“All right, it goes like this,” said Dana S. Owens, creator of smallbanytoons.com, a website dedicated to satirizing all things Albany. “Two weeks ago, Chip [Fasciana] says to me that he has a great idea for a T-shirt and that it might do well, but that it’s also a good idea because it represents something that a lot of people recognize and a phrase that a lot of people have used for years.”
Clearly agitated, Owens paced around the small workspace at the Machine on Lark Street (a local creative cooperative of which he is a member) as he tried to explain how a design that he and Fasciana, another local artist, conceived just last week has become a hugely divisive local issue since a picture of Fasciana was posted on Owens’ Smallbany Facebook page. People have been de-friended over the social debate that the image inspired.
Fasciana and The Shirt
Both artists seem mildly bewildered by the amount of passionate attention, both negative and positive, their design has received during the last week and a half, but they also take a certain amount of pride in the fact that they’ve brought some important questions to the forefront of local awareness—First Amendment rights versus sensitivity to existing social issues and the actions of large corporations, as well as the parameters of their responsibility to consumers.
If you haven’t guessed yet, we were talking about The Great “Ghetto Chopper” Debate of 2014.
The image in question was, in fact, Photoshopped. The two artists, who frankly admit that they were initially more interested in supplementing their own bank accounts than in making a social statement, simply wanted to see how much interest (and income) their satirical logo would generate. Owens took a picture of Fasciana in a blank gray T-shirt and digitally added the image that would eventually get them a “cease and desist” notice from the Golub Corporation as well as personal insults and physical threats from many of those who took offense to the image of a gun they used in place of the more recognizable hatchet.
“This was not a fun week,” said Fasciana. “I’ve really been paranoid and looking over my shoulder. I mean, I’m the white, hipster racist on the cover of the Times Union blog. It doesn’t feel good.”
“This wasn’t a stunt,” he continued. “We legitimately just wanted to make some shirts we could make a couple of bucks on. We weren’t naïve to the fact that we might piss somebody off, but we really didn’t think that it would be like this.”
“Chip and I are sensitive artists,” added Owens. “We were freaking out all week. Even though the majority of people seemed to be taking our side, I still felt like public enemy number one.”
The primary objection to the logo has been regarding the use of the gun image alongside the term “ghetto.” Negative public reaction was almost immediately reinforced and amplified by Times Union blogger (and ex-Channel 6 newsman) Ken Screven, who posted an invective on his page on Nov. 13, along with the Photoshopped image of Fasciana, where he essentially denounced the image and use of the “ghetto chopper” term as racism, or “suburban chauvinism.” Admitting that he did not know the artists, Screven presumed the “public project . . . to be the source of ‘uptown Albany.’ ” (In fact, Fasciana lives in Center Square while Owens lives in Arbor Hill and is a brown-skinned young man—the product of a biracial marriage who has been the victim of racism himself.)
Linking to the merchandise site that Owens and Fasciana chose to produce any orders that they might receive, Screven also seemed appalled at the amount of merchandise that is offered by cafepress.com.
“This shirt is obviously satire,” said one commenter on Screven’s blog. “You don’t have to get it, or even like it. But don’t jump to racist conclusions just because you find some of its characterizations objectionable.”
According to another commenter, “Those that refuse to recognize that the word “ghetto” may be offensive to a black man who grew up in the sixties and seventies are either uninformed or foolish. . . . I would hope that the creators of the shirt would continue to use their talents in a more positive manner to make our society a better one.”
Screven, in response to several comments, seemed to insist that one must hold a minority status to even be able to recognize racism.
On Facebook, Hyacinth Miles, an African-American Albanian, weighed in on Fasciana’s page: “I thought it was brilliant and found more racism in some of the bleeding heart liberal white guilt responses than the shirt itself. After all, I saw considerably more white post-grads using chapter 6 of their sociology books to interpret for me how I should be responding to it than I saw diasporic Africans taking offense. . . . I think the fact that a simple logo could spark this much conversation is probably the height of what art is.”
Tom Templeton, a freelance arts writer for the Times Union, took a more cautious view: “I’m all for artistic expression, I just don’t understand the gun—how many shootings have there been in Price Chopper? Have any shootings in the surrounding area been related to Price Chopper? Just seems like deliberate hyperbole.”
Other comments included insults aimed directly at the artists themselves, some which simply questioned the creativity of the design and many others enthusiastically asking where they could purchase merchandise with the logo.
“When we were trying to come up with an image to go along with ‘ghetto chopper,’ said Owens, “the gun just seemed to make sense. I mean, the fact is that gun violence is associated with the ghetto, not necessarily with any particular race. And an image of a rotting potato probably wouldn’t have had the same effect.”
Both Owens and Fasciana insist that the term ‘ghetto chopper’ is so ubiquitous and ingrained in local culture that they can hardly be charged with using it as a means to denigrate the neighborhood in which the store resides or even those who shop there. “It’s just something everyone recognizes,” said Fasciana. “And it’s called ‘ghetto’ because of the condition of the store itself. I honestly thought that if anything resulted from this, it might be that we would get a little bit of a nicer store in our neighborhood. One that we deserve.”
Many believe that urban Price Chopper stores are recipients of lower-grade meats and produce as well as negligible upkeep and lower standards than other stores deemed to have more affluent shoppers. In the past, the company has considered shutting down the store on Delaware due to lower revenues caused by a higher volume of WIC and food stamp shoppers; the corporation allegedly has cited higher rates of store theft as a reason for withholding higher-end goods from certain locations.
Mona Golub, Price Chopper’s vice president of public relations and consumer services, told Metroland via e-mail that as, “an active and involved community partner in the City of Albany, we resent the implication that our company endorses or condones violence. . . . We remain the only supermarket chain committed to providing the residents of this neighborhood with a local full-service grocery store.”
By an almost perfect stroke of coincidence, not long after the image of Fasciana went viral, Price Chopper announced its intention to rebrand its stores under the new name Market 32. The $3 million endeavor seems to be the product of market research conducted in the “Market Bistro” store opened in Latham earlier this year. Further, Golub Corp. CEO Jerry Golub took to Facebook at the end of last week to answer questions about the rebranding process and stated that Price Chopper would “also be updating our smaller and urban stores. The first will be our Delaware and Madison Avenue stores beginning early next year although they won’t be getting the complete Market 32 identity right away.”
Owens and Fasciana like to think that maybe they had some small hand in opening a dialogue that led to Price Chopper’s decision to invest in its urban stores, although Golub claims that they announced the Delaware and Madison Ave. remodels in the Times Union back on October 18. (A quick Google search did not turn up the announcement.) Meanwhile however, the corporation has served the artists with a ‘cease and desist” order, claiming that their logo constitutes trademark infringement of the Price Chopper brand. According to Golub, they also asked that any proceeds earned thus far be donated to a local anti-violence organization.
Fasciana and Owens say they’ve made no money and produced no physical merchandise.
“Freedom of opinion and freedom of speech and freedom to capitalize on that is a big part of what made this country what it is today,” said Owens. “You look at cases like South Park and Family Guy, those are the two most offensive shows I can think of that are on TV, and they’re generating millions of dollars of revenue based on their parody.”
“And creating social awareness simultaneously,” added Fasciana.
“And that’s essentially what we were trying to do,” said Owens. “And it pissed off a lot of people.”
