There are times I get very busy and don’t have a moment to just sit and surf through all the information that’s available. When I get a chance to catch up I’m often surprised by what I see. I was doing just that this past Saturday when I began to notice a trend in what I was seeing.
“You can’t say this word because your skin is the wrong color.”
“You can’t wear this type of clothing.”
“You can’t sing this kind of song.”
“You can’t take that kind of picture.”
“You can’t post links here.”
“Don’t talk about that topic in this forum.”
I soon found myself seething and quickly posted a picture of a sunflower in protest.
Why a sunflower? Because I can. Because it’s beautiful. More than anything, though, because I was pissed and needed to see something that wasn’t as ugly as all the posts and warnings and articles listing things that someone thinks we’re not supposed to do.
This whole trend of trying to control other people’s actions has become too much and I for one am quite done with it. Just yesterday, a report surfaced about a man in Montreal (yes, Canada) who was pulled over by police and fined the equivalent of $118 US for singing in his car! What the royal fuck? Montreal, which we’ve long suspected has a giant stick up its ass, has a law on the books stating that “Noise resulting from cries, clamours, singing, altercations or cursing and any other form of uproar” are prohibited. You can’t sing. You can’t curse. Theoretically, you can’t even yell across the street and say, “Hi, cousin! Ya’ll comin’ over for dinner on Sunday?” How the fuck do laws like this get passed?
The dude is contesting the ticket, which is cool, but my whole point is that we’re way too busy trying to fuck up everyone else’s life and not paying attention to our own fuckups, which are considerable. Don’t you dare try to tell me what I can say, what I can do, which pictures I can take, what clothes I can wear, or what song I can completely butcher when I think no one else is listening.
Restricting our actions in such an offensive ways causes those of us who are creative to do wild and crazy things with our creativity. The pictures below are what I did with my anger. Yes, I know I broke about a dozen rules. I really don’t give a fuck. I don’t care if you understand what we’ve done with the images. I don’t care of they offend your delicate sensibilities or your acquaintances’sensibilities. This is my creative statement against external control. This is where I #TakeAKnee. No one gets to define the who, what, when, where, or how of personal expression even when that expression is stupid as fuck.
So click on a thumbnail to view the full-sized image because the details are totally lost in the smaller version which means that if you’re viewing this on your phone you’re probably not going to see the subtlety at all. Not my problem.
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