Flashes of Panic

Sometime last summer, an enterprising (and somewhat mean-spirited, I think) graffiti “artist” used a stencil to apply a slogan to a number of spots on Amherst’s downtown sidewalks. The message, applied in red, was something like, “The head of a woman is a man,” with the enigmatic citation, “The Bible.”

Now, before we get too jacked up about the implied message here, let’s consider the delivery. First, “normal” and believable citations of Biblical verses usually carry a somewhat more specific citation, like “Romans 1:15,” indicating the fifteenth verse of the first chapter of Paul’s letter to the church in Rome (or some other book.) The implication is, “Don’t believe me, look it up.” Further, quoting small verses from the Bible without benefit of context is like saying that the Constitution protects my right to a handgun without considering the implications of my membership in a well-organized militia. The context is everything; this could have been a statement of a misguided Biblical character, soon to be put right by the voices of Good.

In short, without context or citation, it was a pretty silly thing to spray on sidewalks. Unless, of course, you’re just trying to piss people off, which is not hard to do around here.

Before the graffiti could be removed, someone reached several of them with a cruder message. In hand-scrawled black paint, it suggested one perform an obscenity I hadn’t thought possible with a book, using an imperative which left it unclear whether the reader or the original spray-painter was supposed to be following through.

Both messages had to be covered with white paint, leaving a number of white rectangles scattered around the downtown sidewalks.

We’ve had a few snow-and-ice storms this winter, and the town has been diligently sanding and applying ice-melt to the sidewalks. Combined with foot traffic, the white paint is beginning to flake away. The red paint of the original stencils is coming with it, but the black-painted reaction isn’t. If this continues, rather than a vague and poorly-argued slur against the intelligence of women, we’ll have only a quite direct and obscene dismissal of religion.

You have to laugh at the way we fight fire with fire around here. Otherwise, you’d cry.