Our commitments to ending appearance hate

Our ‘Real Cost of Beauty Ideals’ report reveals that appearance hate and discrimination caused by toxic beauty standards is a public health crisis that costs Americans more than $500 billion per year*.

07 November '24

But the real cost is so much more than that.

And young people are paying the highest price – with their health, happiness and sometimes even, their lives. It’s time to fight the toxic beauty standards fuelling appearance hate and discrimination. We’re working alongside youth activists, researchers, experts and likeminded organizations to build body confidence in young people, and to further our commitments to ending body hate and discrimination, once and for all.

Building self-esteem and positive body image through the Dove Self-Esteem Project
Since 2004, we’ve been on a mission to help the next generation develop a positive relationship with the way they look and empower them to develop positive mental health habits through the Dove Self-Esteem Project. Why? Because appearance-related anxiety and low self-esteem holds young people back from reaching their full potential in life.

So far, we’ve reached more than 82 million young people across 150 countries with our free evidence-based tools and resources (making us the largest provider of body confidence education globally). And by 2030, we'll have helped 250 million young people around the world.

Helping young people to build body confidence not only improves their self-esteem, it also contributes to positive mental health. That's why we’re building on our existing partnerships with organizations like the Boys and Girls Clubs of America, and committing to expanding our support for youth mental health resources.

Confident Me
Confident Me is a Dove Self-Esteem Project resource designed to help teachers run body-confidence workshops in schools – exploring the impact that topics like unrealistic beauty standards and social media and body image have on young people’s self-esteem. To help teach young people about appearance-based discrimination, such as sizeism, ableism and colorism, we’ve created an extension lession that examines the intersections between body image and different forms of discrimination.

Download the Confident Me Appearance Discrimination lesson.
Proud to Be Me
When it comes to appearance pressure, LGBTQ+ youth are especially vulnerable – facing pressure to conform to unrealistic beauty standards, binary ideals and narrow stereotypes which leads to higher levels of body dissatisfaction.

We’ve also created Proud to Be Me – a body positive tool designed specifically for LGBTQ2S+ youth to help them feel confident and proud of who they are and be their most authentic selves

Download Proud to Be Me.
My Hair, My CROWN
Black girls cite their first experience with negativity about their appearance at eight years old, and the top critique they receive is in relation to their hair. Building self-confidence is critical – that’s why we’ve expanded our Dove Self-Esteem Project resources to include a prevalent source of appearance pressure and discrimination for young people: hair and hair culture.

We’ve partnered with experts to create My Hair, My CROWN – a toolkit to boost hair confidence in kids with coils, curls, waves and protective styles, as well as build allyship in others to Create a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair.

Download My Hair, My CROWN.

Advocating against appearance hate and discrimination on a legislative level
Our work doesn’t stop there. We’re committed to ending appearance hate at a legislative level.

Ending hair discrimination through the CROWN Act
Currently, in some US states, it is legal to discriminate against a person in the workplace, schools, and/or pools because of their natural or protective hairstyle. You can join us to take action to help end race-based hair discrimination in the US. As part of our mission to help end race-based hair discrimination, we co-founded the CROWN Coalition in 2019, to support US anti-hair discrimination legislation, The CROWN Act. To-date, The CROWN Act or legislation inspired by the CROWN Act has passed in 19 states and more than 40 municipalities.

Sign the petition.

Taking action to end body size discrimination
Currently, there are no federal laws protecting people from body size discrimination in the US. We’re partnering with advocacy organizations led by the most impacted communities to support legislative advocacy and raise awareness.

We’re taking our findings from ‘The Real Cost of Beauty Ideals’ report (PDF) (3.3 MB) and using them to support legislation to end body size discrimination in New York and Massachusetts.

Along with our report collaborators, we’ll continue to make the data accessible to everyone who wants to use it to support necessary systemic change across the country, state by state.

Building on findings from The Real Cost of Beauty Ideals report and other existing research, we have commissioned a new global study that will quantify the scale and personal impact of weight and body size discrimination, empowering activists and law makers to advocate for the end of body size discrimination.

Discover more about ending body size discrimination in New York and Massachusetts.

Let’s end appearance hate
Discrimination based on appearance (including weight, skin shade, hair texture and style) has a devastating impact on wellbeing. It’s time to tackle the harmful beauty ideals that fuel appearance hate and discrimination – front on. Together, we can end appearance hate. Get involved and take action. Find out more about The Real Cost of Beauty campaign.