Vandalism or Art?

As defined by webster's dicitonary graffiti is the unlawful destruction of property by means of defacing with paint or any other substance which can leave a mark. But this is just what society wants us to believe. In my opinion graffiti is one of the greatest art form to ever exist in the history of humanity. It started as simply writing a simple nickname of a few short letters and the area you were from. But like all things in life it continued to grown and evolve. Soon teens with great artistic talent began adding charcaters and backgrounds to these simple nicknames tagged on street walls. Despite police forces attempting to stop them in their tracks it was of no use. These street artist began spray painting whole subway cars from top to bottom not only expressing their artist vision but also expressing political and social views. Society and politians have thought us to look down on graffiti and to think that it harms us but a lot of the people doing it are actually just making things even more beauitful and making their surrounding colorful instead of plain and bland. When asked why they do it many simply say because the art runs through their veins. In today's day and age graffiti has gone from simple letters and numbers on street walls and subway cars to artist murals spanning store fronts, billboards and even into commercial america on things such as t-shirts to packaging for items. So before you stop to judge teens for tagging on the wall of a back alley think that are simply expressing them selfs in a artistic manner.