Graffiti: Art Or Vandalism Essay

DEMOGRAPHICS Demographical breakup of the vandals that are tinting Los Angeles city buildings and freeway structures will allow a more detailed and clear analysis of the motivational factors behind their acts. This will allow better strategy making and provide a clear understanding of the ways to create awareness among these groups that vandalism is a crime and that they should not be engaged in such activities. The different demographical factors on which research was done are as follows: Age Group Under 15 4% 15-19 46% 20-25 38% 25-35 9% Over 35 3% The pie chart displays the information contained in the table above left. It can be seen very clearly that the general age group to which most of the vandals belong to is the 15-25 age group (combining the two most populated age groups: 15-19 and 20-25). The 25-35 age group accounts for 9% of the vandals in Los Angeles. There are negligible number of vandals in the under 15 and the over35 age groups. This finding strongly suggests the fact that there are a large number of high schools and university students (predominantly undergraduate students) involved in these acts of vandalism. The fun and pressure part is probably the main influence in the 15-25 age groups. Youngsters in this age group are also likely to be influenced by peer pressure and local groups of mischief-creators. The under 15 age group contributes 4% to the total vandal population of Los Angeles. When further research was carried out, it was found out that this group consists mainly of the poor children thriving around in slums or on roadsides. It was found that these children were paid to carry out these activities of graffiti spraying. Thus, money was the most important factor in motivating the people in this age group to continue vandalism. It should be noted that there is a relatively small percentage of vandals in the 25-35 age group which predominantly suggests that this age group is composed of the professional vandals. Read more:  Essay About Vandalism These professional vandals may be groups of people who may be involved in street crimes and mischief. It is possible that these people may not be enrolled in any schooling or university program. Similarly, for the over 35 age group comprising of 3% of the total vandals, it can be estimated that most of these people are either mentally ill or belong to mischief groups. (California Vandalism Charges) The age is an important demographical characteristic of the vandals since it will influence the marketing strategies greatly. However, the occupation of the vandals is also an important factor due to the fact that two different people belonging to the same age group may have to be appealed to differently depending upon their occupation. Our next research will provide a detail into the occupation of the vandals researched above.   Occupation Occupation Students 44% Labor Industry 7% Professional Workers 1% Federal Servants 1% Unemployed 37% Others/Undisclosed 10% (California Vandalism Charges) As suggested by previous demographical finding, the occupational breakup of the vandals also conforms to the fact that there are a majority of students and unemployed people involved in these mischievous acts. This gives a strong support to the fact that the strategies that will be used to combat these activities should be directed mainly towards high school and undergraduate students and people belonging to the 15-25 age groups without any records of enrolment in any school, college or university. This is due to the fact that there is a very negligible presence of professionals or federal servants in these activities. Furthermore, the 10% vandals with undisclosed occupations look like mainly the poor and the underprivileged people. These people have no occupation and therefore they thrive either on charity or by doing acts such as these in return for money. The next characteristic, income group, will further testify to the above findings. Income Group Weekly Income $0-$100 66% $101-$250 23% $251-$400 1% $400-$800 1% >$800 0% Others/Undisclosed 9% The suggestion in the previous findings that a large portion of the vandals are either students with only pocket money as their source of income, or they are the poor people thriving on charity, is supported strongly by the income breakup table. There is a strong indication of the fact that the people involved in these activities are poor people motivated by the monetary rewards for committing these acts of graffiti spraying and there are other students and mischief makers who either do it for the â€Å"fun† of doing it or under serious pressure from other mischief-maker groups. The distribution of the vandals with regard to the area they thrive in will complete the picture of the nature of the vandals and will enable us to propose more accurate marketing strategies to curtail the mischievous activities of graffiti spraying. (California Vandalism Charges) Area Area-wise Breakup Downtown 15% East and Northeast 14% Echo Park & Westlake 8% Greater Hollywood 1% Harbor Area 11% Los Feliz & Silver Lake 1% South 23% San Fernando Valley 22% West (The Westside) 2% Wilshire 3% (List of districts and neighborhoods of Los Angeles) The research carried out on the area-wise demographics of the vandals population has led to the same conclusion which was repeatedly being observed in the previous researchers. As the graph displays, the majority of the vandals either belong to those areas which house the largest number of skyscrapers and freeway structures or belong to the most populated and poor areas (signifying the fact that the graffiti sprayers are poor people paid to do the job by other people). Thus, the general picture of a vandal can be sketched to be either a college student or a poor person threatened with the consequences of poverty without any means of survival motivated by monetary gains to do the graffiti spraying. MARKETING STRATEGIES Since the demographical research has led to the conclusion that a great majority of the people involved in these acts of graffiti tagging belong to the 15-25 age group and they would generally be either enrolled in a school, college or university program or would be thriving the streets of Los Angeles, we would like to propose a two-fold marketing strategy. (From Vandal to Artist) The first fold of the strategy would be targeted towards the student population and the college graders for whom graffiti spraying is a matter of fun or it is due to the â€Å"joining the bandwagon† effect. We propose that this category of graffiti sprayers should be treated differently with different marketing strategies since they are quite different from the other category. This group predominantly consists of students of various ages and enrolments: from middle school students to undergraduate students. There is a possibility of there being graduate students as well. But for simplicity, we are considering that the general range of this category is from the middle age students to undergraduate students. The marketing strategy to use with this category is simple yet effective. Organizing concerts and mass awareness programs at campuses are perhaps one of the most effective ways in tackling out the problems in this category of graffiti sprayers. Since the motivation factor behind their activities is majorly fun and the â€Å"bandwagon† effect and there is no real purpose behind their activities, we believe that if they are provided alternative platforms to display their creativity and ability to mix and match colors, they will not resort to vandalism on Los Angeles buildings. It is probably the lack of outpouring opportunities that has fuelled their activities to such a great height. Using mass advertising campaigns within the campus will be an effective advertising strategy that will pay off in the long-run. Since, it is the campus where students spend most of their time away from home, constant exposure to banners and billboards condemning vandalism and regarding it as a heinous crime will instill in the graffiti sprayers a degree of shame and deter them from committing the same activities the next time. (Graffiti Removal) Since we cannot be sure as to the number of schools and colleges in which students involved in vandalism are spread a good marketing strategy would be to advertise on books, stationary and all those items that are connected with high school and college students. Advertising may not cost a lot if done intelligently: placing billboards and banners at the entrances of coffee shops and locations where lots of students gather may be an effective way to communicate the message that â€Å"vandalism is a crimeâ€Å". Furthermore, it can be ensured that college principals and influential teachers in schools and colleges reinforce this message in their discussions repeatedly. It will serve as a deterrent for students to remain involved in graffiti spraying and in the long-run will turn students involved in graffiti spraying into critics of vandalism themselves. Competitions can be arranged to invite students in graffiti contests where they can compete against each other in graffiti painting and color matching. (From Vandal to Artist) This will be an opportunity for students involved in graffiti spraying to put their energy into these competitions so that their attention can be diverted to more productive work. It is no doubt that a student having graffiti skills will show up when such competitions will be organized. Offering prizes for outstanding paintings and graffiti work will give a boost to their morals and a promise of repeated contests in the years to come will make them eager to practice their graffiti skills personally and productively rather than on the walls of Los Angeles buildings. For the next set of graffiti sprayers – the poor people paid by others to do the job, since money is their only motivational factor – we propose a different marketing campaign. These people do not have any means of work and so they resort to whatever work they can get in return for money. Thus, their main motivational factor is the money being provided to them by other parties for spraying graffiti. The local city council can gather these people under one roof and organize an awareness campaign which should also provide work and labor opportunities for them. Since, their unemployment and poverty leads them to resort to such activities, ensuring that they are engaged in respectable work will eliminate their tendencies to continue with vandalism and will automatically curb the percentage of people with such demographics involved in graffiti spraying. (Graffiti Removal) It is possible that networking amongst this category of vandals will get the message across more easily and strongly. Thus, we strongly recommend that the Los Angeles council should use word-of-mouth communication to stress upon the immorality of vandalism. They should give rewards to the people who give details about the people involved in vandalism and should take the emotional appeal to marketing as their tool to restrict vandalism in this category. These people can be provided the means to live a respectable life and enjoy a future one can look forward too. Even though the population of such people may be large – since Los Angeles is already a big city with a population of 13 million people – to be supported by the city council on its own, trying is better than not doing anything. On the whole, we believe that these marketing strategies, if implemented hand in hand, will be a greater success than if implemented one after the other. Since these two categories summarize 89% of the graffiti sprayers, there will be just the need to combat other professional and mischief-makers through the local police and law enforcement agencies. We believe that the above strategies have great potential in reducing the amount of graffiti on Los Angeles buildings and freeway structures and that proper communication strategy can always be effective in communicating the message across. We believe that the described marketing strategies will reduce graffiti spraying on Los Angeles buildings by at least 89% which will be a significant reduction in the graffiti on Los Angeles buildings and freeway structures. (Graffiti Removal) Works Cited 1. California Vandalism Charges. (n.d.). Retrieved June 29, 2008, from Vandalism Cases: www.lacriminaldefenseattorney.com/Vandalism.html 2. From Vandal to Artist. (n.d.). Retrieved June 29, 2008, from Business Week: www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/content/jul2005/sb20050718_049224.htm 3. Graffiti Removal. (n.d.). Retrieved June 29, 2008, from CleanLink: http://www.cleanlink.com/sm/article.asp?id=601&keywords= 4. List of districts and neighborhoods of Los Angeles. (n.d.). Retrieved June 30, 2008, from Wikipedia.org: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_districts_and_neighborhoods_of_Los_Angeles