On Tuesday, December 1st, Terra Linda High School’s walls were found sabotaged with vile language and images, sloppily sprayed on with black paint. One of these walls, as seen in the photo above, had been previously turned into a piece of artwork crafted by a few of our very own students, and is now defaced (literally, they painted on the faces), utterly disrespecting the time and effort these art students put into the mural.

Although I do not wish to glorify them in any way, the messages on the walls consisted of insults towards our security guard, swear words, the word “snitch,” implying the motivation for their idiocracy, students’ names, as well as the classic male genitalia, a final touch to emphasize their immaturity.

Thanks to our quick-thinking administration, interim principal Katy Dunlap made sure to address the issue early, even before students arrived on campus the morning after. The janitors as well as a few teachers grabbed their paint brushes, and within a few hours the walls were good as new. Although we’re lucky to have staff members who are so attentive to our school campus, the perpetrators gave no thought at all to the fact that our janitors have other things to take care of around campus, and do not deserve to have to deal with someone else’s carelessness. By making a statement about a “snitch” or even about the school itself with graffiti, the ones who suffer the most are those who have to clean it up, and I highly doubt that the janitors were the target of this moronic behavior.

Secondly, let’s talk about properly making a statement. I actually love graffiti. I love how people choose to express themselves with art and show their thoughts through a somewhat rebellious form to catch people’s attentions. However, there is a time, a place, and a morally correct way to do it. Most murals in urban areas such as cities, although they technically count as graffiti and vandalism, are there to serve a political purpose. They usually contain a provocative statement, or a valuable message for people to think upon and take away from it. They might even just be art pieces that are pleasing to the eye. These “tags,” or messy blurbs are far from masterpieces. In fact, the closest comparison I can think of is a dog marking his territory, but I’m sure even a dog has more respect when peeing on a hydrant than someone drawing all over a school. Making a visual statement that is not visually appealing, and actually repulsive, might catch the attention of a few peers, but really, the story will be over within a couple days. Truly, no one cares that someone snitched on another student, or if someone disrespected our school. Actions like these don’t prove anything except stupidity and does nothing but ruin other’s days. Vandalizing a school, or especially someone’s artwork, which represents pure thought and emotion dug up from a person’s most vulnerable creative mind, will affect others, and is really not worth the trouble.