think I feel more confident"

One girl shyly announces into a webcam the next morning after the patch. How absurd! The contradiction in itself should have been adjusted or edited out by some part of the Dove marketing team. Listening to it makes me cringe. The dead eyes past the camera as the words drool out like an overstuffed thanksgiving indulgence. 

Why should this bother me? Because confidence is an important pillar of individual development and it can be shaped so completely by media and peer pressure. It’s a trigger word for attention, or at least it used to be. Back before it was hijacked by infomercials about weight loss, penis growth and hair transplants. It never fails to have beauty products tied into confidence and then guise it with a 'just kidding, you're actually beautiful by yourself' line at the end.

“I think I feel more confident.”

Are you sure? It doesn’t sound to me like you know. I would like to know what you think confidence is, because clearly it has little to do with certainty and empowerment. If I could venture, it has more to do with appearances than mental assertiveness. Truly those things can go hand in hand, but if you look better and that makes you more confident, than say that. Say, 'I used this crap and now I feel welcomed in public spheres, and therefore I have confidence'. 

To say you are uncertain of certainty, particularly in the basis of feelings, you sound more lost than found. This is more of a finger pointing to the scripting of the episode, which could have been truly candid, but at least understand the value of language. You fail to translate confidence by saying you are wary of your own effectiveness. 

What would have been better? I don’t know, drop the candid, thumb in mouth representation of human insecurities and bring forth quality statements. If you don’t wish to use actors, fine, but coach a little, help people articulate, as you can only lose by misrepresenting the intentions of your product, clouding them with contradictions in your basic introduction.