I don’t remember seeing graffiti in Kathmandu. I also don’t recall seeing it in China or India.
Anyone else been to cities that didn’t have graffiti? Is it primarily a scourge of Western cities?
Singapore is the first one that comes to mind. You can get a rather large fine for even having gum, let alone spitting it out on the street and it is actually enforced with importation bans. An American teen, Michael Fay, was prominent in the national news in 1994 because he was sentenced to caning (more painful and harsher than it sounds) for committing vandalism while he lived in Singapore with his parents. Singapore reduced the number of lashes from 4 to 6 but still ultimately went through with it. Needless to say, they do not have a problem with simple littering in Singapore let alone graffiti.
Singapore is a nice 1st world city/country but they really, really hate anyone messing up their stuff in any way.
Reduced from 4 to 6? I thought they were supposed to be better than us at math.
No you can’t. It is perfectly legal to chew gum in Singapore, or to import quantities for personal use. It is illegal to sell it in open commerce, or to import marketable quantities.
As I understand it, the reason it was banned dates back to the public transit system introducing fare-paying devices that could be jammed with gum. Unable to enforce that vandalism, gum was banned instead.
Sorry, flip that around. I am sure the 4 were bad enough anyway. Their caning technique is similar to slave lashing in the past so you probably want to leave your spraypaint at home on your vacation there.
This is getting a little off topic but I disagree. It is possible to get legal personal chewing gum but it has to have theuaputic value such as nicotine gum for stopping smoking or gum for some dental issues. Admittedly, I have never been to Singapore but everyone I know that has been there said the airlines passed on the warning about it before they even landed.
Wikipedia even has an article on it with cites. It certainly doesn’t say that it is “perfectly legal”. It does say that some people are allowed to have it for therapeutic reasons but it has to be prescribed by a doctor.
*"There is a ban on importing chewing gum into Singapore which is strictly enforced. Since 2004, only chewing gum of therapeutic value is allowed into Singapore under the “Regulation of Imports and Exports (Chewing Gum) Regulations.” The exception is made for dental or nicotine gum.[1] Gum can be bought from a doctor, but must be prescribed.
According to the Regulations, “importing” means to “bring or cause to be brought into Singapore by land, water or air from any place which is outside Singapore …” any goods, even if they are not for purposes of trade."*
You may live in Singapore for all I know and know something that I don’t but the chewing gum ban is both real and enforced in general according to every source that I know of. The harsh penalties for vandalism of any type are famously real as well.
When a country has draconian laws against something, that doesn’t indicate that they don’t have a problem with the something. If they didn’t have a problem with it, they wouldn’t need the draconian laws.
And the draconian laws are not necessarily effective. Singapore does have clean streets, but this is mainly because they spend a lot of time and money cleaning them. Look at the incredible amounts of detritus that can be seen floating along the city waterways, and you’ll realise that Singaporeans discard their coffee cups and empty bottles and sweet rappers and cigarette packets just as carelessly as the rest of the world.
So even their musicians are nicer over there?
Yeah, you’ll find Wonder Mike just floating by, assuring you that what you see is not a test, he’s floatin’ by the street.
It’s been years since I lived there, but I don’t recall there being any graffiti in Salt Lake City, Utah.
The city was the cleanest I’d ever seen – they even had less random trash blowing around on the street than other cities I’ve visited or lived in. And there were no slums that I encountered.
A few months ago I was in Pyongyang (pop. 3.3 million). Absolutely no graffiti whatsoever.
According to an acquaintance whose family emigrated from Singapore, their draconian punishments for graffiti were used against a particular type of graffiti – anti-government slogans.
Singapore is ruled a one-party government*, which controls the print & electronic media. So protesting government policies was done by painting slogans on walls or posting flyers in public places. (Like Chinese protesters did in Tiananmen Square.) So the government tried to stop this by having unusually harsh anti-graffiti laws.
He also said that the chewing gum ban was enforced because protesters used gum to affix flyers to walls – apparently carrying regular poster-affixing glue was dangerous when the police stopped you, but you could claim that chewing gum was just an innocent item.
I’m not sure how accurate this is – most of it comes from things his parents told him. But it does give a different view of this aspect of Singapore.
- Other parties are allowed to exist in Singapore. They just aren’t allowed to win elections. Or even compete equally in elections, really.
That whole chewing gum thing is now in the realm of urban legend. You can buy gum commonly in Singapore. There may or may not be a law against its import or use, but it’s not enforced
Kathmandu has graffiti. It’s just very fucking pretty.