Graffiti: Art or Crime?

By Carmen (Age 13, St. Paul Convent)

Graffiti art is more and more popular now. People think that graffiti art can help them to express their own feelings by writing words on the wall or even drawing characters. I think people who draw graffiti art are mainly teenagers, gangsters, or artists. However, in Hong Kong, graffiti art gives people a bad impression because this is illegal in Hong Kong. Therefore, I am not in support of graffiti art because I think it gives Hong Kong a bad image.

First, I think that it is not a form of protected speech because there may be lots of offensive words. If children see it, they may learn from it which gives them a bad influence. They might also learn from the people's drawings and they may start drawing pictures on the wall or at school, which may hurt the school and home environment. Second, it is uncontrolled. I have seen there is more and more graffiti art nowadays on the streets and old apartments. It seems to be good for the environment as graffiti art is on walls and not on paper, but actually it is very distracting for people who see this art. In my own opinion, I think it is quite selfish for the people who draw out their feelings but don't consider other peoples' feelings.

I think that graffiti art should be banned because it is not only giving bad education to the children, but it may also give a bad image to the tourists from other countries. Hong Kong is giving a good impression to people that it is a well-disciplined city. However, if this graffiti art appears more and more on every street, I think this kind of art may ruin Hong Kong's good name. Therefore, graffiti art should be banned. Also, there should be a punishment. We should give them a penalty like a fine, or in a more serious case, they might need to go to jail. I think this should be a good way to warn people.

Therefore, I think graffiti art should be done in a proper way without bad words. They may do this in a more healthy way like just using safe words with beautiful cartoon pictures. But, I think it is still important to let people know that they should not damage the environment by using some advertisements to let them be noticed. If people get warned and they do it in a proper way, I think we will get out city's good image back.