Keep Calm and Carry On

Fran sent me an interesting article the piece Dial Down the Feminism, created by an artist, outraged at a comment made by her tutor.  Inspired by the piece, I look at attitudes which made me angry.

The ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ phrase has always irritated me.  Although I agree it is important to be strong and resilient, I also find encourages acceptance, without the push for change.  My philosophy is to work between the two extremes - to calmly be angry.

Poverty in the UK is an issue largely ignored.  The British stiff-up lip attitude (resilience in the face of adversity), expects people to carry on regardless of the situation.  A person carrying on with a broken leg is respected by society, however women soldering on through period poverty, and appearing in public covered in menstrual blood would be a complete social taboo.

The piece is an exploration of period poverty, finding low cost alternatives to sanitary wear.  Bodily orifices are the boundary between the inner and outer body.  Julia Kristeva argues in the Powers of Horror (1980), that cultures create many elaborate social rituals focusing of the expulsion of unclean matter.  Our ideas of cleanliness are intertwined with our ideas of social order – breaking these rules makes us an outcast.
​RG