Sunday was our bake sale and cupcake contest at Dolores Park. We had a variety of tasty treats to share, along with 18 different cupcake flavors! Judges for the cupcake contest sampled each flavor and voted for their top five favorites. Want to know whose cupcakes took the cake? Here are the results:
How sweet of Sweet to donate these cupcakes! (photo by Naomi)
By the end of the day, we raised $540! All proceeds will go to continue our media-literacy workshops, keep our website up and running, and fund future Take Action groups.
On August 15, 2009, the About-Face Take Action group members, About-Face volunteers, and their friends posted decals with positive messages on various stores’ fitting room mirrors in the heavily populated Union Square area and downtown shopping area in San Francisco.
They also handed out decals to others who wished to do the same or to keep one for their mirrors at home.
On the same day, our Take Action Group also set up its own “dressing room” at Powell St. and Market St. in downtown San Francisco and invited people to write inspirational messages about body image on the walls. Watch our video and see how it went!:
To learn more about this action, check out this page.
Who: Passionate activists! Quiet behind-the-scenes helpers! Education-minded world changers! New and familiar faces are welcome! (Volunteers must be ages 13 and up).
Why: To help About-Face equip women and girls with tools to understand and resist harmful media messages that affect their self-esteem and body image.
How: At this Volunteer Meetup, you will learn more about our small but effective organization and the many ways we can work together! You will also get to enjoy a free dinner with others who are interested in this issue!
In the early part of the meeting, About-Face staff will introduce the organization and talk about the many volunteer opportunities we have open, which range from a couple hours to a couple months.
If you like, you can stay and start volunteering RIGHT AWAY! We’ll have a few projects to do until the end of the meeting.
You can also sign up for longer-term volunteer opportunities and get to know us better.
If you have a laptop with Microsoft Office (Word, Excel) on it, we’d love for you to bring it.
Please try to RSVP so we are sure we have enough food (and to let us know if you have any food restrictions, which we will try to accommodate): iwanttovolunteer@about-face.org or (415) 436-0212. But we’re not going to turn you away if you don’t RSVP!
We wish we could hear from women and girls who went into those 200 fitting rooms after us: What did you think when you saw “You are Beautiful!” and “Beauty Fits Every Size,” among other messages, on the mirror?
Thanks all our friends and About-Face supporters who came out to put up decals and write on the walls of our “dressing room” on Market and Powell Streets!
We’re also making a video, which you’ll see on our site next week sometime… watch for it.
Carol Normandi (co-founder of Beyond Hunger), Darryl Roberts, me, and Laurelee Roark (co-founder of Beyond Hunger)
Way back in August ‘08, I had the pleasure of catching this little indie film, “America the Beautiful,” as it showed briefly in San Francisco. I thought to myself “If About-Face made a film, this is the film it would make.” And I sure had a lot to say about it when I walked out of that theater, as evidenced here! From that blog entry:
There are just so many pertinent, poignant bits in this film, one being that the whole thing flows really well and nails the problem of our culture’s beauty obsession in a way that no somewhat-smart woman can deny.
Even more than the gratitude I felt in August that “America the Beautiful” had been produced at all, I wanted (no, needed) to help bring it back again to San Francisco so all of our About-Face supporters could also see it. So you know what? We did that on May 27 and 28. It took some instigation from a firebrand community member (Christa! Yay!) and her fellow yoga teacher Vajra (yay!). We added many planning hours and joined up with Beyond Hunger, another great org that helps women, teens, and men with severe eating disorders. Then we stirred it all up.
Two screenings followed — one in San Francisco and one in San Rafael (up in Marin County), and we had such an outpouring of support for the film, and for About-Face and Beyond Hunger. Our awesome founder, Kathy Bruin, took her rightful place as an About-Face schmoozer, all our supportive board members (Mara, Kelly, Kristen, Jennifer, and Vivian) supported us, and my wonderful friends came (Trish! Kim! Alison! Kendra!) too.
Our beautiful audience at the Clay Theatre.
The best part, really, was that 350 more people got to see “America the Beautiful” in our area.
Darryl Roberts, the filmmaker (a tall man with a heart of gold) did a Q&A session after each screening, and told some great stories (yes, Oprah was mentioned). Basically, everyone was just hanging on his every word.
I heard from so many friends, acquaintances, and strangers after the screenings, saying they’d never considered how much our culture damages young women with messages about “beauty.” I even ran into one friend on the street the day after she saw the film, and she was still thinking about it, and mulling over how to talk to her very young daughter about body image issues.
Get this film to your area! Click here to go to the site.
What’s that? You say you missed it this time? Or you’re not nearby? “America the Beautiful” is not on DVD as of this writing, but it will be soon. Here are some other ways to see and bring “America the Beautiful to your community:
Head on over to the film’s web site and sign up to be alerted when the DVD is released
When the DVD comes out in the fall, contact us, and we’ll help you throw the party so you can show friends the film at your home
Go to the film’s web siteand invite Darryl Roberts, the filmmaker, to speak to your group after a screening
And a little extra goodness: How fun would it be to have an “About-Face film series” in San Francisco or nearby, made up of some of the best media/body image/women’s self-esteem movies out there? (Jean Kilbourne’s “Killing Us Softly 3,” anyone? “Lovely and Amazing” anybody?) If you’re interested in attending or helping organize that, e-mail me directly and be sure to comment below to register your support!
We’ve opened a few internship and volunteer opportunities at or near our office in San Francisco… Plus our next Volunteer Meetup on February 18! Need community service hours or college credit for school? Take a look!
Passionate activists! Quiet behind-the-scenes helpers! Education-minded world changers! Join About-Face in getting the word out about how young women are affected by mainstream media!
A couple new About-Face events for you, Bay Area-ites! A series of Wednesdays: August 6, 13, and 20. We’d love to see you in person, so check out the details over on our Volunteer page.
