'Teaching Females Respect & Decency'

The person who owns the above Uroboros Facebook page saw and shared this original meme I posted as my personal header. As I hope you can see, he completely missed the point and thought he'd 'teach' me a lesson (a DV term if ever I heard one). My first response was to give him a serve - no swearing - just express my outrage. Then I thought, you know what - it's not worth trying to change this guy's mind, so I reported him to Facebook admin. instead - after all he was suggesting I 'shoot' myself and that was getting a bit personal. Next I did some sleuthing and figured out who was hiding behind the page. When I checked his personal page I found some rather incoherent ramblings and references to THC. Maybe he was drug-fucked or had some kind of drug-induced psychosis - so I blocked him, and his page. Overnight I did some more thinking about it and decided - dammit! I really want the right of reply, so I unblocked him and placed this comment on his feed, which, btw, nobody else had responded to. Let's see what unfolds......

Hi there Les. Just want to set the record straight - this meme, my original artwork which you have chosen to share in an attempt to 'shame' me (and failed), is not about YOU as a 'man' or any other man. The 'patriarchy' is a particular brand of toxic masculinity that supports a set of social behaviours and beliefs within which women are largely disempowered. I don't hate men and I don't think women should have all the power either - it should be a partnership. Currently it's far from it. Just look at what is happening in the world and the decisions that yes, men are mostly making, and you can't say this isn't true. Our own government is a classic example of the patriarchy - arrogant in their assumption that THEY know and we don't, non-consultative, telling us what we need rather than asking, being controlling, holding power at all costs. My meme is deliberately confrontational because it seeks to challenge and undermine the authority of 'the patriarchy'. I'd also like to point out that YOUR LANGUAGE is actually a pretty good demonstration of the sort of behaviour I'm talking about. 'This is how we do it, teaching females respect and decency' is incredibly paternal and demeaning, objectifying also because of the 'teaching females' inclusion. And 'our females' - we are not YOUR females. This is such a patronising comment, it harks back to that old idea that women are property, a commodity to be owned and traded. Comments like this certainly don't make me respect you more. Even so, looking at your timeline, you may find we have more in common than you think. I'm for social justice, anti neo-liberalism and an environmentalist. My meme, this meme, is a 'parody' - I suggest you Google that. Have a nice life.

Image: Author. Hand drawn, colour and text added digitally.