Monkey Wrench info

Everywhere girls and women look, they see messages about their bodies and their selves, telling them they must be tall, blonde, tan, and sexually available. In fact, a woman can rarely separate her feelings about her physical body from her self-worth, especially in our media-saturated society. And the messages even the youngest girls are seeing and hearing are skewed, sexualized, and sexist.

These messages -- part of what About-Face calls the "toxic media environment" -- are contributing to a host of girls' and women's ills, including low self-esteem, depression, persistent anxiety over weight and appearance, extremely unhealthy diets and exercise regimens, and eating disorders. All of these problems interfere with a woman's ability to function to the best of her abilities.

About-Face's mission is to equip women and girls with tools to understand and resist the harmful stereotypes of women the media disseminates. There are three components to About-Face's program, Education into Action: media-literacy workshops, action groups, and this resource-filled web site. About-Face is based in San Francisco, California. Our workshops and action groups reach throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. Our web site, of course, is available the world over.

Our ultimate goal, the About-Face vision, is to imbue girls and women with the power to free themselves from body-related oppression, so they will be capable of fulfilling their potential.