Karen Celestino-Horseman: Tagging is an indicator of the state of our society

We are under a tagging attack. Tagging is the simplest, most common form of graffiti. It involves painting your name on random surfaces. For some reason, it appears to have increased in Indianapolis.

Don’t get me wrong—I love graffiti art, and I even appreciate very creative taggers. What I do not appreciate are those who simply scrawl a tag with what appears to be little thought or effort.

And what makes the current tagging offensive is that tags are now appearing on actual murals and historic buildings. To not like the mural or building is one thing—you are entitled to your opinion. But to deface and damage the work of an artist is elevating the offensiveness of tagging to a whole other level.

Colorful and stylized tagging is intended to get fame and notoriety. These types of tags become works of street art. Simply writing your tag with a can of spray paint is nothing more than a pathetic attempt to get attention—any kind of attention. I called these taggers “not artist taggers,” or NATs. And like gnats, their similarly named counterpart, they are waved away as soon as their tag is painted over.

But there is another reason NATs tag. People also tag as a means of letting the world know, “I exist.” When you live in a city of many people and you have no particular accomplishments, whether those be small (like those most of us enjoy) or big, you simply feel you are being swept away, unnoticed, spinning in a current over which you have no control, so you reach out and grab anything that can help stop that feeling, even if it is nothing more than a can of paint.

Most taggers are young people, which is why I believe we should be paying attention to increased tagging. We need to know what is happening—or not happening—in their lives. Tagging by NATs is not simply a crime, it is an indicator of the state of our society. We need to be asking why “not artist” tagging has increased.

Studies have shown that teenage taggers justify their actions by claiming no one was hurt. This rationalization fails to consider that the property owner might be on a limited income, or the property owner might be an absentee landlord who no longer cares for the property—in which case, the tagging remains an eyesore to the neighborhood.

For some NATs, to add excitement to the tagging, they seek to tag locations that are readily visible but not easily accessible, potentially placing themselves and others in danger. We need to let them know this is a crime with a cost.

Tagging by NATs also impacts an area by creating impressions of criminality and lack of safety—lowering an area’s reputation, regardless of whether there is actual crime. Tagging reminds people that, if a person can come in under cover of night and spray paint illegally, the night can also provide cover for other criminal activities.

While graffiti art can enhance an area, particularly if it is not done over the work of other artists, simply scrawling a name with a can of paint without thought or planning is the equivalent of a small child jumping up and down, crying out, “Look at me, look at me.” Well, we see you, so knock it off!

Thanks for letting me vent.•

__________

Celestino-Horseman is an Indianapolis attorney. Send comments to ibjedit@ibj.com.

Click here for more Forefront columns.