Thursday, March 25, 2004
Funny graffiti. I've always had an eye out for interesting graffiti. Some of my all-time favourites are "Heterosexuality: now recrui" (on Swanston St near cnr Queensberry St, years ago!), "I am the idiot! Who writing all this stupid thing" (cnr Swanston and Lt Lonsdale St, years ago), "Fuck a punk for charity" (cnr Richardson and Lygon St, North Carlton), and on a stop sign in Fitzroy St, Fitzroy, "Hammer time."
Another recent discovery was "What if the Hokey Pokey is really what it's all about?" (chicks' toilets, Builders' Arms), which I like because of its existential angst. Generally I don't like those political ones which all seem to be in the same handwriting, like at Melbourne Uni: "You are all the same", which Daniel thinks is condemnation of the cloned bourgeois kiddies everywhere; I innocently took it as a message of inclusivity!
Just like I always thought that Bowie song "John, I'm Only Dancing" was about not wanting to piss off the boyfriend of the chick he was dancing with, but Daniel of course sees Bowie reassuring his own boyfriend John that he's not turning into a breeder just cos he's dancing with the girl, even though she turns him on. And then Daniel lambasts me for my oppressive heteronormativity. You really can't win with him. But anyway.
I generally prefer the weird spazzo graffiti to that artful politics stuff. There seems to be a raw, reactionary quality to it that reminds me of the intensity of my own emotions. So today I was walking to uni and I saw this great new piece - it's actually in two places, on a wall and on a parking ticket machine. It says Shane the Preston ho is a retart. Gold! Gold for Australia! Apart from the quixotic nature of writing this in public thinking that this Shane character would be humiliated by other people reading it, I like the idea that a guy is a ho (although it's possible Shane is a girl; there's a female character called Shane in that appalling new lesbo-soft-porn-soap, The L Word.) But my favourite part of all is the "retart", which could be someone who was tarty in the past and has decided to begin their sluttish behaviour again. I wanna call my friends retarts. But I don't think they'd get it. Especially if I called them [insert home suburb] hoes.
Another recent discovery was "What if the Hokey Pokey is really what it's all about?" (chicks' toilets, Builders' Arms), which I like because of its existential angst. Generally I don't like those political ones which all seem to be in the same handwriting, like at Melbourne Uni: "You are all the same", which Daniel thinks is condemnation of the cloned bourgeois kiddies everywhere; I innocently took it as a message of inclusivity!
Just like I always thought that Bowie song "John, I'm Only Dancing" was about not wanting to piss off the boyfriend of the chick he was dancing with, but Daniel of course sees Bowie reassuring his own boyfriend John that he's not turning into a breeder just cos he's dancing with the girl, even though she turns him on. And then Daniel lambasts me for my oppressive heteronormativity. You really can't win with him. But anyway.
I generally prefer the weird spazzo graffiti to that artful politics stuff. There seems to be a raw, reactionary quality to it that reminds me of the intensity of my own emotions. So today I was walking to uni and I saw this great new piece - it's actually in two places, on a wall and on a parking ticket machine. It says Shane the Preston ho is a retart. Gold! Gold for Australia! Apart from the quixotic nature of writing this in public thinking that this Shane character would be humiliated by other people reading it, I like the idea that a guy is a ho (although it's possible Shane is a girl; there's a female character called Shane in that appalling new lesbo-soft-porn-soap, The L Word.) But my favourite part of all is the "retart", which could be someone who was tarty in the past and has decided to begin their sluttish behaviour again. I wanna call my friends retarts. But I don't think they'd get it. Especially if I called them [insert home suburb] hoes.
