Opinion Poll

[Sara]

No!

It is not OK to write/draw on AT shelter walls, posts, beams, rafters.

[FarmerChef]

Definite no vote here.

[Rain Man]

No, not okay.

I like the post turning the question around. Is it okay for us to write on their packs, tents, sleeping bags, ... or their homes, ... their cars? If personal property is excluded based on their rationalizations, ... what about their church? Their school? What about the Washington Monument in DC? Can we write on it? Other national and state monuments, statues, and sites?

No, it's not "okay." The fact that it is out in nature makes it even less okay.

RainMan

.

[TAG]

Nope. I don't go hiking to see graffiti.

[michaelosborne]

No way it's not okay!

[atmilkman]

I guess it doesnt bother me to see it, and I dont do it. I dont feel it ruins anything and I like to read the comments as long as they are positive. I remember this cool shelter that could fit maybe 5 ppl somewhere in NC that had markings dating back to 1950. I just think its neat to read and look at and think of all the memories those places hold. For me it adds character.

Heck, I could write on the wall and date it 1776 and people would really think they "discovered" something. Maybe leave behind some chicken ankles and call them prehistoric.

[9pin]

Yes, JK, obviously no!

[Dad]

I’m ok with it and not ok with it. When I go into a very old shelter and see “Tommy and Daddy – June 3, 1951” or something like that it seems pretty cool to think about whoever they are (were) and what their trip was like then and what their life has been like since that day, and how that experience has impacted them. Don’t bother going into the stuff you have seen on port-a-potty walls and the like, writing on my living room walls, etc – I get it. I have never written on any shelter wall, nor will I. I don’t reserve the right to be “offended” by everything a fellow human does in this life - not worth the bother – but I do have my own preferences. The question and the comments are legitimate, but then I assume so are mine. If we think about one of the fairly new shelters – say Mountaineer – and walk in there right after it was finished, I’d have a hard time seeing someone being the first one to write on the wall. I’m trying to understand the comparison between the first one in there and the example above from “1951”… Funny how we change. A few years ago when there was a “malfunction” during the halftime show at the Super Bowl, they searched and selected a more “wholesome” act for a few years following – that’s what they said. But, back in the day when the currently “wholesome” act was just coming onto the scene, some of them would have been considered very “unwholesome”. The consensus here is to leave the walls clean, and some will not. Years later we will all read them.

[kayak karl]

NO, never all right.
i stopped at a new shelter is the south. saw dust was still around it. on the second level written in pencil was "i was the first to sleep here 0/0/00". torn between LNT and irony i wanted to write "NO, you were the first to vandalize it". instead i got a rock and erased it.

to the example above, what is the difference between Father & Son 1951 or Father & Son 2013?

[DandT40]

Not okay.

At the double spring gap shelter I did like the one person that wrote over several others "No one cares that you were here".

[HikerMom58]

I’m ok with it and not ok with it. When I go into a very old shelter and see “Tommy and Daddy – June 3, 1951” or something like that it seems pretty cool to think about whoever they are (were) and what their trip was like then and what their life has been like since that day, and how that experience has impacted them. Don’t bother going into the stuff you have seen on port-a-potty walls and the like, writing on my living room walls, etc – I get it. I have never written on any shelter wall, nor will I. I don’t reserve the right to be “offended” by everything a fellow human does in this life - not worth the bother – but I do have my own preferences. The question and the comments are legitimate, but then I assume so are mine. If we think about one of the fairly new shelters – say Mountaineer – and walk in there right after it was finished, I’d have a hard time seeing someone being the first one to write on the wall. I’m trying to understand the comparison between the first one in there and the example above from “1951”… Funny how we change. A few years ago when there was a “malfunction” during the halftime show at the Super Bowl, they searched and selected a more “wholesome” act for a few years following – that’s what they said. But, back in the day when the currently “wholesome” act was just coming onto the scene, some of them would have been considered very “unwholesome”. The consensus here is to leave the walls clean, and some will not. Years later we will all read them.

I LOVE this post!! This post is a reality check on so many levels. ^ You and I can't control others behavior so it's all about finding ways to cope & try to wrap our heads around it.

I still strongly dislike seeing any type of graffiti etc.. on any thing natural ...rocks, trees etc... it's heartbreaking.
For my own sanity, I have found ways to cope with it.

I couldn't/wouldn't do any of it, myself.

[tiptoe]

It's never OK to deface anything along the AT or anywhere else, and I find it hard to imagine that any serious hiker would disagree. Not a very good topic for an opinion poll.

[Seatbelt]

[QUOTE=Dad;1816255] If we think about one of the fairly new shelters – say Mountaineer – and walk in there right after it was finished, I’d have a hard time seeing someone being the first one to write on the wall.
Funny you mention this--I was in this shelter 2012 and was amazed at how much graffitti is in it already.

For the record, I vote NO also, but will admit to laughing out loud at the lengthy discourse someone wrote on the privy door at Spring Mtn shelter--where a large chunk was missing from the toilet seat.

[rocketsocks]

graffiti begets graffiti...


insert graffiti where broken windows appear in the article, kinda similar.


The broken windows theory was first introduced by social scientists James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling, in an article titled "Broken Windows" and which appeared in the March 1982 edition of The Atlantic Monthly.^[1] The title comes from the following example:

Consider a building with a few broken windows. If the windows are not repaired, the tendency is for vandals to break a few more windows. Eventually, they may even break into the building, and if it's unoccupied, perhaps become squatters or light fires inside.
Or consider a pavement. Some litter accumulates. Soon, more litter accumulates. Eventually, people even start leaving bags of refuse from take-out restaurants there or even break into cars.

Before the introduction of this theory by Wilson and Kelling, Philip Zimbardo, a Stanford psychologist, arranged an experiment testing the broken-window theory in 1969. Zimbardo arranged for an automobile with no license plates and the hood up to be parked idle in a Bronx neighbourhood and a second automobile in the same condition to be set up in Palo Alto, California. The car in the Bronx was attacked by "vandals" within minutes of its "abandonment". Zimbardo noted that the first "vandals" to arrive were a family – a father, mother and a young son – who removed the radiator and battery. Within twenty four hours of its abandonment, everything of value had been stripped from the vehicle. After that, the car's windows were smashed in, parts torn, upholstery ripped, and children were using the car as a playground. At the same time, the vehicle sitting idle in Palo Alto, California sat untouched for more than a week. Then Zimbardo himself went up to the vehicle and deliberately smashed it with a sledgehammer. Soon after, people joined in for the destruction. Zimbardo observed that majority of the adult "vandals" in both cases were primarily well dressed, clean-cut and respectable whites. It is believed that in a neighborhood such as the Bronx where the history of abandoned property and theft are more prevalent, vandalism occurs much more quickly as the community gives off a "no one cares" vibe. Similar events can occur in any civilized community when communal barriers – the sense of mutual regard and obligations of civility – are lowered by actions that suggests "no one cares".^[1]
The article received a great deal of attention and was very widely cited. A 1996 criminology andurban sociology book, Fixing Broken Windows: Restoring Order and Reducing Crime in Our Communities by George L. Kelling and a co-author Catharine Coles, is based on the article but develops the argument in greater detail. It discusses the theory in relation to crime and strategies to contain or eliminate crime from urban neighborhoods.^[2]
A successful strategy for preventing vandalism, say the book's authors, is to fix the problems when they are small. Repair the broken windows within a short time, say, a day or a week, and the tendency is that vandals are much less likely to break more windows or do further damage. Clean up the sidewalk every day, and the tendency is for litter not to accumulate (or for the rate of littering to be much less). Problems do not escalate and thus respectable residents do not flee a neighborhood.
Although work done by the police is crucial towards crime prevention, Oscar Newman, in his 1972 book, Defensible Space, explained that the presence of the police authority is just not enough for a safe and crime-free city. People in the community also need to lend a hand towards crime prevention. The theory that Newman proposes is that people will take care of and protect their own spaces they feel they have an investment in, arguing that an area will eventually be safer if the people feel a sense of ownership and responsibility towards the area. The reason why broken windows and acts of vandalism are still prevalent is because communities simply do not seem to care for it. Regardless of how many times the windows have been repaired, the society still has to invest some of their time to keep it safe. The negligence of society towards any form of a "broken window" signifies the a lack of concern for the community. Newman states this as a clear sign that the society has accepted this disorder, allowing for the unrepaired broken windows to display the vulnerability and lack of defence against the situation.^[3]
The theory thus makes two major claims: that further petty crime and low-level anti-social behavior will be deterred, and that major crime will be prevented as a result. Criticism of the theory has tended to focus only on the latter claim.

[BabySue]

41.5 not OK / 1.5 not OK

Tiptoe says: "Not a very good topic for an opinion poll." Just because you say no and believe it strongly doesn't mean it's a worthless poll. It was apparently worthwhile enough for you to chime in with a "no" even though 40 others had already said "no." For those voting "no," there is value in knowing that almost everyone agrees with you. For those who would tend to vote "yes," there is value for them in discovering they are in the minority. For those who can't give a simple answer without taking a jab at the original post, there is value in having a place to vent.

[solobip]

No, not OK. (unless you are actually dying and you wanted to leave that last note, but you better be found dead right next to it.)

[perdidochas]

I guess it doesnt bother me to see it, and I dont do it. I dont feel it ruins anything and I like to read the comments as long as they are positive. I remember this cool shelter that could fit maybe 5 ppl somewhere in NC that had markings dating back to 1950. I just think its neat to read and look at and think of all the memories those places hold. For me it adds character.

If everybody did that, the 1950s messages would have been written over.

[perdidochas]

I vote No.

[Old Hiker]

No way it's not okay!

OK - sorry - I need some punctuation, please.

No way ! It's not OK to deface.

There is no way it's not all right to deface. It's OK.

Let's eat Granny !!

Let's eat, Granny !!

[Kerosene]

Not okay. Never done it. I have read what is written though.