My current statement of intentions:
The Mirror Hack'd A commentary On online misogyny And those that post it A critical response Where the protagonist Becomes the subject Rather than the combatant.
This week’s webinar, was interesting on several accounts, the initial discussion was on Instagram and social media in reflection to this week’s topic and forums. The overall take appears to be that Instagram should be used as a promotional tool, to curate content, sharing inspired work a bit like how earlier web 2.0 social medias functioned like blogs and tumblr as a vehicle of expression and networking with like minded individuals, instead of being too self-indulgent or hunting for likes homogenising your style to conform to the popular current trend.
In regards to my actual work in progress I received highly insightful feedback this week, as the phenomenon of online misogyny, the manosphere and ‘incels’ seems to be largely driven by younger Millennial and Generation Z men whose power bases have felt to have been threatened, the comments themselves were shocking to an older Millennial peer. My choice of not straight forward misogynistic tweets, was felt to have aided the flipped narrative and humour in the images themselves. Another peer thought the doll depicted a confused weird individual, a manifestation of people making the comments, yet also not. However, I was advised that Figure 2 (above) might work better if I coloured his hair an exotic colour and incorporated a can of yeast into the scene (below).
On prior advice in my 1-2-1, this week I have also documented the sets themselves (Figures 3, 4, 5), and each of the figures (Figure 6) I have been taking throughout this model (largely one specific male figure), taking these images made me realise that none of my sets have been fully explored or used as of yet, and I feel this is something I should exploit when I take this work forward into my FMP.
Figure 3 Murray, J. (November 2020) Set Details: The Living Room.
In the webinar, I realised certain terminology used in the tweets I had selected may need an explanatory *asterik or a glossary of terms section, as a lot use obscure manosphere slang commonly used by incels and MGTOWs (Men going their own way). For example the term ‘foid’ is largely unknown and until I started researching myself into the manosphere it wasn’t something I really understood either.
Figure 4 Murray, J. (November 2020) Set Details: The Bathroom
Glossary of Terms
| Term | Definition |
| Femoid (Foid) | Slang insult used to describe women, the shorter form is ‘foid’ is now more common. Usually stands for: “female humanoid (organism)” or: “female android”. Often used to indicate that women aren’t fully human, and are sub-human, other or inferior. |
| Incel | Coined in the 1990s, as short form for ‘Involuntary Celibate’. A member of an online community of young men who consider themselves incapable of sexually attracting women, typically associated with views that are hostile towards both women and men who are sexually active. |
| Manosphere | A loose network of internet discussion groups, websites, and blogs that claim to be concerned with men’s interests and rights, often connected with an opposition to feminism and a dislike of women. |
| MGTOW | Abbreviation of: Men Going Their Own Way. A group of men under the manopshere, who identify as wanting nothing to do with women, yet spend the majority of time moaning about, you guessed it, women. |
| MRA | Abbreviation of: Men’s Rights Activist |
| Simp | Slang insult largely directed at men deemed to be doing anything for a girl (putting her on a pedestal) to gain attention or sexual favours. |
| PUA | Abbreviation of: Pick Up Artist |
Figure 5 Murray, J. (November 2020) Set Details: Kitchen
In the webinar, the notion of new patriarchy, and the digital manosphere was in my portrayal dysfunctional and contradictory in it’s misogyny, I think if anything this is down to the fact that the manosphere encompasses multiple different tribes from incels, to MGTOWs and whilst all treat woman as object, they do so in different methods, however the intention is ultimately to “re-inscribes gender in a particular way and reinforces gendered, classed and racialized power relations.” (Locke, A.; Lawthorn, R. & Lyons, A. (2018; 8)
I think Hogg, summarises my thoughts on what I have found during my trawls on twitter, he writes:
“For many men, respect for women is superficial. They may respect the women who are closest to them, but other women are different. They don’t see the contradiction in respecting one’s mother or sister, but sexually objectifying women in general.”
Hogg, R. (2016)
References
Figures
Figure 1 Murray, J. (October 2020) Screenshot Twitter: “Doesn’t matter if she is in Midtown Manhattan or Mongolia, if she uses the internet she’s a slut.
Figure 2 Murray, J. (November 2020) I thought to myself “she is prob a crazy cat lady with colored hair that prob looks like she smells like a yeast infection.” And here you are.
Figure 3 Murray, J. (November 2020) Set Details: The Living Room.
Figure 4 Murray, J. (November 2020) Set Details: The Bathroom.
Figure 5 Murray, J. (November 2020) Set Details: Kitchen.
Figure 6 Murray, J. (November 2020) Figures.
Bibliography
Bates, L. (2020) The Guardian: Men Going Their Own Way: the rise of the toxic male separatist movement that is now mainstream. [Online] Available from: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/aug/26/men-going-their-own-way-the-toxic-male-separatist-movement-that-is-now-mainstream [Accessed 26/11/2020]
Cambridge Dictionary (2020) Manosphere. [Online] Available from: https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/manosphere [Accessed 26/11/2020]
Dhrodia, A. (2017) New Statesman: Social media and the silencing effect: why misogyny online is a human rights issue. [Online] Available from: https://www.newstatesman.com/2017/11/social-media-and-silencing-effect-why-misogyny-online-human-rights-issue [Accessed 24/11/2020]
Dhrodia, A. (2017) Amnesty Global Insights: Unsocial Media: Tracking Twitter Abuse against Women MPs. [Online] Available from: https://medium.com/@AmnestyInsights/unsocial-media-tracking-twitter-abuse-against-women-mps-fc28aeca498a [Accessed 24/11/2020]
Dictionary.com (2020) Manosphere. [Online] Available from: https://www.dictionary.com/e/slang/manosphere/ [Accessed 26/11/2020]
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Hogg, R. (2016) The Guardian: Power, patriarchy, and men’s contradictory attitudes to women. [Online] Available from: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/19/power-patriarchy-and-mens-contradictory-attitudes-to-women [Accessed 24/11/2020]
Lexico (2020) Incel. [Online] Available from: https://www.lexico.com/definition/incel [Accessed 26/11/2020]
Lexico (2020) MRA. [Online] Available from: https://www.lexico.com/definition/mra [Accessed 26/11/2020]
Lexico (2020) PUA. [Online] Available from: https://www.lexico.com/definition/pua [Accessed 26/11/2020]
Locke, A.; Lawthorn, R. & Lyons, A. (2018) Feminism & Psychology, Vol. 28: Social media platforms as complex and contradictory spaces for feminisms: Visibility, opportunity, power, resistance and activism. pg 8. [Online] Available from: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0959353517753973 [Accessed 24/11/2020]
Squirrel, T. (2018) A definitive guide to Incels part two: the A-Z incel dictionary. [Online] Available from: https://www.timsquirrell.com/blog/2018/5/30/a-definitive-guide-to-incels-part-two-the-blackpill-and-vocabulary [Accessed 26/11/2020]
Taylor, J. (2018) BBC: The woman who founded the ‘incel’ movement. [Online] Available from: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-45284455 [Accessed 26/11/2020]
Jasmine Murray Photography 