Who Shapes the Narrative in Ferguson, MO?

The verdict was announced and police officer Darren Wilson will not be charged with killing unarmed Michael Brown. I could write an article on the lack of wisdom shown by the prosecutor choosing to announce this verdict late at night. But that is not my angle. I could also write an article on the pattern of unarmed Black men killed by law enforcement. I won’t do that here.

This is a controversial topic and I confess a mix of confusion and anger. The verdict did not help but there are other things that also bothered me. Bear with me as I share my observations on this issue and feel free to add yours.

I have spent a fair bit of time in my past developing media education curriculum for children and youth. Image is everything today and studies show that minority youth are heavy media consumers. I was trained at the undergraduate level to see what others don’t see. I learned the fundamentals of graphic design such as how to draw letterforms, positive/negative space, compare and contrast scenarios and the psychology of color. Along with this, I also studied European art history, art from other cultures, the science of typography, semiotics, etc. I continued my learning after graduation and presently teach social science courses.

I want to submit this simple idea to you: we are living in a global image culture. Modern images are socially constructed artifacts for our entertainment and consumption. I define ‘image’ as a captured or rendered visual representation. An English Anthropologist is credited with developing the first broad definition of culture:

Culture, or civilization, taken in its broad, ethnographic sense, is that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society.– Tylor, Edward Burnett, Primitive Culture, 1923.

The idea of an image culture is an exciting development to creative professionals because new jobs and projects have resulted. Branding opportunities are everywhere. Multinational companies are pioneering this culture. It accelerated with the birth of the internet and the passage of the Telecommunications Act in 1996 by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). This law allowed cross media ownership. Before this law, the FCC restricted media ownership in the same markets because they believed that competition between companies was better for the consumer. After the act was instituted, megamergers went through the roof.

However, there are also some frightening developments with an ‘image culture.’ As we use images more consistently, we began to rely on them as a form of communication. The late artist and scholar Sol Worth compared images with spoken words. “Speech requires a clearly defined syntax which allows us to articulate propositions of truth and falsity.” If I moved the words around in Sol’s quote, you would not be able to decipher it because I would have broken the rules of grammatical structure in the English language.

As I stated earlier, an image comes from a socially constructed context BUT it has no clearly defined syntax. You are only a receiver while speech implies listening and dialogue. Therefore, an image cannot function like speech. The end result is that images can limit our vocabulary. This is why saying a picture is worth a thousand words makes sense. Which thousand words? Here is an example. Examine the picture below. Is the sun rising or setting?

Unless you know something about the science of earth’s atmosphere and the sun, there are only two possibilities. Looking at the photo, you cannot tell. But if I told you the sun is setting, you will see the above picture in your mind as my spoken words give it context.

The idea I want to introduce to you in relation to Ferguson, MO is that those who control the images in our culture control the narrative. But what about those without the social, political and cultural capital to influence the narratives in our media? As soon as Michael Brown was killed in August 2014, this was the national narrative:

1. A racist police officer killed an unarmed Black teen. In the beginning, no pictures circulated of the officer.
2. Michael Brown was an aggressive teen with criminal tendencies. Pictures of him circulated on the internet and in the media.
3. Charlatans photoshopped picts of the police officer and Michael Brown to influence the narrative.

The top two ideas tap into harmful stereotypes and have a historical basis. But only one was immediately given a national narrative with an image: Michael Brown. Immediately attached to Michael’s image were the bad decisions he made. This negative narrative feeds off of dangerous stereotypes of African American males as aggressors. The problem with this story is not whether it is true. Michael did make bad decisions. It is about the timing of its release knowing the perceptions of Black males in our society. Also, it can further erode the distrust between the media and poor African American communities. Lord knows this is already true of how Black people feel about the media. Unfortunately, it fits with the timing in other narratives about Black males (like Trayvon Martin) suggesting that they were imminent threats and killing them is justified. Imagine someone suggesting to you as a teen that you deserve to lose your life because of a few bad decisions you made. Brown was judged in and by the media because his sins were on public display yet we would never want our own sins paraded that way. Unfortunately, the reporting on protesting in Ferguson, MO means they are developing a negative narrative as well.

The travesty is that an image culture presupposes curators. i.e., those who control and disseminate the images. Does Michael Brown’s family have the social, political and/or cultural capital necessary to control the narrative? Over time, President Bill Clinton was able to change his story after the 1998 Lewinsky scandal. But Monica Lewinsky has lived a somewhat reductive life because of it while her last name became a vulgar verb for Beyonce’s latest video. I have no confidence in the media because they help keep the stereotypes of the dangerous Black male alive (along with the entertainment industry) for their own purposes. This narrative continues to impact my life even though I have two degrees.

This social, political and/or cultural capital is often wielded by America’s most influential people. Cultural and business elites brought their influence to bear on former football star O.J. Simpson. He was acquitted of murdering his wife, Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman. This was probably the most publicized criminal trial in U.S. history. The reaction to the verdict around America brought racial tensions to the surface. Generally, Black people were happy and White people were not. O.J. was found not guilty by a jury of his peers yet he was blacklisted from the athletic and entertainment industries. No one would hire him for anything. He was branded. That’s power. Now contrast this with the Ferguson situation and almost everyone saying that we should respect the jury’s verdict.

Controlling the narrative of people’s lives means the option of changing their past, present and future as it suits you. Why doesn’t Facebook delete my friend’s page even though he died 5 years ago? Why doesn’t Google Inc. in Europe want to allow people to opt out of being found on their search engine?

Historically, African Americans have had a hard time controlling the narratives about their American experience. As a result, I am very sensitive about how images are used. But how I long for the most vulnerable in our society to have the social, political and cultural capital to shape their own narratives.

Some say this is the internet. Possibly.

As long as the control of local, regional and national news media is concentrated in the hands of a few, this will be a problem.

“He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past.” ― George Orwell, 1984.

Thanks for taking the time to read this article. These are my observations and I am open to further thoughts. Your shares and likes are appreciated.

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