Graffiti often artistic, but shouldn’t be used to vandalize property

I have noticed around the outskirts of Tucson a growing amount of newly-added graffiti, near Sixth Street, on building walls and sidewalks. I first noticed this a few weeks ago when I was walking to my friend’s house off Park Street.

There was a spray-painted face of our newly elected President Barack Obama. Most of the graffiti I had seen up to this point seemed gang-affiliated, but this was different. It made me think about the difference between graffiti as a criminal act or an expression of art. When I see graffiti on the streets, I can accept its potential and value as an artist’s expression, but I do question why graffiti artists have to put our president’s face along our sidewalks.

Is there no better canvas for these artists than to deface public buildings? I think the art of graffiti can be beautiful and tell a powerful message that should be freely expressed, but in a manner that does not promote criminal acts, mark gang territories or destroy private and public property.

Linnea Olofsson

undeclared freshman

Wildcat should focus on quiet heroism of ordinary students

You know, it’s disappointing to read this paper every day and see the strip tease ads, see the articles on convicted criminals who killed UA students, other articles on how we spent over a million dollars on frivolous concerts (when the $1,000,000 could have been put right into scholarships to begin with) and see people jump up and down, whether happy or angry, that the UA is ranked number five in partying.

There’s no respect for the student who puts forth an effort to just get through school. Even I do it; if someone is in bed before 11:30, or is at home on Friday and Saturday nights hanging out with their family or doing homework or resting from projects my friends and I ask them what kind of college student they are.

Why can’t we spend some time and admire the strength, determination, patience and skill of the everyday student who is just trying to get better at something he or she loves and doesn’t bother with frivolities of the everyday nonsense that defines college life?

Elizabeth Turney

history freshman

UA police should spend time preventing real crimes, not harassing dorm residents

I am writing to express my outrage regarding the incident with University of Arizona Police Department and the two dorm residents who bravely invoked their Constitutional right of protection against unreasonable searches and seizures on April 28. I was only briefly reminded of Rosa Parks upon reading of their ordeal- my real issue with the way UAPD acted was that in choosing to spend their time playing Toucan Sam, smelling around in a dorm, they were not present elsewhere on campus, where real crimes can and certainly do occur.

Actually, that night of the search, I was in the UA Main Library and found three men pleasuring themselves in separate locations between 9 p.m. and 1 a.m. What I was doing scouring the library for this type of activity is nobody’s business but my own, but my point is that UAPD needs to reevaluate its priorities. If they find that their time is truly best spent making grown men cry over phantom odors, then perhaps their ranks are a little too thick – after all, it is my understanding that the UA is seeking out ways to reduce its overall budget.

Ming Lee

entomology masters student

Tax system has little in common with GPA system

In response to Katie Pavlich’s letter on Wednesday (“”Conservative writer unveils ideas for fixing higher education””): I would just like to point out that your analogy fails miserably on two accounts. Firstly, it is internally inconsistent. If “”Those below a 3.0 will not be deducted points,”” how could all students “”end up on the same C level””? Putting aside for a second the fact that a 3.0 is actually a B, this still doesn’t add up because under your scenario anybody below a 2.5 would not be boosted up to a 3.0 anyway.

Worse still is that you think your scenario is in any way similar to the U.S. tax system. One huge difference is that the income scale goes from $0 to billions of dollars with no maximum while the GPA scale goes only from 0.0 to 4.0.

More important, however, is that under any tax system, people who have a larger net income end up taking in more money after taxes, whereas your proposed analogy leaves everyone above 2.5 at a 3.0. I can see the connection if you were trying to talk about communism, but even then your analogy and your argument are both fail-tastic.

Rob Dawson

engineering physics junior