You know it's super gross to be "repurposing" flags that are important to people right? Especially in a dehumanizing way such as comparing people's identities to monsters. Nothing cute about it, just bullying and cruelty behind a facade of "uwu cute art :3"
Ah, that’s an unfortunate line folks draw sometimes, that because I call my little dudes ‘monsters’ that I’m comparing whatever the purpose behind the flags I look at to something negative, but lo! That’s entirely incorrect!
I actually really, really love ‘monsters’, the concept of them, the history and varying definitions of the word, as well as to a certain extent the sheer flexibility of the definition. For me, when I refer to my creations as ‘monsters’, I’m more using the word as a category for beings that I create that aren’t human in the sense that they aren’t homo sapiens, but they are people in the same sense a human being is, you know? I’m very passionate and attached to my characters, and in a lot of my written and artistic works that I don’t share on here, I keep that definition but in those instances I like to bounce the idea of monster vs. human in the sense of ‘what makes us human’ as well as using it as a story device to discuss metaphors for things such as gender, sexuality, race, that kind of thing. To a certain extent, the idea of a ‘monster’ can be a really great way to discuss ‘us vs. them’ mentalities and how differences can form within ourselves and our societies as well as how they can effect interpersonal interaction. Maybe this is a result of feeling like an ‘other’ in my own life as a result of my own conceptions of myself and how others feel about and view me, that this feeling of being an other has led me to empathize with the idea of someone being different from a normal in a way that they can’t help but that does nothing to detract from their innate humanity - but honestly that’s a big ol’ tangent on a perspective that I don’t so much apply to all of these dudes, as I try to keep this project relatively light! For my intents and purposes, my monsters are people and very human. It isn’t meant to be a backhanded statement on some nonexistent attitude towards the creator of this flag - if that was my mentality on every monster I created, then I guess I’m dehumanizing LGBT folks, of which I am one, I guess I’m bullying the creator of the French flag for using the colors, I guess I’m being cruel towards your skateboarder cousin Throckmorton for making a monster out of a flag related to him - that argument holds water like holey cheesecloth, my good bro.
And on another note, one of the intentions of my projects is to divorce the connotation of a color scheme from it’s sometimes divisive origins and repurpose it into something that everybody, whether they wholeheartedly agree with, disagree with, or feel nothing but complete apathy towards the original. Occasionally, I use my monsters to pay homage to something - for example, a lot of my country monsters have some kind of nod towards the country that particular flag represents - but in general, I try to toss aside preconceived connotations and replace them with a sense of togetherness and understanding I think a cool character with a neat story can bring!
I really hope that this explanation gives you greater insight into why I draw what I draw, as well as what I mean when I say the word ‘monster’. I hope you end up enjoying what I make, and glean some kind of happiness from it! :D