Dove's Pro.Age Campaign Raises Eyebrows

Dove's Campaign for Real Beauty is again turning heads with its new "pro.age" campaign featuring nude women over 50. The women are not models and the camera seems to relish the gray hair, wrinkles and age spots unique to each woman.

The commercials have been banned by network television due to the amount of skin shown, even though none of the women are fully exposed during the ad. The ad campaign has been launched through the Internet and movie theaters. Response has been mixed with many women lauding the campaign for presenting real women over 50 as models of beauty, but some have been offended by the nudity in the ads.

The pro.age campaign is not the first time that Dove's Campaign for Real Beauty has drawn attention. The first ad to receive both widespread acclaim mixed with a few negative reactions, "Real Women Have Curves" featured a group of regular women in their underwear. The ads were on television, in magazines and on billboards in Times Square. Dove was both lauded for presenting a realistic image of the female body and mocked by some for showing women who were outside the media stereotypes of thin and beautiful.

Dove's next ad, "Evolution" featured an ordinary woman who, through the magic of professional make up and hair stylists and photo retouching is turned into a super model fit for a billboard. The image of the model at the end of the ad bears little resemblance to the woman at the beginning of the ad.

Other ads that have created media buzz for the company have included the "True Colors" ad that featured little girls worried about their appearances and a series of ads featuring large women, older women and women with perceived flaws that asked viewers to vote on their level of attractiveness.

According to Dove's Global Study, only 2% of the 3000 women surveyed believe they are beautiful. Nine percent describe themselves as "attractive" while 29% described themselves as "average." Sixty-three percent of respondents felt that women were expected to be more attractive than women of their mothers' generation.