My Self Portrait

Recently I was "unfriended" on Facebook, the reason being that allegedly, I am "mocking black women" with my cartoons and caricatures.  The person who "unfriended" me said she didn't like seeing the images that kept appearing from my Facebook page, and took them to be "mocking black women".  I suppose, because I am not "black", she had decided I am not allowed to make any commentary that might be construed as "mocking black women".  Well, she said, she realized "art is art", however, apparently, from her view, I had gone too far...thus, it seems that "art is art" but needs to be censored when the "wrong" people say things that one can only supposed the "right" people are allowed to say.  Then she said, in her closing email to me on Facebook, that she would remain "unfriended" with me, until we had time to "talk".  I suppose that meant that, after I had duly gone and received my lecture in political correctness, and perhaps, oh joy, permission to make cartoons that might APPEAR to be "mocking black women", then, and only then, would she "befriend" me again.
Ha! So you think that  my first reaction was to feel badly, to want immediately to rush over and apologize for making inappropriate and offensive  drawings?  Well, no, exactly I had thought this does not even deserve an acknowledgement of a "return" email.  "Unfriend" me if you wish, oh, Art Police, for, in fact you have been so very wrong, revealing your most racist prejudice yourself, your assumption belies your own deeply seated racist outlook.  And here is why:  you see, after receiving this unusual Facebook email, I thought, oh, I wonder what she is talking about?  I ran my memory over the pictures that had recently been my profile on facebook, and thought, I wonder which one she was referring to?  And then, Oh Yes, I remembered, it is probably THAT one, the one I call "Big Tat", here it is:

Oh, of course, naturally she would jump to the conclusion that I am "mocking black women", since in her racist book, only if I were a "black woman" would I be able validly to be allowed to speculate thusly with my pen and ink.  Yes, perhaps someone might be thinking, that is "mocking black women" because someone might also be stuck with stereotypical thinking on that subject.
But, you know, if she (the "unfriender") knew anything about it at all, and didn't have knee-jerk, racist attitudes herself, then she would understand that this is a SELF-PORTRAIT!  Oh, yes, I forget, the Politically Correct Woman "Of Colour" can dismiss my self-portrait without question or inquiry into how this picture might have come about, because The Politically Correct Woman Of Colour is much higher on her pecking order of whose opinion is valid, and whose is not.  Because this "critic" sees me as being "white" (compared to her measuring paper that classifies people accordingly?) therefore she has seen the picture and jumped (incorrectly) to the conclusion that what I am doing is "mocking black women".  I am a sinner by virtue of the accident of my birth...and who is the racist?
I will not elevate the critism "mocking black women" with any kind of explanation as to how this self-portrait came about (although, I may sometime in the future, put in this blog the story out of which my self portrait came.  I will keep you posted).  Nor will I validate such claptrap criticism with any kind of justification for the drawing, for no such justification is necessary.  All I can say to this PC Censor is "YOU figure out why your comment is so much claptrap, and YOU figure out how and why this is indeed a self portrait!"  How dare you call my self portrait "Mocking Black Women".  You are a fool!  A racist fool at that...oh, wait just a minute, you're a "black" woman, so how could YOU possibly have a racist attitude, especially about "black" women.  Ha ha ha, you figure that one out, too!

No City Bashing

A recent abduction of a girl in a small town in alberta set people there off making comments that they were shocked and horrified that such terrible thing could happen in their peaceful, harmless little small town. Usually when something nasty happens in a small town, the city bashers come forward with their slanders about "big city problems" coming to the small town. One woman from Penhold, Alberta, opined that she had moved to this small community to "escape the Big City problems" and her "sleeping little rural community (had) lost some of it's innocence." I think these people must be walking around in some kind of protective, blind, deaf bubble. I am 61 years old and grew up in a small town (10,000 pop) in the interior of British Columbia. I was eleven years old when I and two of my girl friends first experienced an angry, lashing out assault by a young man...we managed to fight him off...was he from the city? No...no way, country boy, farm boy, hopped up on repressed anger probably from father-beatings. My point, small, rural communities are just as capable of inventing their own "sweep it under the rug" nastiness, manifesting itself as assault, murder, abduction. When I was sixteen, still living in the small towns, the shocking radio announcement came about a murder in an even smaller town north of us. The Ring twin sisters, both fifteen years old, had been murdered on their way home from school in the little community of Mara Lake in the north okanagan; the man convicted of their murder had been born, raised and schooled in the same "sleepy little rural community" as I came from. He didn't have to go visit "the city" to learn how to be a psychopath. Perhaps there is something about the isolation of rural communities that can be a special breeding ground for this kind of thing. Just think of some of the more recent murder atrocities and the location of their engenderment: Mayerthorpe, Alberta, the murderer of four Mounties was a small town, born and bred farm boy. Oh, how could he possibly have thought to do such a thing when he was just a small town fellah? Did some secret murder agents from The City come in the dark of night and instruct him in his nefarious deed. Columbine School massacre in Columbine, Colorado, population on 24 thousand...I could go on, my point is, after having lived for half my life in "sleepy little rural communities" and having been only too glad to get as far away from them when i was finally old enough to leave home, it does not surprise me IN THE LEAST that nasty things happen in small towns...for people carry around their twisted secrets in small communities as much as in "big" communities like cities. there is nothing inherent in urbanity that engenders crime and depraved behaviour; matter of fact, my experience has been that small towns and communities are just as capable of producing weirdos and criminals....after all, it was in the "sleepy little rural community" that I learned to "look behind me" when I went out...just street (or rural road) smarts, is all. Stop it with the slanders against the city. Open your eyes rural and small town newbies...moving to the country you will find that a perv born and bred in the country could just as likely be living down the street from you.

What is the Meaning of The Black Uterus?

The Black Uterus is a work of art. As its' creator, I have no control, ultimately, over what people may see in the art. However, the origin circa 1975 was from the context of the political movements for various kinds of liberation up to that time, where the raised and clenched fist was used as a symbol of liberation and empowerment. Here's a wikepedia link explaining:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raised_fist
as well as a more particular explanation of the "women's liberation" symbol (circle with cross below and clenched fist in circle), which was originally designed by Robin Morgan, here's a link to her website and the book "Sisterhood is Powerful":
http://www.robinmorgan.us/robin_morgan_bookDetails.asp?ProductID=6

The Black Uterus

The Black Uterus was born in the early 1970's, in the nascent revolutionary cauldron of the Women's Movement. The Black Uterus emerged from the revolutionary power symbol of the 1960's, sisterhood is powerful, black power, the uprising of the oppressed. This powerful symbol of female energy was conceived in the fertile imaginations of Canada's creative West Coast women who cultivated their female energy as they prowled the night in the cities, towns and countryside, leaving graffiti on the walls of their beloved East Side, illuminating the turn of the millenium with the power of The Black Uterus. When darkness begins to press them, they look into the night sky, and the silhouette of the Black Uterus appears in an orb, calling the women to gather as if they are a storm of brilliant energy.
http://www.cafepress.com/autonomoustees/4784294