[ldjb]

The impact isn't merely aesthetic.

For one thing, it can be costly to remove graffiti. And when it's on publicly owned property, who pays for that removal? The public, of course.

If, for example, a train is the target of graffiti, it will often need to be taken out of service. This, then, results in a degraded service to the travelling public.

Furthermore, graffiti artists often put themselves in dangerous situations. Numerous people have been seriously injured or killed when doing graffiti. That not only sucks for them, but also has various knock-on effects.

Some graffiti art can look really nice, whereas others have little artistic value. Regardless, the negative impacts of graffiti should not be overlooked.

[thuuuomas]

> The impact isn't merely aesthetic. For one thing, it can be costly to remove graffiti.

The cost incurred here is a choice the owner makes when they disagree with the aesthetics of the graffiti.

[ldjb]

We're talking about public property here. Many authorities have a 'no tolerance' approach to graffiti. Even if it looks nice, it will be removed. There is a belief that removing graffiti quickly discourages it. If graffiti artists find that their work won't last long, they may be discouraged from doing it in the first place. Aesthetics doesn't really come into it.

[lloeki]

> There is a belief that removing graffiti quickly discourages it. If graffiti artists find that their work won't last long, they may be discouraged from doing it in the first place.

Ephemerality is known, understood, accepted, and even leveraged in art. I don't think this is an efficient deterrent, or even a deterrent at all.

[whilenot-dev]

> There is a belief that removing graffiti quickly discourages it.

It's the other way around, if it isn't quickly removed it will be encouraged: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_windows_theory

[Thorrez]

That's not really the other way around. That's 2 ways of stating basically the same thing.

[whilenot-dev]

I'll have to disagree... the goal is to stop encouragement, rather than to start discouragement - stopping acceleration is not the same as starting deceleration.

[Thorrez]

When it comes to acceleration, it's possible to define 0 acceleration. So we can define acceleration and deceleration in relation to that 0 acceleration.

What is 0 encouragement/discouragement? It's not obviously easy to define. One definition is doing nothing = 0 encouragement and 0 discouragement. By that definition, not removing graffiti (aka doing nothing) is not encouragement, it's simply doing nothing: a lack of encouragement and a lack of discouragement.

Because we haven't agreed on a definition of 0 encouragement and 0 discouragement, saying "decreasing encouragement" and "increasing discouragement" mean basically the same thing.

[TillE]

I dunno about the entirety of Germany, but I don't think I've ever seen graffiti removed in Berlin, and there's a ton of it. It's fine, nobody cares.

[Symbiote]

Graffiti on trains in Berlin is very quickly removed.

[portaouflop]

Haha thanks for the light chuckle as I wake up

[wiseowise]

Is it fine or public just fed up constantly removing it?

[sircastor]

But that cost is not paid by the person creating the graffiti. The owner has a cost forced on them.

The aesthetic argument here is trying to validate a violent act. A lot of graffiti is beautiful, but that doesn’t mean it’s okay.

[complaintdept]

What violent act?

[tsimionescu]

Modifying someone else's property, or public property, without consent.

[TallTales]

This is a fascinating comment. How would you define violence?

[usrusr]

If I smash your car, is that violence or not? What if I take care to smash your car only so much that it will still be able carry you to work and back?

[helboi4]

They definitely have a very hyper-capitalist definition of violence. It's sort of pathetic how much people somehow care about the property of the ruling classes that they will never own.

[fragmede]

not op but violence is traditionally defined as physical force to cause harm. but now there's financial violence and social media violence and here the message in the graffiti causes harm. eg die techy scum. it's not physically violent, but some think it's helpful to frame it as a non-physical violent act because of the expression of dislike for a particular community. it doesn't cause any grave harm, but everyone who walks by and sees it is affected by it.

[tpm]

No, the owner or rather operator (if the carriage is publicly owned) might be legally obliged to remove it just for the carriage identification to be clearly visible, the windows to be clean etc.

[subjectsigma]

This has got to be the most insane comment in this thread.

“Hey, I’m going to hold a gun to your head. If you don’t give me $100 I’ll shoot you. Remember though that the cost incurred here is a choice you’re going to make if you disagree with my actions. I can’t truly force you to do anything…”

[wiseowise]

Nice.

I'm going to spray a can of paint on your car and explain to judge that "it's thuuuomas's problem now, since he disagrees with aesthetics of his new car color".

[matrix_overload]

Why does this comment read like it's written by AI?

[ben_w]

Possibly because AI was trained on humans.

The "furthermore" and the "Regardless, the negative impacts of graffiti should not be overlooked" do feel a bit AI-esq these days, but it was only yesterday that I myself felt like I was writing like an LLM by responding to a "you misunderstood, I meant …" with an "ah, now I understand": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40380692

[saagarjha]

Because the only other group of people who use transitions so often are third graders making sentences from templates.

[walterbell]

Observations affect the observer?

[nextaccountic]

Why remove it?

[stormking]

Because 99.99% of it is shit and the rest is barely above shit.