I’m not 110 percent sure yet, but I’m considering the topic of misogyny in the military. As I was searching for memes, I happened on a letter sent last year from Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and top military officials, where she includes screen shots of memes posted on FaceBook that she claims “contribute to a culture that permits and seems to encourage sexual assault and abuse.” I guess I shouldn’t have been, but after googling “women in the military memes,” I was surprised at how many I had to work with, and after further review, I have to agree with Rep. Speier. The themes themselves predate the computer revolution: a woman’s place is in the kitchen (preferably barefoot & pregnant); her god-given role is sexual objectification; and when she forgets her place, she needs to be reminded that men are stronger by whatever means necessary:

If that’s not enough to convince her she’s no equal to real men, she’s a lousy driver:

The knowledge necessary to get the joke is baked into our patriarchal, Judeo-Christian-Moslem-dominated culture: God is male, omnipotent, and omniscient. He made woman to serve man. Get it? It gets a little more complex when we look into who supposedly posted these memes. According to Marines Corps Times, the offenders “indicated in interaction with their followers that they were women: ‘Veteran assistance, good laughs, sammiches, recipes for taste, love and destruction of societal norms — but most of all, we’re here to add levity and laughs to life,’ read the page description.” And the poster of the women-driver meme identified herself as a 19-year-old woman. This could very well be true in both cases, but what would that mean? God is still male, omnipotent, and omniscient.

Going deep on the purpose of these memes requires some military intelligence: a 2012 Pentagon report “estimated 26,000 troops had been sexually abused in 2012, up 35 percent since the last survey in 2010.” Note the lack of gender-specificity in these stats, which, I believe, is the whole problem from the memes’ pov. Women get into the military and expect to be treated like men, and when they are, they bitch about it and ruin the entire esprit de corps, which apparently needed heavy non-gender-specific reinforcements in 2012. The fallout is that it’s becoming a little more apparent to civilians just how heavy a lift it’ll take to bring our military culture into compliance with civilians’ rights to a workplace free of sexual discrimination and abuse. Does US military service really require sexual dominance of supervisors over supervisees? Are US civilians really obligated to wink and nod?

As for the fanatical artistry engaged to further the cause of patriarchy, I’m not overly impressed. 

http://fortheleft.blogspot.com/2013/05/here-is-sexist-obscene-marine-facebook.html

http://www.memecenter.com/fun/161548/women-in-the-army

Note: embedded images repaired and image URLs added 9/29