Mailbag

A Letter on the Brink of Massive Hyperventilation

Give me a BREAK! What a load of CRAP! No wonder you are just a rag read! "Tagging Tales" (Jan. 4) was an extremely immature story. Let's see when your "reporter" goes along with a gang to do a drive-by or a home invasion!

This glamorizes a CRIMINAL activity! Besides, the two outlaws in the story need to grow up! I have never seen a 24-year-old with so many damn wrinkles, even under his "disguise"--this guy used your reporter as a chump! Furthermore, she will NEVER be in the ranks of Diane Sawyer!

KC Cousins


Graffiti Is a Crime, Pure and Simple

As a taxpayer, I don't object to public art in the Californicated arroyos, but when it comes to the tagging of private property, that is a crime, pure and simple. I am among the first in my neighborhood to go out and cover tagging, at my own expense. When the (rental) property owners don't give a damn, then the neighborhood starts to look like shit from all the mismatched rectangles and squiggles on what were once nice walls.

I'd love to catch some of these punk "artists" on camera!

Lois Smith


There's No Possible Headline That Could Do Justice to This Letter

I am totally offended by "Tagging Tales," the totally disgusting display of "student work" that somehow, by heinous accident, ended up as the cover story. Two li'l-boy wannabe gangster artists do not define graffiti. Some li'l-girl wannabe writer doesn't deserve the space in your fucking rag.

I'm a graff writer and street artist, work on canvas and design clothes, and that article is wrong and uncharacteristic. Usually, the Weekly is trustworthy, has good info and promotes good events. That article is enough to make me a former Weekly reader. The content is shameful to all of us out here who are actual artists, particularly myself, as a woman and feminist. Exit and Kai are toys. Thanks for the completely worthless slang translations--a nice cherry on top of the bloated, distorted, worthless corporate-sellout-fascist-prostituted proverbial ice cream sundae.

I'm sure when the girl who wrote the article was planning it, she thought it would be totally harmless to write up a piece about some of her super-cool MySpace friends and go down to East Coast Super Subs for lunch and get some old guys' opinion on tagging. But the true artist, feminist and graffiti communities don't need this trash. You, as the editor, should have stopped this girl.

For a graff writer, selling your shit and scoring chicks does not earn you respect. Almost all of the male writers in Tucson are exactly the same, and the only other girl writers I've met in Tucson have been li'l trendy hos--similar to the author of the article. She should be ashamed that, by transitive property, she's encouraging sexism, violence against women, poor-self-image for women, rape, assault and the increase of the upper-class white male ego.

The main issue here is respect--as a graff writer, you earn it. Boys/men earn it through bombing, good graff and dedication to art and the lifestyle. For a girl/woman, you have to do all that plus struggle past all of the shit-talking and the dangers of street-assault and rape.

To redeem yourself, you should get an unbiased female author to round up all the lady writers of T-town and organize collaboration on a special ladies-only legal wall. As editor of the Weekly, you have the power.

Audrey Keefe


The Dangers of Animal Molestation

Once, when some friends and I were swimming in a secluded watering hole in Florida, we noticed a sign that said: "Do not molest the alligators." We all had a little laugh, imagining someone trying to get it on with a gator.

Later, some rangers stopped by, and we asked them, "So, you must be having a lot of alligator molestation going on 'round these parts?" The rangers then explained that the "molestation" referred to was any human interaction. Whether it's the gross crime of feeding them, or just being around them, it is harmful to the natural order.

As Catherine O'Sullivan said regarding her neighbor's feeding of the javelinas (Dec. 28), this causes the wild animals to become human-acclimated. When dealing with an alligator, it's pretty obvious that you don't feed them, because you really don't want gators equating humans with food. With the javelinas, it may not be so obvious to a self-proclaimed "animal lover" that their interactions are harmful and not beneficial to the animals or to the humans.

People need to stop molesting the javelinas!

Inci Erdem


Claim: Real Cities Don't Use Two-Way Streets

Regarding the Dec. 14 Currents story, "New Direction: Can Two-Way Streets Work on Congress and Broadway?" The answer to your question is an emphatic NO!

Making Congress Street and Broadway Boulevard into two-way streets will turn downtown traffic into a clusterfuck. There's no way to time traffic lights on two-way streets so that the traffic flows smoothly. Anyone who drives Speedway Boulevard, Broadway Boulevard or Grant Road and hits every single traffic light between Craycroft Road and Interstate 10 can tell you this.

The best way to reduce traffic through these streets is to divert it entirely, especially if most of it is going to or coming from Interstate 10. Of course, this is at cross-purposes with the owners of downtown businesses who want people driving by. As proponent Donovan Durband admits, two-way Broadway and Congress streets will lead to increased congestion until Aviation Highway terminates at the interstate, so why make matters worse until that extension becomes reality?

Face it: Real cities (a status to which Tucson allegedly aspires) have long ago realized that two-way streets just don't work. Imagine the "green wave" you could catch driving a one-way Speedway!

Andy Peters


In Conclusion, We Feature This, Linking Two Things Having Nothing to Do With Each Other

In reading the reference to a Ms. Dolph's financial plight ("The Rich and the Poor," Currents, Dec. 21), I thought "how obscene"--not the reference, but the contrast. Congressman Raul Grijalva, like so many politicians, makes no secret of his love of taxing to the max, and too many taxing entities deem it their mandate.

In financial documents from Northwest Fire District, one notes Fire Chief Jeff Piechura spent $675 of taxpayer money at Wigwam Resort in Litchfield Park for a state fire chief meeting in July 2006. That's $139 more spent in three days than Ms. Dolph's monthly income. Two days later, the chief spent more than $1,142 ordering materials and trinkets for making ethical decisions.

In January 2006 Piechura hosted, at taxpayer expense, a luncheon for local fire officials and other bureaucrats with an estimated budget of $6,000. The five dozen cookies, at $42.50 per dozen, were a gracious touch.

In August 2006, NWFD hosted battalion chief tests for five candidates, including three from NWFD and one from Sierra Vista. One from Connecticut had taxpayers paying all expenses for travel and the hotel stay. In little more than two days, NWFD ran up a bill for $7,098 at Westward Look Resort.

Rolling over $2-$3 million of excess taxation, every year, is a way of life with rich taxing entities and bureaucrats. The number of Ms. Dolphs is increasing as taxing predators, like NWFD, tax and spend with no restraint.

The contrast is obscene. The philosophy is insulting. The consequences are shameful.

Mary C. Schuh