From "Sticky situation: Mexico City's sisyphean battle with chewing gum/Streets across the world are littered with gum, and although many cities have tried and failed to eradicate these sticky circles, Mexico City continues to wage this seemingly unwinnable war" in The Guardian.
The photo at the link bears witness to the fun of the street art that is The Gum Wall.
I looked up the address so I could find it in Google Street View:
Posts
34 comments:
Why? I don't understand it. It was a Seattle landmark of sorts. And anyone who chewed gum could contribute to it.
Remember when this was news?:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chewing_gum_ban_in_Singapore
In the mid 1990s, Singapore's laws began to receive international press coverage. For example, the U.S. media paid great attention to the case of Michael P. Fay, an American teenager sentenced in 1994 to caning in Singapore for vandalism (for using spray paint, not chewing gum).
Confused reporting about these issues has led to worldwide propagation of the myth that the use or importation of chewing gum is itself punishable with caning. In fact, this has never been a caning offence, and the only penalties provided under Chapter 57 are fines and imprisonment.
If you think it's fun and art, you could post your home address and invite the gum-stickers over. Personally, I think it's gross. But at least removing it provides work for the poor (I was going to say "and down trodden", but it's the gum that's down trodden).
"Why? I don't understand it...."
Seattle is one of those "keep X weird" cities.
Way grosser than shorts.
If I was going to give the good people of Mexico one piece of advice that would move their beautiful (mostly) country out of the past and into the future it would be, "Stop littering, pick up the Goddamn trash and tidy the place up."
Every street I ever rode down on my several trips South of the Border had litter all along the sides of the roads and in front of the houses and just about everywhere I looked. It is unsightly. Broken windows theory has applications outside of law enforcement.
And weeds. Weeds everywhere, damnit. If only there was a resource, a cheap labor supply they could bring in to combat these scabs on the natural beauty of America's bottom. It's a shame.
Officer Obie would be a national hero if they would give him a stinkin' badge. They could build a statute.
Spitoon stocks gonna skyrocket any day now. Any day.....
"Every street I ever rode down on my several trips South of the Border had litter all along the sides of the roads and in front of the houses and just about everywhere."
The U.S. was like that in the 1950s.
And we fixed it and then we went to the moon. Easy Peasy.
It's like that on Native Reservations except the roads tourists take to the casinos.
Swallow
I wish that chewing gum had never been invented (or adapted from the spruce-sap chewing Native Americans). It makes people look completely moronic, sound even worse (I found out I had misophonia when I googled why I was filled with murderous rage when hearing people chew gum), and makes an enormous and intractable mess.
The gum wall in Seattle was completely repellent, but what a waste of time to clean it up. Obviously it would immediately begin filling up again.
In my book it's vandalism. Not cute, or artistic, or anything positive.
~
No gum wall is complete without Adams Black Jack. Discontinued now so it may never happen.
Seattle. I'll bet you could get a pretty good buzz pulling a few of those off and recycling.
Neither "art" nor a problem in Singapore.
Teresa Heinz has got you covered, Feste.
Gum can be recycled into a sort of plastic. It would be neat to take all that nasty gum and turn into usable objects.
I made a few trips to Singapore in the 90's and came away with the impression that if there were enough Singaporeans they would rule the world.
They would keep it tidy, too.
Seattle needs a wall like that made with boogers, but I suppose people would steal them.
I have always swallowed my gum. I think people should do the same with cigarette butts. If you put it in your mouth, you have to either wash it or swallow it.
Rabel, thank you. Went to order, “discontinued.” Thanks anyway.
In middle school when I was finished with my gum I gave it to Britney Banker to chew.
Ann Althouse said...
"Seattle is one of those "keep X weird" cities.
Laslo Films DO take place in Seattle.
You know, I kinda thought Heaven would have higher standards...
I am Laslo.
That, is disgusting.
~
Laslo Films presents "Uncle Ghost!" - "are chicks in heaven naked?" And “yes” to both grandmas! Then again, this is Laslo’s version of heaven, and so ... "I kinda thought heaven would have higher standards!"
... Missile Pop ... that is one sick ice-cream man ...
We used to have a wall near school that was gum and pennies. You'd stick your gum on the wall, and squish a penny into it heads-out.
Us Seattleites love the gum wall. The folks who tried to take it down are idiots.
I throw my gum, on the rare occasions now that I chew it, in the trash. It's not a hard thing to do.
Just up the road a bit from the 'Gumworks' in Seattle is a part of town called Fremont. It's there that you'll find a statue of Lenin just outside of a gelato shop.
Now if we could only get those gum artists to start posting their work all over Lenin, then we'd have something.
2017 America. Lenin statues, OK. Confederate statues, must be destroyed.
OK. That's just fucking discgusting.
From Wikipedia, re. the Seattle wall: "After the cleaning was finished on November 13, gum began to be re-added to the wall;...."
The gum began to be re-added. By itself?
It is indeed gross but weirdly fun too...
We used to live across the Fremont Bridge from Fremont and the Lenin statue. Fremont was pretty kooky back then (one highlight was the Solstice Parade, featuring Naked Guys On Bikes - I suspect that the group is now un-specifically-gendered in name as well as fact). Now I think it's probably all the way the heck in the deep end, paddling madly.
Post a Comment