Response to Graffiti Lives

When I first began reading this book I quickly became curious as to how the dictionary defined graffiti. The definition I found was pretty much what I expect, basically, markings/writings/drawings on surfaces in public places. A quick lookup of “graffiti” on dictionary.com yielded this definition and also showed that the society’s general view of graffiti is much like what Snyder describes in the book, something troublesome that is meant to gain public attention. For example, the sentence used in the dictionary definition to demonstrate the meaning of “graffiti” was “These graffiti are evidence of the neighborhood’s decline.” This ties in with the “broken windows” theory that Snyder describes in the introduction of this book and, I think, reflects societies apparent belief in this theory.

In his introduction, Snyder describes the role of race in the graffiti world. I thought he assumed too much about the race of participants in graffiti art and their interaction with the law and the police. Snyder was quick to infer that white participants in graffiti art had less to lose than the black participants. While this may very well be true, he failed to cite specific examples and only relied on the premise that cops are likely to be racist against “black and brown” individuals, particularly males, and therefore, harsher and more violent towards them.

In the section “Crime Space vs. Cool Space,” Snyder’s argument against the “broken windows” theory does not convincingly prove its falsehood. While he does prove that less crime exists in the neighborhood with more graffiti, this doesn’t prove that the “broken windows” theory which (stated in Snyder’s words) is that “petty crime increases the propensity for more serious criminal activity.” The hole in his argument is that, while the graffiti may be located in one area, it is not necessarily created by someone that lives in that area. In fact, the person that creates graffiti in SoHo could live in Prospect Heights where the rate of crime in most of the categories he specified was higher than in SoHo.

Again in his section about VERT where he discusses the role of “beef” in the graffiti world, he goes against his earlier argument against the “broken windows” theory. He begins by talking about how “beef” is the aspect of his research of which he is most fearful. He then goes on to say that “Graffiti is violent and competitive” and “lots of graffiti writers like to fight.” He also says that if graffiti writers are unwilling to fight, they will have a short career in the art of graffiti. These statements clearly prove that graffiti can lead to and is often times intertwined with larger criminal activities such as assault and other violent crimes. It is clear throughout the entire book that Mr. Snyder brings a political agenda to his writing. While this made me more interested in the book, I was disappointed in his lack of evidence for most of his arguments.

Throughout the book, I was extremely impressed with the talent and ability behind the graffiti shown in the pictures. It is clear that those that are major players in the graffiti culture are individuals with significant gifts in the field of art. Additionally, I was realized that I was previously unaware of the importance of the artists’ names or nicknames in the culture and in the graffiti itself. This reminded me of a type of “branding” that you would see in corporate and political advertising with consistent repetition of the names in support of a message or idea.