I write this as I finish off a box of Tagalongs. 

Patricia Diaz Dennis, chair of the board of directors for the Girl Scouts, was recently here in Minnesota to address the newly merged Girl Scouts of Minnesota and Wisconsin River Valleys. In a televison interview, Diaz Dennis addresses what girls have to deal with today in the midst of a celebrity culture: the messages of how to dress and how to act in order to be a woman. She says that the Girl Scouts are the antidote to those messages.

Then how can the Girl Scouts accept funding from a corporation that produces this?

The recent Axe print ads featuring Hillary Clinton pushed me over the edge. I sent the following letter to Diaz Dennis and to Kathy Cloninger, the Girl Scouts’ CEO:

I was a Girl Scout in the seventies and my daughter is a Girl Scout now. I am writing to express my deep concern over the Girl Scouts of America’s affiliation with the Dove Self-Esteem Fund.

I am sure you are aware of the controversies surrounding Unilever’s claimed support for girls’ self-esteem (through the Self-Esteem Fund) while continuing to advertise their Axe products using degrading and sexist marketing. And you might be aware of their production of skin-lightening products marketed to women in India and other countries as a means to “gain confidence.”

And you may have even seen their latest ad campaign for Axe products, depicting Hillary Clinton wearing an “Obama” button.

I understand that Unilever is a very large corporation with many different markets. And I understand that any corporation you partner with may have some components which do not align perfectly with the Girls Scouts’ mission.

But for the Girl Scouts to be directly associated with a corporation that continually undermines the very core of what Scouting is today – a woman running for President will still feel silly around boys — is reprehensible.

Turning a blind eye to these marketing messages is one reason we still have a problem.

Can you please explain to me why this relationship with Unilever continues?

Thanks for your time.

I’m not surprised that they didn’t respond to me, even after a second request for comment. What could they say? How can an organization that promotes healthy girls possibly justify a financial relationship with Unilever?

We’ll continue to support the Girl Scouts and their volunteers for taking time to invest in our girls’ futures.

But not Dove, nor their Self-Esteem Fund. You can still let Unilever know that they cannot claim to help in the fight for girls’ self-esteem while producing ads that degrade women.

Related posts from other sites:

The Antidote to Women’s Liberation
Axe and Unilever strike again: Clinton as slavering brainless schoolgirl
Scent of a Woman
Hillary Sexism Watch (Axe edition)
How Sincere is Dove?
Boycott Unilever/Dove
Internet guerrilla attack exposes Unilever ‘hypocrisy’ of Dove girls and dirty dancers

This entry was posted on Monday, March 3, 2008 at 6:00 am and is filed under Unilever, Corporate Contradictions, The Problem. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.