Is Graffiti Vandalism?

Graffiti is in fact vandalism because it diminishes the well being of neighborhoods. Graffiti has many bad side affects when people spray graffiti all over cities. Graffiti comes in many froms from small tagging to big images, I have nothing agaisnt people who spray grafftit and create art but they need to do it in an allowed area not trespassing because this costs lots of money and many people see graffiti as if it was gang related.

Many areas in cities where you see graffiti are in the neighborhoods where it is potrayed as the rough side of the city. Especially when the graffiti in these areas studies show can lead to the crime rate increasing. This already should be a reason to ban graffiti in public areas without a pass or access to the walls where they are painting. When it’s proven that crime rate is high in these areas and you can see gang signs sprayed onto the walls it should be a reason to not allow graffiti and shows how this vandalism should be punsihed to stop the spread of gangs marking territory and creating conflicts.

Another reason that graffiti is vandalism is that graffiti cost big money to towns people and tax payers to clean it up. There has not been an actual record on how much clean ups have costed the U.S. but it is safe to say over a billion dollars have been spent on cleaning up graffiti. Not only this but for bigger cities such as chicago they can spend up to 6.5 million per year cleaning it up. This hurts the hard working familys when tax rates go up because cities are tired of cleaning up all the graffiti, for this reason it shows it is vandalism because of how much money they cost and most graffiti artist tend to steal supplies and spray paint which also adds to the expensive toll they take on the city.

Graffiti can cause loss of financial gains for businesses because the affect it does on the outside eye. Graffiti also hurts business in the area of the graffiti, such as if im a real estate agent and im trying to sell property in an area where graffitis is all over the place the value of my property now is decreasing because that graffiti is not appealing to the eye. Also it could suggest high crime rates in that area which doesn not help a business trying to sell property. then there is the fact that taxes could be higher in these areas for the town to get a way to clean up after all the paintings.

For these reasons graffiti is vandalism and should be punishable with payment fines to those who are caught in the act of creating art. First because many of them are trespassing and graffiti hurts the city and the other people living in it. This should be a reason to help crack down and stop the unlawful ways people are creating graffiti because it is vandalism to the cities.

“graffiti” by Lieutenant Pol is licensed under CC BY 2.0