How can you be a man to your family when you are poor and black? Killer of Sheep asks this question again and again, and the tension between masculinity, blackness and poverty is central to the film. The film appears to provide Stan with several choices, all directly related to his masculinity. He can accept the white woman's advances, which offer him both a way out of a miserable slaughterhouse job and a boost to his "manhood" in the form of a date with a woman of higher status. This is immediately unpleasant to him, a fact that is emphasized by the uncomfortable closeness of her hand massaging his wrist and followed by her smirk. Although he promises to think about her “hot proposal,” the film never explores this possibility again. Alternatively, he can purchase the motor, which serves as both an assertion of masculinity and, as his friend notes, a signifier of class. Although he chooses to try it, the whole plan is unfortunate; the scene where he picks up the engine contains some of the most unbalanced sequences in the entire film, and the extreme and off-putting diagonal of the road effectively communicates that his only ways out of his job as a sheep butcher are through infidelity or being complicit in murder. Whether it's the sheep, his wife, or the white man, he doesn't have the option of not hurting anyone. The scene takes place on the porch, in such a way that both the walls and the two men close it in the frame. Once again, the slight low angle and camera movement add a slightly sinister feel to the scene. But the entrance of the wife on the scene, hidden behind the mosquito net, completely surrounded by darkness, seems heavy, and when she opens the door and hovers above him, placed even above the other two men, she catches him again. Her decision not to assist them in the murder appears to have been made final, or at least clearer, by her