An artist going by Saint Hoax has been in the news regarding several series of anti-abuse posters he’s produced themed around animated Disney characters. The first two were about the Disney princesses, but now, responding to online feedback, Saint Hoax has produced a poster series about abused men.
You can read about it here at Huffington Post. The poster series is meant to highlight the plight of victims of domestic violence by graphically portraying Disney “heroes” after having been beaten by their respective “princesses.” The goal, Saint Hoax says, is to encourage men not to be embarrassed to ask for help when they are abused.
Now, the HuffPo article itself is a mess, reporting on the posters with obvious reluctance and bending over backwards to cite every misrepresented, ill-conceived, and debunked pseudo-statistic on DV ever printed, with the usual goal of insisting that women are the majority of victims.
The posters, however, seek to draw attention to abused men. I salute Saint Hoax for this, but I also must cry foul. His heart is in the right place, but even these posters fall far short of what needs to be said about abused men. They also carry the telltale signs of (I’ll be polite and assume unconscious) gynocentrism and Patriarchy Theory.
It’s not the images themselves I take exception to. Heroes and princesses alike are portrayed bloodied and bruised. The problem is the words, and the problem runs deep. Each of the two DV poster series has three main pieces of text: a title, question, and answer. Saint Hoax’s unfortunate bias becomes apparent when we compare the two sets of posters.
The Title
First was the series of posters portraying abused Disney princesses titled “Happy Never After,” a common spin on an old fairy-tale stock phrase. For the abused heroes, the title is “Prince Charmless.”
Right off the bat we can see that there is something skewed in Saint Hoax’s thinking. The title “Prince Charmless” is blatant victim-blaming of the worst kind. The princesses’ title of “Happy Never After” implies a betrayal, an uncovering of the patriarchal lie of a Happy Ever After ending; the truth is, she will be beaten by her hero.
For the hero, though, if he is beaten, he is “charmless.” This implies there is something wrong with him and leads nicely into the old rationalization of “Well, if I’d tried harder …” The title does nothing to suggest that anyone but the prince himself is at fault, leaving him as a target of the ridicule the posters claim to be combating.
The Question
Each poster series has a question posed to the abuse victim printed along the bottom. The princesses are asked, “When did he stop treating you like a princess?” and the heroes similarly, “When did she stop treating you like a hero?”
From the first moment I saw these posters, the use of the word hero rubbed me the wrong way, and this is why. Both posters pose the question “When did she/he stop treating you with respect?” For women, respect comes from being a princess. For men, it comes from being a hero.
This is performance culture. Being a princess is something innate, something you are born or marry into. The most effort it takes is getting to the ball on time so you can marry the prince. Bam, respect and love. For men, though, being a prince isn’t enough. No, you have to be a hero, you have to risk your life to defeat the sea witch, the god of death, the evil wizard, or whatever. Then you have earned love.
Women are valued for what they are. Men are valued for what they do. This princess–hero dichotomy leads people to condemn abusive men for beating an “innocent princess” but plants the seed of doubt toward abused men: “Maybe he wasn’t living up to his role as a hero?” becomes “He must’ve done something to deserve it.” Because if he’d just acted like a hero, she wouldn’t have beaten him. Princesses are princesses, though, no matter how they act, so abusing them is never acceptable.
The Answer
Finally, beneath the question each poster series has an answer. Princesses are told: “It’s never too late to put an end to it.” Heroes are told: “Don’t be ashamed to ask for help.”
Both answers call for agency on the part of the abused but come from two very different directions. Princesses are assured it is never too late to end an abusive relationship. This helps instill hope and encourages the abused to take control of their lives by getting out of a dangerous relationship.
Heroes are also given a message of hope but only against their own inadequacy. By simply telling abused men not to be ashamed, the posters fail to address any of the reasons they are ashamed or the profound lack of support awaiting a man brave enough to speak up. It leaves these men in their isolated cell of hopelessness, effectively telling them their imprisonment is their own fault.
Princesses are told they can just walk away. Heroes are told they need to man up and ask for help. By telling them not to be ashamed, you remind them that it is shameful. The message also carries the veiled implication that there is help if men would only ask for it, which is frankly false. Heroes aren’t even granted the agency to “put an end to it” like princesses; all they can do is “ask for help.”
Target those who shame, not those who feel the shame.
Conclusion
Saint Hoax’s anti-DV poster series is a refreshing change from the usual propaganda, but it falls short of the mark. The Huffington Post‘s adherence to feminist DV doctrine mirrors the artist’s inability to come to grips with the reality of domestic violence and how it affects men.
Saint Hoax could have easily changed the text for the second poster series only to alter the gender. Men could have been asked, “When did she stop treating you like a prince?” and then assured that “It’s never too late to put an end to it.” Instead, they are blamed and reminded of the shame imposed upon them. Good for them if they get help, we say, but they’ll have to do it themselves. This kind of work takes us from the stance of “men don’t matter” to “men matter, but not as much as women.”
I wouldn’t have settled for “women can do almost as much as men.” I wouldn’t have settled for “Blacks deserve almost equal rights.” I won’t settle for being told I am almost worthy of human compassion, and then only if I earn it.
