See "What's really needed in the graffiti war"

My comment:

"These owners . . ."

I think you all are talking about the quantity and quality of gnats.

You need to separate semi-artists from opportunistic vandals.

The vandal would find a bic lighter just as useful at creating mayhem.

Is there a sense of impossibility of even trying to picture oneself as becoming a member of the community with something, anything, at risk from "vandals?"

Given the tag team of franchise-style corporate ownership of all things "corporate" by pensions and insurance companies (making monopoly power, and unearned extractions, the norm rather than the exception) combined with authoritarianism from their partners in government I picture the number of dissolutioned youths only increasing.

The resort to increasingly militarized solutions over that of equal opportunity to be in business for oneself is just as much folly here as in any other part of the world.

You can circle the wagons to separate the civilized folks from the savages for only a short time until reinforcements come. But when only the savages grow in number what then are you going to do? Recycle your wagons into building materials for a cleaner, but immobile, wall? It looks like the target is a broad as that of the side of a barn . . . from the perspective of the savage.

"The city" is not some discrete entity, in an us versus them, view of the world. I am not a savage just because I reside outside the circle. And, my pain would be no less if -- gracious me -- someone inside the circle were to embrace me and let me in . . . then hand me a BlueOregon gun to turn on the savages.

If I were to offer words learned from genuine study of International Economic Development (not superior local social networking skills) I would be viewed from within the circle as a Graffiti Artist or worse, a vandal or demon.

Are the vandals poor folks who have given up or do they tend to instead come from otherwise "good" families but are toying with notions of Anarchism and such? The truly poor would not dare risk their meager thread bare grip on financial security for some fleeting emotional gain, perceived retribution.

Randy, it is you who are the savage inside your closing circle. Think like a Nobel, and build yourself a moat from conscripted labor.