Red Flags

Title: Red Flag

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20″ x 26″

In the vernacular, a red flag is a warning sign. Today in America, there are red flags everywhere we look. Our democracy is in peril. Our planet is burning up. Hate groups are attacking our citizens. Legislators are eroding our rights. And that’s just the start. I’m addressing these and other issues in my series, Red Flags.

Each Red Flag artwork is based on a re-interpretation of the American flag. Each flag in the series represents one of the pressing problems facing America. Each Red Flag is carved in wood – an intentional metaphor. In my opinion, these problems are so ingrained in our history and consciousness, they’re carved into our national DNA.

This exhibit is meant to be more than just an expression of an idea. It’s meant to inform you, the viewer, of the dangers we face and embolden you to organize, educate others, and then vote.

Red Flags is made possible, in part, by a grant from the Regional Arts Commission of St. Louis.

Title: The Redline

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20” x 26”

Redlining was a discriminatory policy created and implemented by the federal government in 1933. Its sole purpose was to intentionally segregate minority populations by herding them into less desirable neighborhoods. Redlining had the effect of pushing Black families to the bottom of the socio-economic ladder while allowing White families to move up and prosper in wealthier and more desirable communities. 

The passage of the Fair Housing Act in 1968 formally ended the policy of redlining, but its effects are still felt today. In 2023, the household wealth of the average Black family was 17% that of the average White family. 

Poverty is not just an indicator of economic status; it is a cause of sickness, crime, injustice and instability that undermines our nation. In 2021, President Biden’s American Rescue Plan payments to families with children cut child poverty by more than half, yet Congress has allowed this and a number of other anti-poverty programs to lapse.

Title: Pride – and Prejudice

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20” x 26”

A GOP lawmaker recently said he wanted to “erase” the LGBTQ community. He is one of many on the right who share these beliefs. 

In 2022, the National Institutes of Health tracked hate crimes against marginalized people. It found gays, lesbians and transgender individuals were 10 times more likely than heterosexuals to be the victims of violent hate crimes, including murder. In a study by UCLA, police discrimination and harassment of the LGBTQ community was found to be pervasive throughout the United States. And according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, gays are more than twice as likely to be attacked in violent hate crimes as Jews or Blacks; more than four times as likely as Muslims, and 14 times as likely as Latinos. 

The hate rhetoric on the right is real and becoming more intense. Hate crimes are at their highest recorded point in the 21^st century.

Title: Divided Nation

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20″ x 26″

Most political scientists agree, Americans rarely have been as divided as we are today. Tribal politics – where devotion to party is more important than devotion to country – drives many of the problematic issues in America. Some red flag examples:

– Legislators who intentionally draw political districts to give their party unfair advantages.

– Legislators who restrict voting so as to block opposition.

– Party leaders who encourage violence to enforce their views. 

One of the most notable red flags occurred on January 6, 2021 when former president Donald Trump, claiming the election he lost had been “stolen,” directed thousands of his supporters to march on the Capitol, “fight like hell…stop the steal” and block certification of the 2020 election. Up to that day, Trump and his team had lost 64 legal challenges to this claim; the courts universally agreed nothing had been “stolen” and no election fraud had occurred. Despite that, pro-Trump extremists ransacked the Capitol, causing several deaths, multiple injuries and millions of dollars in damages. And later that night, six United States Senators and 121 Congressmen, all Republicans, still voted against certifying the 2020 Presidential election. 

To this day, despite all evidence to the contrary, Donald Trump still claims the 2020 election was stolen. And the Republican party has made him its 2024 nominee for President of the United States. Tribal politics.

Title: Another Christian Crusade

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20″ x 26″

The extremist Republican-affiliated Christian Nationalist movement is rooted in white supremacy, authoritarianism, patriarchy and violence. It is anti-democratic. Its members are threatened by changes in society and are anti-gay, anti-immigrant, anti-Black, anti-Muslim and antisemitic. 

Today, Christian Nationalism is behind many of the attacks on democracy. Hobby Lobby, a retailer of art supplies, and The Heritage Foundation, a far-right think tank, are just two of many groups that have poured hundreds of millions of dollars into CN-affiliated organizations, which are actively pushing an agenda to dismantle the separation of church and state, legally discriminate against non-Whites, prohibit the sale and use of contraceptives, deny access to abortion services, ban books, and make America a fundamentalist Christian nation. It is working with Republican legislators, lawyers, former President Trump and others to codify its agenda into American law. 

The Brookings Institution says, “White Christian Nationalism is posing a major threat to the health of our democracy and culture.” The FBI calls the movement a “persistent, pervasive threat.”

Title: The World’s Warden

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20” x 26”

The United States incarcerates more of its citizens than any other country, with about 2 million people nationwide currently serving prison sentences – more than China, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Afghanistan combined – more than the world’s most repressive regimes.* On a per capita basis, every single state imprisons more people than almost any independent democracy. 

The U.S. imprisons 30% of all the world’s incarcerated women and that number is increasing. Men are over 8 times more likely than women to be imprisoned at least once. Black men are about twice as likely as Hispanic men and 6 times more likely than White men to be incarcerated during their lives.**

According to the Prison Policy Initiative, “incarceration in the United States has become the nation’s default response to crime, with 70 percent of convictions resulting in confinement – far more than other developed nations with comparable crime rates…There is little correlation between actual violent crimes and the rate at which individual states lock people up in prisons and jails.” Incarceration in the U.S. is not based on rational analysis. Rather, it is a “political response to public fears and perceptions about crime and violence.”

*calculated per 100,000 population. **U.S. Office of Justice Programs

Title: Deo Vindice

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20” x 26”

Latin for “With God as Our Protector,” Deo Vindice was the motto of the Confederate States of America and one of the nicknames of its battle flag – a symbol of slavery and white supremacy. 

In 2015, Dylan Roof, a 19-year-old South Carolinian who was frequently photographed with this flag, murdered nine Black members of an African American church, hoping to start a race war. This caused South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley to have the flag removed from its State House. Her action was followed by governors of other southern states. Yet the flag can still be seen today, flying over homes and businesses, and on stickers on cars and trucks. And not just in the south. The Confederate Flag is a red flag. The Southern Poverty Law Center labels the Confederate flag a hate symbol and serves to drive our nation apart. The Department of Homeland Security has labeled white supremacists as our nation’s greatest threat, even more dangerous than threats from foreign terrorist groups.  

Title: The Whitewash

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20” x 26”

In August 2019, The New York Times published its 1619 Project, a look at American history since slavery was first introduced in the United States and how racial inequities have shaped our country in the 400 years since. 

In May 2020, just nine months later, George Floyd, a Black man, was murdered by White police officers in Minneapolis, sparking riots and civil unrest throughout the nation in protest to centuries-long violent police and judicial actions against minorities. 

The 1619 Project was condemned by Fox News and some Republican politicians as “anti-White.” They blamed the riots on a little-known educational thesis called Critical Race Theory, claiming it was “toxic propaganda and ideological poison” that postulated “White people were inherently racist.”

In reaction, the Florida legislature, led by Governor Ron DeSantis, banned the teaching of CRT in the state’s K-12 public schools along with any discussion that made White children feel “feel discomfort, guilt, anguish, or any other form of psychological distress on account of his or her race.” Other states followed suit. As of January 2024, 18 Republican-dominated states have banned the teaching of Critical Race Theory; another 9 are considering it. 

As a result, some student textbooks have been changed to whitewash-over truths about America, its troubled history with slavery, and the repercussions that are still with us today. Some local school boards have banned related books and eliminated Black studies programs. The red flag: We’re lying to our own citizens. Subject-matter prohibitions prevent students from having a complete understanding of American history – potentially dooming future generations to repeat the mistakes of the past.

Title: The Green New Deal

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20” x 26”

NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, says the impacts of climate change are costing the United States an estimated $150 billion – a number that increases each year.

The Green New Deal is a program to address the climate crisis by eliminating the country’s reliance on fossil fuels and transitioning the United States to 100% clean renewable energy by 2030. In the process, the program’s sponsors say it will create 20 million jobs (including redirecting jobs from fossil fuel industries), end current destructive energy extraction processes, reduce costs for businesses and consumers, and improve healthcare for all. 

The program is largely backed by progressives; climate change deniers oppose it. In 2019, it came up for a vote in the Senate. Claiming that the cost to enact the program would be $93 trillion and would bankrupt the country, 57 Republicans voted against the proposal, and 43 Democrats ducked their responsibility by voting “present.” Bills to enact versions of the Green New Deal have been introduced in every session in Congress since then. None have been enacted into law. 

Meanwhile, the ten most recent years have been the warmest years on record. 

Title: Our Burning Planet

Medium: Carved, painted and burned wood

Size: 20” x 26”

The United States isn’t the only country suffering from climate change. According to the United Nations, its effects are seen across the planet in “intense droughts, water scarcity, severe fires, rising sea levels, flooding, melting polar ice, catastrophic storms and declining biodiversity.” NASA says the changes are “irreversible” over the next hundreds to thousands of years. While harmful to all, unsafe conditions are especially harsh on the poor and vulnerable.

Our burning planet is causing mass migrations of people, leading to conflict everywhere. The Rand Corporation says, “climate change…could substantially worsen conflict in a way that most existing models don’t capture.” 

NATO says, “global warming is rapidly accelerating the likelihood of armed conflict, especially in the Arctic.”

US News and World Report says, “intensifying climate change will likely increase the future risk of violent armed conflict within countries.”

The United States can mitigate the environmental damage and armed conflict to come through better planning, better policy and Congressional action. What do you think should be done?

Title: The Inequity

Medium: Carved and Painted Wood

Size: 20” x 26”

Since the end of Roe, 41 states have implemented abortion bans – 14 of them with no exceptions.

Abortion access is an essential component of women’s healthcare, says the American College of OBGYNs. Those who believe otherwise – a minority in the United States – have the freedom to act in accordance with their beliefs, but when they impose their beliefs on others, it is discrimination – a red flag in any society. 

So it comes down to one simple question: If men are allowed to make decisions about their own bodies, why aren’t women allowed the same privilege?

Title: Fifteen

Medium: Carved and painted wood

Size: 20” x 26”

Unfettered access to military-grade weapons has turned America into a death culture. The weapon of choice among mass shooters and extremist organizations is the AR-15. This artwork, titled “Fifteen,” has been shot fifteen times with an AR-15, representing 15 lives lost.

Missouri has the loosest gun laws in the United States, with several states running a close second. Missouri’s Republicans control the Governorship, both branches of the Legislature, and have the power to regulate gun sales. As gun violence in St. Louis, Kansas City and other cities soars, they have chosen to do nothing. And in each session, some group of legislators proposes bills to make weapons like the AR-15 even more accessible and lethal. 

The National Rifle Association has referred to the AR-15 as the “most popular rifle in America,” with over 20 million in circulation. At least 10 of the 17 deadliest mass shootings in America saw the gunman use an AR-15. Because of gerrymandering, legislators in “safe seats” across many states have little incentive to change their positions. They can allow this carnage to continue without retribution. 

“65% of Americans support an assault weapons ban. 72% of Americans, including 52% of Trump voters, agree that our country should take action on assault weapons, showing that inaction is not an option.”*

In the recent assassination attempt on former President Trump, the shooter, a 20-year-old registered Republican, used an AR-15.

*Time Magazine

Title: The Shining City

Medium: Carved and Painted Wood

Size: 20” x 26”

In 1989, President Ronald Reagan referred to America as a “shining city on a hill” – a place that “teemed with people of all kinds, living in harmony and peace.” Reagan’s idealized image of our nation and his aspirational words, eloquent as they were, didn’t reflect the America of 1989 and certainly don’t reflect the America of today. 

This is the last in my current series of Red Flags. If you are concerned about what we are experiencing as a country – the tilt by some politicians toward authoritarianism, the threat of extremism, the loss or restriction of personal rights, unrelenting gun violence, climate change, a host of myriad injustices – I urge you to become more informed, to organize, and to vote. 

If you are offended by my series and its criticisms of our country, I offer this: America cannot be great through lofty words alone or by ignoring her many problems. We make America great by fixing those problems through hard work – individually and collectively. That’s what citizenship and patriotism are all about.

Thanks for reading and considering.

— Mark Travers