Civics Lessons

Billboards as civics lessons.

Ethical obligations, in storey-high lettering.

Sometimes these messages are sponsored by churches and civic organizations, or national foundations.

They mark territory as surely as other physical features, as surely as graffiti, possibly underscoring or deflocking special community needs or issues. The messages, incidentally, seem mostly intended for males, particularly the many advisories about parenting.

Is my community being debased by these towers of advocacy, presumed guilty, grouped into a mass, misunderstood, ghetto melange? Do outsiders presume the worst, and might those presumptions do further harm, particularly in a society guilty of uneven investment?



Should we discourage murders by chalking bodies on the sidewalk, and by using shell casings to form snowman-like eyes, ears, and mouth?

Didn't pop music used to deal with this stuff?