It’s a striking sight—statues covered in red paint, messages such as, “Hate will not be tolerated, something is coming.” In public spaces, dialogue should be open to people, so what makes graffiti and chalking criminal activity?

Since the rise of graffiti in the 1970’s, its very existence is anarchist in nature. Tagging one’s name on public property is a way of marking territory—of saying that one exists, deserves to exist, and has the right to be seen. Paired with the fact that most graffiti artists of the time were people of color, it was a way of striking back against a society that said that they were not allowed to take up space. Even in the earliest days of tagging, some were accompanied by political messages in that vein.

Chalking became an offshoot of writing political messages, especially popular on college campuses—this was largely because chalk is easy to wash off, so proponents of chalking were not causing difficulty in clean-up for staff around the school. This method was one of the ways that LGBTQ+ students opened dialogue at their universities in the early 90’s in the vein of ACT UP.

Art has and continues to be a major form of protest, and in some of our most troubled times, we still criminalize people who want to speak up in a visual medium. Should it not be protected under freedom of speech? Tom Tosdal, an attorney for a case against chalker Tom Schaefer, says “In California, vandalism is maliciously defacing a property,” he says, “and when you express a political or social idea, it’s not malicious.”

Moving away from California and back to a year ago, it is obvious that there may be a problem beyond chalking and graffiti being criminalized—it is the messages themselves. Emory University was covered in chalk messages saying “Trump 2016.” And yet when met with protestors and students expressing that these messages made them feel unsafe, a university spokesperson responded, “Emory University has not identified the individual(s) responsible for placing chalking graffiti in various campus locations earlier this week, and no follow-up action is planned related to the incident. It’s important to note that chalkings by students are allowed as a form of expression on the Emory campus but must be limited to certain areas and must not deface campus property–––these chalkings did not follow guidelines–––that’s the issue regarding violation of policy, not the content.”

Meanwhile, people who write messages denouncing statues of racists like Christopher Columbus are pursued and arrested.

If certain groups are denied protest while others are free to terrorize, what does that say about our law enforcement and the laws they uphold? And if these methods, which harm no one, are denounced as extreme, what other forms of peaceful protest may be called into question?

The protests of our people should be seen and heard, not sanitized or scrubbed away—not denounced as the work of vandals when it is the voice of people straining to be heard. There is power in these methods that should not be unfairly criminalized.