Last Tuesday, hundreds of copies of The Daily Aztec were found torn in half inside numerous dispensers around campus.
The police were called in the hope this act of vandalism would not go unpunished. With some effort, security cameras or witnesses could lead to the culprits.
Unfortunately, campus police had no intention of filing a police report. Because copies of The Daily Aztec are free, and the public has the right to treat the paper how it wants once it is in its possession, no crime technically occurred. In addition, because the papers were placed back in their bins, the offenders can't be cited for littering.
As far as the law is concerned, you can't devalue something that has no price.
The men and women that give their hearts and souls to this paper couldn't disagree more. Hours of our hard work go into each issue, because we love what we do and care about informing the public. It's very hard to inform, however, when your words are torn into pieces.
Emotional value isn't the only "price" of The Daily Aztec. The paper is free because businesses pay to have their advertisements reach the public. When those advertisements get destroyed, the businesses have a reason to be angry as well. They will likely ask for a refund or choose to take their business elsewhere. And with that, The Daily Aztec could take a financial hit.
If the effect is felt financially, how is it not a crime? As a direct result of the vandalism, our newspaper might lose money. Even though our paper is free to the public, it does have a real dollar price. It costs money to print, and for the students who put hours and effort into creating each issue, the resulting loss of ad revenue directly impacts one of their few sources of income.
This situation is no different from somebody shoplifting at the SDSU Bookstore or pick pocketing a student, incidents that campus police would take care of immediately.
The difference is that dollars can be blatantly placed on money in a wallet or a book in a store, making those acts easy to identify as criminal.
While this recent occurrence isn't nearly as obvious, acts such as this do affect people emotionally, but more importantly to the law, financially. The law may not recognize that, but it should. Punishing acts of vandalism that result in financial consequences is one its functions.
All it takes is a little common sense to realize. Vandalism is expensive, no matter what the target.
Be the first to comment on this article!