Classic British graffiti

December 2, 2003 3:03 PM

Classic British graffiti. None of yer spraycans and colours, mate - a black biro's all you need. And if the pen is truly mightier than the sword, then the British obviously wield their weapons best when they're sitting comfortably. (From b3ta, which also hosts the classic "Argentine football team with handbags" picture)
posted by iffley (28 comments total)

My favorite graffiti was found in a bar bathroom. (Where else?)

Profanity is the literary crutch of the inarticulate motherfucker.

posted by wsg at 3:50 PM on December 2, 2003

Strike "literary" and insert "verbal" above. oops...
posted by wsg at 3:52 PM on December 2, 2003

Around Netherfield and Colwick in Nottingham, someone keeps on writing "Mrs. Peel we're needed" all over the place.

Which, to me, although not very witty and not as crude as graffiti should be, is still the most fabulous thing to see written on broken walls, bus shelters, and plywood.
posted by Katemonkey at 4:02 PM on December 2, 2003

I love graffiti. Favorite:
"My mom made me a homosexual"
and underneath:
"Can she make me one too?"
posted by WolfDaddy at 4:09 PM on December 2, 2003

"here I sit
on the pooper
giving birth
to a MA state trooper"

stall of a bathroom at WPI
posted by cortex at 5:24 PM on December 2, 2003

In the stall of the basement bathroom of a venerable St. Louis pizza institution (the old Talanya's by Wash U.), there was written, down by the door, in very small print (so you had to twist your neck to read it), "You are now shitting at a 45 degree angle."
posted by notsnot at 5:27 PM on December 2, 2003

Bathroom in the philosophy building where I went to school: "Eschew obfuscation".
posted by dejah420 at 7:38 PM on December 2, 2003

"Eschew obfuscation" is all over the bathroom walls in the bars of Lawrence, KS.
posted by sp dinsmoor at 8:16 PM on December 2, 2003

On the Beltway around Washington DC there's a particular curve that you round where the spires of the Mormon Temple in Kensington MD just come into view beyond the trees. There happens to be a railroad bridge right at that spot, and for a long time it has read "SURRENDER DOROTHY".

I just did some net research and apparently it's been there, off and on, since the early 70's. I've also heard a (probably apocryphal) tale that it was first painted there by Situationist author Len Bracken.
posted by rusty at 8:37 PM on December 2, 2003

Those who write on toilet walls
should roll their shit in little balls
those who read these words of wit
should eat those little balls of shit.

Can't remember where.
posted by dg at 8:48 PM on December 2, 2003

Vonnegut's "God Bless You, Mr Rosewater", dg.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 9:36 PM on December 2, 2003

*light bulb goes on over head*
Thanks i_am_joe's_spleen. I have also seen it written in various places, but knew it came from somewhere else first.
posted by dg at 9:39 PM on December 2, 2003

[this is good]

Seen in a public toilet at Birmingham New Street station some years back :-

'Some come here to sit and think,
Some come here to shit and stink,
But I come here to scratch my balls,
And read the writing on the walls.'
posted by plep at 12:15 AM on December 3, 2003

Wellington has a high class of graffiti. Right now Cuba St bears the memorable slogan "Mindless opposition is as bad as unthinking conformity". Here (self-link) I captured an assault on a billboard belonging to one of our nastier politicians.

Stencil graffitti is on the rise here too, pioneered by some loon who likes winged chimpanzee images. My favourite turned up during a winter power crisis this year: a stylised spiral electric stove element with two table knives on it and the legend "Save power this winter, turn knives off after spotting".

(Every student flat worthy of the name here has a pair of blackened spotting knives, which are heated red hot on a stove, so that small lumps of marijuana or hash can then be placed on them and the smoke inhaled through an improvised funnel, such as a cut-open softdrink bottle. Explaining them away to your Mum is one of those rites of passage…)
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 1:00 AM on December 3, 2003

At Hull university, UK: "Socialist Worker Student Society: Thirteen Years, Still Here!"

Underneath someone else added "Hope you graduate soon!"
posted by Pericles at 2:02 AM on December 3, 2003

Wolfdaddy: would you believe that I once wrote that at the top of a blackboard in my English class when i was 17. I think it was a spectacularly unsuccessful attempt to come out (and maybe get some action...) I don't even remember any comments, they just assumed I was being my usual provocative self, I guess.

[Steed] "Mrs. Peel we're needed"
[Emma Peel] "I'll get me leathers...
[/Avengers]
posted by dash_slot- at 2:29 AM on December 3, 2003

a pair of blackened spotting knives, which are heated red hot on a stove, so that small lumps of marijuana or hash can then be placed on them and the smoke inhaled through an improvised funnel

how very...quaint. in the civilised nations, one would use a pipe.
posted by quonsar at 4:08 AM on December 3, 2003

Graffiti everything.
posted by nthdegx at 4:49 AM on December 3, 2003

On the toilet walls of Bar Tactical, an ultra hip soho hangout (now sadly no more), some irate customer had written

Fuck off you trendy
evisu jean wearing
hoxton square
pseudo intellectual
ironic haircut cunts

Underneath which someone else had added

No

Always used to make me smile.

And any old Oxford MeFis remember the bridge on the A40 that read Plank is God?
posted by ciderwoman at 4:54 AM on December 3, 2003

In the library toilets
at Goldsmiths college I once saw 'Sociology degrees. Please take one' written on the lav roll dispenser.
(Robertvaliant, Wed 5 Nov 2003, 5:06, archived)

...This is amazing. I did a year at Goldsmith's, all the way back in 1989, and I actually remember this graffito. Small 'effin world. Or maybe there's just very little memorable graffiti out there.
posted by bendybendy at 5:06 AM on December 3, 2003

a mans ambition must indeed be small
to write his name upon a shithouse wall
but before i die i'll add my regal scrawl
just to show the world i left with sweet fuck all.

The words of that good looking lout shane mcgowan, whose concert i will be happily attending in two weeks. With a bit of luck he'll be sick on stage again, what a performer...
posted by kev23f at 5:08 AM on December 3, 2003

That b3ta thread is a time consuming read.

Turd type 37, The Lumberjack:

About the size of a small rabbit, floats on the surface. Refuses to flush, must be broken up first with some stout implement (e.g. coat hanger).

I have never encountered any of the other 36 turd definitions on toilet walls, despite going to the toilet almost every day!
posted by asok at 5:14 AM on December 3, 2003

(Every student flat worthy of the name here has a pair of blackened spotting knives, which are heated red hot on a stove, so that small lumps of marijuana or hash can then be placed on them and the smoke inhaled through an improvised funnel, such as a cut-open softdrink bottle. Explaining them away to your Mum is one of those rites of passage…)

Damn that just brought back a memory of my parents dropping me off a Uni one year. I think half the knives in our cutlery tray where scorched one year.
posted by smcniven at 5:52 AM on December 3, 2003

Best I've ever seen was in a rock club in Des Moines, IA...

"I Fucked your mom!"

Followed by, in another hand:

"Go home Dad! You're Drunk!"
posted by Jeffy at 6:36 AM on December 3, 2003

Bathroom stall, Univ. of Tennessee Math Dept., circa 1971:

B4I4QRU
_______
18QTp
posted by Pressed Rat at 7:22 AM on December 3, 2003

friggin ascii html - p should be the symbol for "pi"
posted by Pressed Rat at 7:23 AM on December 3, 2003

Pressed Rat - thats brilliant.
posted by Orange Goblin at 10:04 AM on December 3, 2003

Almost every city bus in Mexico City has part of the R in Ruta (route) scratched out to say Puta (whore).
posted by Pollomacho at 11:04 AM on December 3, 2003