Fifty Shades of Gray
August 20, 2015
This painting was conceived and inspired by the growing collective awareness of minorities, especially African American people, to the inner workings of long standing systemic racism and what it takes to both expose and combat it. The wolf, a scapegoat for complex man made problems, analogous to racially laden blame placed on America’s poor urban citizens. The leg trap is similar to devices of sadism and masochism. It is a time tested, barbaric, and soulless device still used by trappers. It represents the seemingly unending means that those who believe they are above other beings will go to carve and maintain their place at the top of the food chain both literally and figuratively. The wolf’s visible defiance of the trap an allusion to the conscious organization of those underserved groups and the immense power they have to make positive, lasting change with a fearlessness rooted in nonviolence. The fiery background is a nod to the Baltimore riots of 1968 and how in many ways, things stalled out very quickly after the civil rights movement in terms of racial equality. Despite our advances in technology, as people we still have far to go before words like “All men are created equal” mean anything within the context of American culture. The liquor store sign is emblematic of so many impoverished urban areas throughout the United States where affluent people who do not live in those communities establish businesses that exploit and profit from poverty. The plight of the wolf, racism, and a multitude of other complex social problems are all surely tied to our inability to connect even with ourselves.
One of the inherent problems with the increasing human lifespan is that it has the capacity to persist for the better part of a century, sometimes longer. Not necessarily a problem for the individual, but rather a problem of culture and progress of the human spirit. The mind running the control room on this journey acts as conductor for action, or apathy and complicity. It’s database initially programmed by people it may eventually disagree with vehemently or perhaps worse, never question at all. Belief systems are usually generational, handed down from parent to child and when they are draped in ignorance it can be tough, often impossible to amend. Life expectancy in the United States now surpasses 78 years. That’s a long time to hold back a much-needed avalanche.
The death of Freddie Gray and the events in Baltimore that followed had the sickening look and feel of what unfolded months before in Ferguson, Missouri just ten minutes from my doorstep. In the St. Louis metropolitan area you can get a sense of the very real forces that led to Michael Brown's death. It hangs thick as the July air that gets no abatement from the cool Mississippi River that flows beneath it. By April 12 when Baltimore Police arrested Freddie Gray, near non-stop media coverage of events in Ferguson had gripped the country for some eight months. The circumstances and public response in these two communities were markedly similar. Baltimore, a city akin to St. Louis is so many ways, also suffered the pitfalls of it’s own institutions. I can only speak for what I see and hear in my town, but we know the rhetoric is not exclusive. The immediate polarizing sentiment of the general public in response to Michael Brown’s deaths may be the most telling example of just how little we have advanced in terms of racial equality and mindset.
Ferguson’s unrest and the unrelenting controversy over what really happened played out like entertainment for scorecard holders. Both potential scenarios are awful and tragic. If Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson killed an innocent Brown in an act of exploding racial bias and corruption of power it is incomprehensible. And if Brown attacked Wilson and forced him to fight for his own life or die, it is equally confounding. There is a finite number of people who can without doubt, attest to what really happened. That didn’t seem to matter much to some folks. Still doesn’t.
While the circumstances involving Michael Brown and Freddie Gray are undoubtedly byproducts of institutionalized racism, the exact details of both remain murky. If opinions surrounding these deaths are not informed with facts, then why do we hold on to them with such a death grip? If we weren’t on that street in Ferguson, witnessing the supposed struggle between Michael Brown and Darren Wilson, then how or why would we be so emotionally charged about it? How could over half a millions dollars have been donated to Darren Wilson for the purchase of a new home and to pay outstanding legal fees? Surely some of those donors have walked right past homeless people shivering on a city sidewalk and offered no assistance, monetary or otherwise. But they have money for Darren Wilson, a man whom they don’t know who committed an act they were not present for.
It seems odd that people who are racially, geographically, and socially removed from events in Ferguson would be upset by them as if they were personally intrusive? These are people who repeatedly voiced an irritation at the plight of folks in that community with statements like “We have equal rights” and that protestors should “Get a job”, all the while denying race is a problematic issue here in America. I can assure you that after a decade of racing stock cars on the dirt bullrings of Illinois and Southeast Missouri that racism is alive and well. I heard racial slurs on a weekly, if not nightly basis. Every time there was that millisecond where I thought “Surely this can not still be happening?”. This in an arena where I rarely saw African American fans and in ten years raced against only one African American driver, a damn good one. I won’t reveal his name but he wore boots, tight blue jeans, a big Western belt buckle and a cowboy hat. I never asked about his choice of pre race attire but I always secretly hoped it was to mock the racist Scots-Irish culture that the sport originated from. After ten years, even the thrill of victory couldn’t overcome my feeling of isolation within that sport. Last summer I sold my car and quit.
I’m not painting motor sports with a broad stroke, it is filled with some wonderful people and I have witnessed unbelievable expressions of humanity from drivers, crew members and fans alike. It’s lingering racist ideologies that do exist are no different than the ones expressed by suburbanites who chanted “Let’s Go Darren!” in the face of Ferguson protestors at a St. Louis Cardinals game last summer, angered by a peaceful protest outside Busch Stadium. This was a protest that in no way disrupted the game itself. These people didn’t question the absurdity of $9 beers or personally contributing to multi-million dollar contracts for players who engage in a child’s game. But they were furious that the ambiance of their evening at the ballpark was intruded upon. From the humble dirt tracks to the pinnacle of professional sports arenas, that lack of empathy and identification is indistinguishable.
Living in the Midwest close to a major city also provides a glimpse of the gamut of diverse American culture. People here often times attach themselves to something geographically vicarious. The recent debate over displaying the confederate flag, a symbol steeped in hatred, racism, slavery and lynching, should seem out of place everywhere in the 21st century. It seems especially out of place here, 150 years after the Civil War ended. Even if we were born in the South, simplistically and honestly proud of the regional heritage, surely we could empathize with those that know the horror of that symbol all too well? I witnessed young males, some teens, gallivanting around in lifted pick up trucks with confederate flags attached to tailgates or emblazoned on rear windows. This isn’t deep Mississippi where I repeatedly witnessed this, it is the St. Louis bi state region. The Midwest. In broad daylight. Ten minutes from Ferguson, Missouri.
It is strange to hear defenders of the flag tell you that’s it is not racist, and is not a symbol of oppression and slavery. The Texas Articles of Secession state otherwise as they mention slavery 21 times. Historical revisionists will gladly tell you that the Civil War was waged over “states rights”. While that is true, those rights in question were focused on slavery. There are also those who don’t believe the Holocaust ever took place. Their opinions have no bearing on facts and reality.
The death of Freddie Gray and the events in Baltimore that followed had the sickening look and feel of what unfolded months before in Ferguson, Missouri just ten minutes from my doorstep. In the St. Louis metropolitan area you can get a sense of the very real forces that led to Michael Brown's death. It hangs thick as the July air that gets no abatement from the cool Mississippi River that flows beneath it. By April 12 when Baltimore Police arrested Freddie Gray, near non-stop media coverage of events in Ferguson had gripped the country for some eight months. The circumstances and public response in these two communities were markedly similar. Baltimore, a city akin to St. Louis is so many ways, also suffered the pitfalls of it’s own institutions. I can only speak for what I see and hear in my town, but we know the rhetoric is not exclusive. The immediate polarizing sentiment of the general public in response to Michael Brown’s deaths may be the most telling example of just how little we have advanced in terms of racial equality and mindset.
Ferguson’s unrest and the unrelenting controversy over what really happened played out like entertainment for scorecard holders. Both potential scenarios are awful and tragic. If Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson killed an innocent Brown in an act of exploding racial bias and corruption of power it is incomprehensible. And if Brown attacked Wilson and forced him to fight for his own life or die, it is equally confounding. There is a finite number of people who can without doubt, attest to what really happened. That didn’t seem to matter much to some folks. Still doesn’t.
While the circumstances involving Michael Brown and Freddie Gray are undoubtedly byproducts of institutionalized racism, the exact details of both remain murky. If opinions surrounding these deaths are not informed with facts, then why do we hold on to them with such a death grip? If we weren’t on that street in Ferguson, witnessing the supposed struggle between Michael Brown and Darren Wilson, then how or why would we be so emotionally charged about it? How could over half a millions dollars have been donated to Darren Wilson for the purchase of a new home and to pay outstanding legal fees? Surely some of those donors have walked right past homeless people shivering on a city sidewalk and offered no assistance, monetary or otherwise. But they have money for Darren Wilson, a man whom they don’t know who committed an act they were not present for.
It seems odd that people who are racially, geographically, and socially removed from events in Ferguson would be upset by them as if they were personally intrusive? These are people who repeatedly voiced an irritation at the plight of folks in that community with statements like “We have equal rights” and that protestors should “Get a job”, all the while denying race is a problematic issue here in America. I can assure you that after a decade of racing stock cars on the dirt bullrings of Illinois and Southeast Missouri that racism is alive and well. I heard racial slurs on a weekly, if not nightly basis. Every time there was that millisecond where I thought “Surely this can not still be happening?”. This in an arena where I rarely saw African American fans and in ten years raced against only one African American driver, a damn good one. I won’t reveal his name but he wore boots, tight blue jeans, a big Western belt buckle and a cowboy hat. I never asked about his choice of pre race attire but I always secretly hoped it was to mock the racist Scots-Irish culture that the sport originated from. After ten years, even the thrill of victory couldn’t overcome my feeling of isolation within that sport. Last summer I sold my car and quit.
I’m not painting motor sports with a broad stroke, it is filled with some wonderful people and I have witnessed unbelievable expressions of humanity from drivers, crew members and fans alike. It’s lingering racist ideologies that do exist are no different than the ones expressed by suburbanites who chanted “Let’s Go Darren!” in the face of Ferguson protestors at a St. Louis Cardinals game last summer, angered by a peaceful protest outside Busch Stadium. This was a protest that in no way disrupted the game itself. These people didn’t question the absurdity of $9 beers or personally contributing to multi-million dollar contracts for players who engage in a child’s game. But they were furious that the ambiance of their evening at the ballpark was intruded upon. From the humble dirt tracks to the pinnacle of professional sports arenas, that lack of empathy and identification is indistinguishable.
Living in the Midwest close to a major city also provides a glimpse of the gamut of diverse American culture. People here often times attach themselves to something geographically vicarious. The recent debate over displaying the confederate flag, a symbol steeped in hatred, racism, slavery and lynching, should seem out of place everywhere in the 21st century. It seems especially out of place here, 150 years after the Civil War ended. Even if we were born in the South, simplistically and honestly proud of the regional heritage, surely we could empathize with those that know the horror of that symbol all too well? I witnessed young males, some teens, gallivanting around in lifted pick up trucks with confederate flags attached to tailgates or emblazoned on rear windows. This isn’t deep Mississippi where I repeatedly witnessed this, it is the St. Louis bi state region. The Midwest. In broad daylight. Ten minutes from Ferguson, Missouri.
It is strange to hear defenders of the flag tell you that’s it is not racist, and is not a symbol of oppression and slavery. The Texas Articles of Secession state otherwise as they mention slavery 21 times. Historical revisionists will gladly tell you that the Civil War was waged over “states rights”. While that is true, those rights in question were focused on slavery. There are also those who don’t believe the Holocaust ever took place. Their opinions have no bearing on facts and reality.
The General Lee, America’s favorite stock car.
This is important to consider when death at the hands of a police officer is callously reduced to dehumanizing racial rhetoric. Freddie Gray was arrested for carrying what police claimed to be a switchblade, which was later found to be a legal knife. He was then left unrestrained inside a BPD van and tossed around with his hands and feet cuffed. A medical examiners report shows he suffered a "high-energy injury" similar to a shallow diving accident. Like Michael Brown, he was not afforded video footage of the incident that killed him.
Video provides an undeniable burden of proof in instances such as the one involving a compliant and unarmed Levar Edward Jones, shot by South Carolina State Trooper Sean Groubert while following the direct orders of the screaming officer. Jones survived his injuries and Groubert was fired. Without that video, surely Groubert would have retained his position. This incident pales in comparison to the fatal shooting of unarmed Walter Scott on April 4, 2015, by North Charleston South Carolina Police officer Michael Slager. Scott is gunned down while fleeing the scene on foot. Slager was later arrested and charged with murder. He is currently being held without bail. These videos, along with the deeply disturbing Eric Garner footage, should be the beginning and end of the debate centered on whether or not law enforcement and our culture need a grand overhaul towards a truer community approach.
The crucial missing element for some demographics, especially ones living in squalor, is hope. Something that is surely at the core of so many issues in blighted urban neighborhoods of cities like Detroit, St. Louis, and Baltimore. Let me be clear, I do not condone violence or criminal activity of any kind, be it the initial circumstances that have sparked incidents like Ferguson and Baltimore, or the looting and rioting that have followed. People will do what they need to do, and sometimes what they feel is just, in order to survive. While some of those actions are inexcusable, almost all are driven by absolute hopelessness.
We have more people behind bars than any other country in the world, including China, an authoritarian country four times the size of the U.S. Clearly, despite our patriotism and the myth of exceptionalism, we are doing something wrong culturally. Issues of income and wage disparity, the product of unbridled capitalism and the eroding value of the dollar are all factors to consider when examining what a better, more community based America should look like. In the case of urban blight, you can add an environment of inferior educational opportunities, a brutally violent crime-ridden culture, lack of leadership, and most devastating of all, a very real sense of hopelessness. It is almost impossible to comprehend the experience of living in a place where few if any of your peers have had enough success to “buy” their way out of that life.
All of these things shine a glaring light on the very issue this country continues to scratch its collective head over but refuses to talk about honestly and introspectively without protective nature. How can we possibly still have racial divides that bring communities to the brink of total devastation nearly fifty years after the Civil Rights Act? How can young black males be 21 times more likely to be killed by police than whites? Why are certain demographics that are literally unaffected by systemic racism so up in arms about this particular issue? It almost certainly lies in our inability to feel compassion for that which we do not identify with, or perhaps what we fear. Our disjointed culture may have something to do with the struggle we have connecting to ourselves. That voluminous lack of personal consciousness surfaced in our choice of literature recently.
“Wear a gun and be proud but bare breasts aren’t allowed.” -The Church, North, South, East and West
Fifty Shades of Grey has sold well over 50 million copies in the U.S. alone. A book so poorly written that despite my best attempt to see what all the fuss was about, I simply couldn’t finish it. Touted as liberating, it only seemed to be veiled pornography, further solidifying America’s double standard of socially accepted sexual behavior in women versus men, or sex in general for that matter. Our perpetual obsession with violence while continuing to treat sex as taboo is maybe more prevalent now than ever. From twenty-somethings to baby boomers, an entire nation was gripped by a singular but not necessarily unique, updated version of trash romance. Perhaps anti-romance is more fitting considering the lead character is a damaged misogynist who takes advantage of a fairly innocent and inexperienced female. Evidently millions of Americans find emotionally abusive relationships to be "sexually freeing". I thought back to my youth when a friend would roll up on his mag wheeled BMX bike with a copy of Penthouse he nabbed from his fathers closet and the letters each issue contained. It seemed to me that E.L. James might have had similar friends during her formative years.
If anti-intellectualism is destroying America then “50 Shades” could very well be the instruction manual. If people can’t be in touch with their own sexuality then how will they possibly empathize and connect with the plight of marginalized groups in underserved communities? How would they value the lives of other sentient beings that are not even of the same species?
This egocentric mindset, steeped in the preservation of our own narrative got me thinking about the recent so called “conservation” of the Gray Wolf and how it parallels societal problems, specifically systemic racism. The audacity to think that simply because we are human, any desire we have comes before that of other species at any cost seems like something from a Neanderthal epoch. Rather it is the sentiment of people looking to eradicate wolves, mostly cattle and sheep ranchers. Continual development and deforestation have disrupted the normal ecosystem and forced wolves to look for other sources of food, which occasionally means ranchers livestock.
It is estimated that in what is now the United States there were between 250,000 and 500,000 wild wolves living in harmony with Native Americans in a fully functioning ecosystem. With the onslaught of Western expansion that changed dramatically. In America and beyond wolves have been vilified as evil, aggressive beings that pose a direct threat to civilization. This false portrayal has only grown over hundreds of years in founding literary works of Western culture such as the Three Little Pigs. Theodore Roosevelt, a man held in high regard for his environmentalism, referred to the wolf as "the beast of waste and destruction" and called for its extermination. By 1960, the Gray Wolf was all but extinct. Some 300 wolves remained in deeply secluded areas of upper Michigan and Minnesota, surviving by avoiding humans at all cost. Over the last half century protective laws have helped wolf populations in the U.S. grow to over 4,000.
As we speak anti-wolf politicians are working to overturn court victories that protect wolves in Wyoming, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan under the Endangered Species Act. It’s no surprise however. The U.S. government shells out over $557 million annually for animal food producers to advertise and push their “goods“ on the American public. These amount to welfare payments for meat and dairy producers, subsidies that help pay for overtly masculine slogans like “Stack it High Tough Guy” and “Eat Like a Man“ that are hammered into your psyche via TV, radio, and internet. A pretty incredible hypocrisy when you consider the resistance to public health care and the rising diabetes, cancer and obesity rates of Americans, mostly due to consumption of animal products. So the wolf, an actual carnivore, is deemed a threat to the pocket book of those who profit from exploiting domesticated animals in these regions. Wolves are simply attempting to survive. They were here long before us. They preceded cattle ranching for profit, light beer, baseball, and apple pie.
The argument has always been about who really deserves to be here, wolf or man. The reasons given are interesting, full of everything from religion and Manifest Destiny to the most basic speciesist language. A proper way to settle the debate might be between the two adversaries themselves and not Washington politicians. Rancher and wolf, beast versus beast, face to face. My advice to the unarmed rancher is simple. When the wolf bares his teeth in unyielding defiance, show yours in return. An exaggerated smile if you will. Nice and wide. In that moment, at least for a brief second, the distinction will be undeniably clear.
Fifty Shades of Gray, 2015, graphite, acrylic, and collage on reclaimed door 24” x 27"