Artist Fights Unsafe Streets With Dick Graffiti

Social good, thy name is penis graffiti. An anonymous British street artist is on a crusade to make Manchester streets safer, raising awareness of the area’s crumbling roads with giant dick pictures. The BBC reports that the artist, who goes by the nom de guerre Wanksy, uses his phallic flair to draw attention to potholes, which are often soon after fixed.

“The roads of Manchester are in an appalling state…I have cyclist friends who have been hospitalized,” said the artist, speaking with the Manchester Evening News. “They damage vehicles. Sometimes it’s hard to know which pothole caused the damage because there are so many.”

While drawing dicks all over the place is not usually considered socially constructive behavior, Wanksy’s campaign has reportedly been making a difference, with many of his targets, “filled in within 48 hours.”

“They’ll be there for months,” Wanksy told the BBC. “People will drive over the same pothole and forget about it. Suddenly you draw something amusing around it, everyone sees it and it either gets reported or fixed.”

A filled-in Wanksy work.

The press and the public have seized on the activist’s inspiring story, and Wanksy has been called a “superhero,” a “dick pic vigilante,” and “the only artist in 2015 that matters.” “Silly billy’s art willies help fill in potholes,” read one headline. Yet, perhaps unsurprisingly, not everyone is thrilled by all these dicks.

“The actions of this individual are not only stupid, but incredibly insulting to local residents,” said one local official. “Has this person, for just one second, considered how families with young children must feel when they are confronted with these obscene symbols as they walk to school?”

But Wanksy is having none of that “think of the children” crap. “There are sculptures that don't wear clothes,” he told the BBC. “It's artistic expression. To be offended by that, you must be very prudish.”

You can follow Wanksy’s adventures in civic vandalism on his Facebook page.