My name is Karla Villar de Leon, my artistic name is Catty (sometimes Space, I am still working on it), I am from Dominican Republic and I am a sophomore studying graphic design. Being from Latin America made me realize many of the problematics that my own existence as woman was political, making me being aware of many of the problematics not only of women in Latin America but also minorities from other countries, in general, the multiple social problems we are surrounded by. Additionally, I love art history but going more in a focus on art made by women and art in Latin America, I feel that I had consumed all my life art from other countries but not from my own region
Artistically speaking, I draw and love to do any craft I can put my hand on, as crochet, and other hobbies that enrich myself as reading or listening to video essays on YouTube, or just relaxing by listening to other variety of videos and by playing some games as The Sims 4, Escape Academy, and any games I can get for free lol.
Here is a drawing I had done in 2023 of one of my own characters I have called Numbra, an species I created based on Latin American Folklore, is like a mix between a ciguapa (a Dominican spirit that is shy and uses their long hair as clothes) and a typical vengefull woman spirit in any part of these region. I like the folklore and legends as sometimes, in a feminist perspective, it is just pure victim blaming and seeing the fury of this female spirits as nonsense, something still seeing in our culture.
My art instagram is _just_catty_
Understanding patriarchy
“The laughter is itself a weapon of patriarchal terrorism”
This is painfully true and can be seen in so many situations: women bringing their problems to the table and being used as a punching line, just seen as exaggerations, feminist protest songs and dances being ridiculed, etc. I still remember time ago, in social media, it went viral the costume from a party made by high school seniors, where one of them was dressed, as a raped and killed woman, everybody instead of scolding him by that horrible “joke”, they were recording and laughing with him. The sufferings and trauma of many people being ridiculed in a costume. Continuing to invalidate the trauma and severity of these crimes by making it a costume.
“The crisis facing men is not the crisis of masculinity, it is the crisis of patriarchal masculinity.”
Reminds me of the nowadays “male loneliness epidemic”. To be honest, I don’t believe there is a "loneliness epidemic”. This is just the consequences of the mistreatment that women all around the world will not tolerate anymore, rejecting the idea of being with a man if that means they will constantly face mistreatment in a relationship because "that's the way it is”, a perfect example is the 4B movement originated in Korea. Additionally, people often forget that masculinity is not bad, the problem is, as Bell Hooks says, the patriarchal masculinity, the macho persona. Masculinity doesn’t mean to be aggressive 24/7, doesn’t mean to like sports, equally as femininity, femininity doesn’t mean weak, doesn’t mean you have to like pink. The target is not femininity neither masculinity, but the idea of these as patriarchy has molded for us.
This is my first time ever reading something by Bell Hooks and I feel I have been missing out from the holy grail all my life! Her dissection is in just a few pages about patriarchy and challenging the concept of making men the only one perpetrators of this system and women solely the only victims. When the reality is, having this idea is beneficial for the patriarchy. Women are seen as weak, so weak that is unbelievable perpetuate this patriarchal behavior such as being sexist, slut-shame other women, and in extremes, being abusers. On the other hand, men are solely a beast, can’t process any emotion more than anger, the only perpetrators. This belief instead of being “woke” is just patriarchal roles but with glitter. In the end, every individual is a victim of this system but at the same time we could perpetuate it without noticing and even get benefits from it in different ways.
What Memes Owns to Art History?
“Through humor, memes incite a collective reaction to everyday life as well as reveling in it, in a format no less playful than it is political, decoding the murky structural screw-ups, paradoxes, and hypocrisies of our current political climate."
This reminds me of the phrase “my trauma, my joke” as people usually will use memes to express, for example in Latin America, situations they went through or in the country that is happening in the moment. For example, one meme is this one:
Translation: POV: you are a journalist who wanted to expose corruption cases by the government in Latin America.
This meme is recurrent and showcases the hopelessness in our society for finding justice, as when it is attempted, it does not end in justice. As if the seeking of justice is useless. Opening the door not only to joke about daily life in similar situations but also to question why things are like that and where the meme stands on the line that divides exaggeration or real life experiences.
“'Memes aren’t an innocent process—they carry serious political weight, and not always of the activist variety,' Wershler said, citing the website 4chan’s politics board and other alt-right cyber-communes where hate speech has festered in the form of memes.”
As memes spread like wildfire, it can help not only by criticizing politics, it can help spread the beliefs of those, influencing people by hiding propaganda behind the excuse of “dark humor”. Spreading hate speech or even criminal level beliefs behind a “dark humor” meme, saying that if you don’t get it, is not their problem and you don’t have comical sense. Gaslighthing anybody who sees the reality behind those memes.
Memes Are Our Generation’s Protest Art
“The ability for the meme to empower and push back can be really powerful. They’re definitely sites of resistance against perceptions of abuse of power. They spread so quickly and evolve and transform, and it’s hard to shut them down in the way other forms of communicative protest can be silenced.”
It is hard to erase memes as this can get globally known in a matter of minutes thanks to the internet being more accessible nowadays, making it almost impossible to avoid the spread of a meme. It is like throwing a message in the bottle and somebody finding it on the other side of the globe, spreading the information for not only people inside that area but all around the globe when not even news covers it.
“Most people interact with these images in fleeting ways as they scroll through their feeds, but creating or consuming political memes that align with one’s point of view can be therapeutic. They reflect what’s happening in society, and help justify feelings of rage and fear while helping us feel less alone.”
Memes in this context can be a powerful tool to create a sense of community. For example, if you share these kinds of memes and/or humor, people probably will have a vision of the kind of person you are without asking you directly. Political memes could act like a filter, attracting or keeping away people from your life.
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