Articulating my thoughts on that terrible LD poster

[kaberett]

Prompted by having received an utterly anodyne response from the party that completely ignored all of the actual issues I raised.

So, with content notes for transmisogyny and transmisogynist violence, here's the very brief summary of why -- regardless of party leadership's opinion on that matter -- that poster is Not Okay. (Yes, I have explained this in painstaking detail in reply to the e-mail from the party.)

Specifically, this poster: strapline VOTE HER GET HIM, image of Nigel Farage's face badly photoshopped into Theresa May's haircut, pearls, and jacket.

It is not intended to be transmisogynist, I am very sure! But, fundamentally, it's relying on the idea that men disguise themselves as women for sinister purposes in order to sneak into places they oughtn't be and cause harm. Does that sound familiar from anywhere? Yeah.

It relies on the trope of "man in a dress" as ridiculous and vaguely threatening. There does not exist any compelling reason to not do better: as other folk have pointed out, Farage pulling May's puppet strings would have communicated more-or-less the same message without the transmisogyny.

... I remain really disappointed that party PR and leadership think this is okay.

Comments

[alexseanchai]

ewwwwww.

(did you mean to close the bold at some point?)

[recessional]

That strikes me as a really good example of a case where it's entirely possible that the creators were totally focused on the primary message ("TADA! CURRENT CONSERVATIVE POLICIES ARE JUST UKIP POLICIES IN DISGUISE!") and translated it DIRECTLY . . . And gave NO thought to the other contexts because it just didn't cross their minds.

Which is NOT AN EXCUSE, I just like collecting examples of that kind of shit. Because like you could run the same structure for two male politicians (of the same race/religion) without it hitting the other notes, so I can honestly see them thinking over it superficially and going yeah, fine, great! . . . And just. Not having a CLUE about the other shit they are, whether they like it or not, tapping into. *facehands*

[kaberett]

Ayup. The thing(s) that is (er, are) REALLY ANNOYING ME, though, are (1) their response to having the unfortunate pointed out to them, and (2) the trans people who are being all "well it's not a good campaign but it's not actually a PROBLEM" with... sufficiet prominence in the party that people are comfortable just brushing the complaints off.

(Actual amusing me: I am sufficiently faceblind that I had to google it to work out why my trans friends and acquaintances were so annoyed by it to start with -- I seriously didn't get AT ALL what the intended message was. It was a picture of someone with Theresa May's hair and terrible fashion choices! It was... clearly Theresa May...?)

[swaldman]

I'm not generally faceblind, and I still didn't get it for a long time.

[cosmolinguist]

... I remain really disappointed that party PR and leadership think this is okay.

Their response continues to elicit swearing from some of the LGBT+ exec. There's more I could bitch about, but maybe not so publicly. :)

[kaberett]

Ha. <3

[shehasathree]

UGH
/o\

[kaberett]

PRETTY MUCH.

[vass]

*snarls*

[kaberett]

aYUP.

[ex_we935]

Ugh. There are other ways to articulate how the Tories are co-opting UKIP's message without relying on this horribly anti-trans trope that's been routinely weaponised against trans women.

~K.

[silveradept]

...there are better ways to convey that message. Seems like political campaigns need a board of marginalized people to run their messaging through to make sure they're not offending the voters they're trying to court.