Your picture reminds me of Poe's story The Mask of the Red Death. A great tale about how a rich prince entertains his rich friends in his house for many months in order to avoid a plague that has been devastating the land. Poe describes it as follows - it causes "sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores" leading to death within half an hour.

He throws a masked ball creating seven rooms of different colors, the last being black and red. A masked visitor attends, and as a result brings the plague inside as all the guests succumb. The final line of the story reads as follows, "And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all." Perhaps this fabulous Poe tale may be a metaphor for what has become of our humanity and our democracy?