I'm supposed to write an Op-Ed for The Quest about why we need graffiti at Reed, in response to the administration's daily erasure of bathroom art.
I had so many things to say when I first started, but now... and let me make this clear: it's not the well that has run dry, it's that someone, specifically everyone who kept making art on the walls, has muddied the water. So what can I write?
Can I say that we need to express ourselves? Do we need to write "I thought I would be happy here" for everyone to see? Did we need to hear "you will be" did we need to hear "you are" did we need to hear "I thought so too?" Did that heal us?
Colors, spread by hands; handprints, spread by colors. They must have been tall, or jumped, or climbed, because the hand prints are on the walls and ceilings and tiles and doors. If the graffiti-ist didn't get at the very least a little bit of catharsis out of that fucking mess then I don't know how they could ever get it.
Someone said "It's really intense" someone said "I like yours better, not that it matters" someone said "it's kind of frightening." And before I saw it I wondered if writing "murder" on the walls was disrespectful to someone who might be triggered by the word. But then, I wouldn't be triggered by "suicide" but I would be triggered by bright blue tarps, or any disembodied body parts with blue anywhere near them. So, that's probably silly.
The bathroom is messier than it was. Less aesthetically pleasing. Someone called it "solipsistic," so I googled the word. I decided I didn't have a problem with that. And look: a conversation. A conversation between A, B, C, D. A: one frustrated with censorship, B: one frustrated with self-importance and idle struggles, C: silly little voyeuristic reactionary, D: the internet, and by extension our language and culture. That's progress, at least for me. I grew from that, me being C.
I'm rhyming, you can tell this is fucking with me.
Because people keep writing about the need to have more sex, this stuff is clearly representative of our student body. But it's not. The audience certainly is, everybody poops as we learned early on. So how does it balance out, that everyone sees what a few people overwhelmed by their feelings need to tell the world? And interesting, isn't it, that most of the comments to the extreme dissatisfaction are moderate. They're calming. Someone's flexing their Helper role. Few people say "fuck, yeah, me too, everything sucks for me too." They say "I thought that too, and now I think otherwise and I think you'll be like me someday."
From writing that last paragraph, I have come to two conclusions. 1: Solidarity is a huge part of it. And a part of the solidarity comes from the fact that it is being erased every night. Maybe I like this better, having it gone and forcing it to keep growing. Then again, it grew when there was no impetus, and maybe everything meant a little more back then. 2: The fact that I can generalize, and invent conversation and potential reactions means that we are connecting beyond absorbing other people's sentiments. The connection is affecting my thoughts, and my ideas about our student body. This is serious. I've seen graffiti that says "don't come here" and that hurts us. "I'm sad" doesn't hurt us because we know that it's a part of us. "Don't come here" hurts us because it takes away from the potential us.
But I cannot censor graffiti as harmful. I can respond to it. I could write "If I had not come here, I would not be the person that I am and that would be a tragedy." And the only true balance is an oscillation between good and bad. And constant erasure does that for us. So where does that put the idea, and the cause?
Well, I'll keep trying to narrow down how I feel. I also love the ambiguity of the title I didn't even really think about. It's so true.
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