Well, thank God #11: Paint It Black edition
Here's a pretty old post from the blog archives of Geekery Today; it was written about 16 years ago, in 2008, on the World Wide Web.
As part of its ongoing campaign of socio-economic cleansing, the city government of Las Vegas has taken a bold step against vandalism and graffiti. The problem with graffiti, you’ll remember, is that no matter how artistic it may be, it defaces somebody’s private property without their permission. So now the city of Las Vegas will force you to paint over the graffiti, without your permission, and fine you $900 and up if you choose to leave it up on your own wall.
Well, thank God, says I. If the city government weren’t sending around a bunch of professional busybodies and armed thugs to make sure that Ted Marshall’s walls stay painted the way he wanted them painted — even if he doesn’t want to pant them that way anymore — well, who would? Not Ted Marshall, that’s for sure. Why, it’d be sheer– well, you know.
See also:
- GT 2008-07-09: Well, thank God #10: Got Milk? edition
- GT 2008-05-14: Well, thank God #9: Income Taxi edition
- GT 2008-01-16: Well, thank God #8: Civil Tongue edition
- GT 2007-09-19: Well, thank God #7: sagging and the new sumptuary laws
- GT 2006-08-31: Well, thank God #6: Raed Jarrar and ostensive definitions
- GT 2006-07-18: Well, thank God #5: the Director’s Guild triumphs over insurgent customers
- GT 2006-06-27: Well, thank God #4: Unauthorized Erections edition
- GT 2006-02-23: Well, thank God #3: National Caffeine Awareness Month
- GT 2005-12-05: Well, thank God #2: We Are The Champions edition
- GT 2005-10-27: Well, thank God: The Bluest Eye edition
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Clearly, the best way to tackle the problem of mugging is to arrest people for being mugged. That way, they will have an incentive to resist muggers!
Failing to hire a private eye to find the culprit and a crew of lackeys to take back your coin purse is a serious dereliction of civic duty! Never mind that you only had a few bucks in it!
I’d like to see more people accepting of graffiti ( :
Clearly, the best way to tackle the problem of mugging is to arrest people for being mugged. That way, they will have an incentive to resist muggers!
Please don’t give these statist wackos any ideas. :(
I wonder what the planning process for this stuff is like. “Hey! Those pesky kids are violating property rights with their art work” “Hey, I have an idea. Let’s force the victimized property owners to spend money taking it off..”
Perceptual concretes give way to any normative conceptual view of inalienable rights once again…
Private property? No no no no.
We can’t have graffiti because it’s ugly, and we all have a right not to have to look at such hideousness.
Ah, you crazy people with your ideas of property.
Robert is right. No one cares about property but the looks.