OUGD401 - Practical Rationale

For my practical, I decided to create a body positive campaign that would be relatable to a large audience. I wanted both men and women to associate with this campaign, because as I found within my research, over 80% of young adults has body confidence issues. I created a campaign for thebodypositive.org, an organisation that helps people accept their body, and love themselves. I thought that this was a fitting organisaiton because all of the work they do focusses on the same message as my campaign.

I felt that this campaign was suitable for this module because throughout my essay, the main issue with advertising is the way people are portrayed. They are seen as almost unattainable, and give off the wrong ideals for both men and women, with the way that they look and act. It’s problematic within today’s society, because people will strive to become these people, subconsciously or not, because they are told that anything below this is sub-par. If you don’t buy this product, or look like this, you won’t be successful. You won’t have any friends. You won’t be happy. I wanted to create this campaign, and I thought it was appropriate, because these messages affect everyone. Both men, women, adults and children are all found to have body confidence issues, and it’s important that we teach self love and respect.

The messages portrayed throughout my campaign were gender neutral (apart from one - how to get a bikini body), and I tried to aim the messages to as large an audience as I could. There are a few that are aimed at a specific audience, such as “healthy is a good thing”, aimed at people who suffer from eating disorders, as “healthy” often has negative connotations. To them, it indicates that they have put on weight, and are losing the self image that they would prefer. I want to remind them that healthy means you are alive, you’re living, and you should love your body for all that it does for you.

I also created a Twitter page for this campaign and created a hashtag associated with it - #iloveme, because everyone should love themselves and not feel bad about it. Some people may see this hashtag and think that it’s vain and self-indulgent, but is there really anything wrong with that? I feel that the most important person in your life is you, and you’re the only person that can look after yourself properly. This campaign is about accepting yourself for who you are, your flaws and what you don’t like are a part of you, and learning to love them will create so much positivity in peoples lives, rather than comparing to unrealistic body ideas set by the media.