I was looking through a plain social media site when I came across this - and it made me freeze for a bit. This visual text is a campaign by Saint Hoax, an artist from the Middle East, and uses photoshopped images of Disney Princesses to raise awareness of domestic violence. The collection is called "Happy Never After," and has the tagline "When did he stop treating you like a princess?"
Disney Princesses are viewed as the iconic perfect fairty tale characters with perfect happy endings and perfect lived. These princesses are the last ones for people to have expected to be victims of domestic violence. By placing domestic violence on these Disney Princesses, Saint Hoax emphasizes the cruelty of domestic violence. A thought can easily run through people's heads: "How could anyone do this - to Jasmine? To Ariel?" Saint Hoax stresses the fact that anyone - even princesses - can be victims of domestic violence.
Underneath the tagline, "When did he stop treating you like a princess?" He adds, "It's never too late to put an end to it." The first thing anyone notices about this poster and about domestic violence in general is its cruelty. The graphics are gruesome and horrific, which can easily lead people to believe that there can't be a stop to it. However, with those tiny letters, he's giving the small but existent hope: "It's never too late to put an end to it." Many people don't realize that domestic violence can be stopped if the situation is properly dealt with, but many give up or simply succumb to it because they think they don't deserve better. Although it isn't one of the most obvious aspects of domestic violence, as represented by the tiny letters, it's still there - and people should realize it.
This is overall a very dark piece that ruins the childhood feeling of many, but that stabbing, hurtful feeling is what makes the campaign effective, and it's what raises awareness of domestic violence.
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