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Last weekend, a school board in Virginia gathered together in their secret lair for a five-alarm emergency meeting … about a high school girl’s art project. Some members thought it was highly offensive and disrespectful and wanted it burned in a pyre or, barring that, removed from the school premises.
Was it porn? Was it something encouraging children to shoot up either heroin or their school? It was not.
The work in question was created as part of a Defiance High art class assignment on trauma. Abby Driscoll, 17, painted several pieces, but it was just one that caused all the drama: a painting titled “But Not Enough to Save You,” about the religious trauma she experienced as a lesbian, being told that she couldn’t be “saved” because of the way she was born.
The painting itself is pretty freaking awesome. It depicts praying hands holding a rosary over a patchwork of pages from the Bible, dripping with rainbow “blood,” with the words “GOD LOVES YOU BUT NOT ENOUGH TO SAVE YOU” emblazoned across. (You can buy a print here if you like!)
“The whole thing is about showing light through the darkness of trauma,” Driscoll told The News Leader last weekend. “That piece in particular was about religious trauma and trauma faced from not being accepted in a quote-unquote loving community. I wanted to really portray that. I know the message is a little strong and in your face, but the kind of shock factor is what I wanted to get out of it.”
But once word spread on Facebook about the painting, people were offended, including the aforementioned school board members.
Via News Leader:
It all began Friday, shortly after Driscoll finished putting up the work for display, she started getting texts that her work was being posted on social media in part of Augusta County, and not in a favorable away. Someone had seen it in the lobby, was offended and started spreading the work on social media. More people were then critical of the work, including at least two school board members.
A day later, on a Saturday night, the Augusta County School Board was meeting to talk about Driscoll’s work and whether or not it should be allowed to remain in the show. The News Leader first found out about the issue when Tim Simmons, who represents the Pastures District, posted on his Facebook page that people had reached out to him about the art and the school board was going into a closed meeting Saturday night to discuss.
In a text response to The News Leader Saturday, Simmons said he would happily send a link to the art but he hadn’t included details on his page because, “I personally find it offensive.”
Someone saw it in the lobby and was offended. Tim Simmons personally found it offensive.
You know, when I am offended by something, I generally have no problem explaining why I am offended. It’s kind of weird, I think, to say you are offended, to be offended enough to post about it on Facebook, to hold a whole emergency meeting about it (without, by the way, even letting the girl’s parents know) without actually explaining what it is that offends you about it.
But I think I know why.
They can’t say “We’re offended because of course Christians would never do any such thing! And if they did, we would disagree with it!” because that’s not true. In fact, it’s not the kind of thing that would offend anyone who would disagree with it. Surely, any Christian who wouldn’t agree with it would also be aware of the fact that there are a whole lot of people out there like that, and would believe they were deserving of criticism.
What they’re upset about is that they believe they should be able to say things like this to people and believe things like this without ever being directly confronted with the damage they do.
But there is a bright side to all of this — the bad guys actually lost this time. Abby Driscoll’s painting will stay up after all. It will be there in the school hallway, and perhaps it will remind some people that there are consequences to treating people poorly, even if God is the one who told you to do it.
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