Why Does Graffiti Have a Negative Cognition?

Growing up I had the privilege to see artwork almost on every wall I passed by. I saw artwork that mainly related to the latino or hispanic culture, my neighborhood Little village is known for having Hispanic murals. I did not only see artwork just in my neighborhood I also saw it all over my city, I saw it even more on the CTA. Artwork on walls has always fascinated me, I was amazed at how someone's hand can create something so colorful and intriguing. When I say art work I mean it as Murals, Street Art and especially graffiti. Being exposed to all of this amazing work it inspired me to get into graffiti. Fast forward to today I have been a graffiti writer for about 6 years now. Being involved in this artform i often get angry when I hear someone categorize graffiti and street art as a criminal activity, like if it was on the same level as murdering someone. Ever since I started my graffiti way of life I have asked myself numerous times why do people like to exaggerate the criminality level of graffiti or street art?
One reason why people might demoralize graffiti and street art is because it is a form of vandalism. It is hard to say that anyone wants graffiti written all over their walls on their homes, But then again it does bring a healthy color vibrancy to the neighborhood or city . Another reason why people might call out these artforms as extreme criminal activity is because it is often seen as being tied to gang activity, when in fact graffiti itself and gang graffiti are totally different things. One other reason might because when people see graffiti they might imagine a young guy or girl who is ruthless, does not care for the law or just a pure delinquent. People have the right to imagine such things when they see graffiti. In fact most graffiti writers or street artists are delinquent, but again one can not judge by what they see on the surface because there are fathers, mothers and even college students out there painting a wall who have never had a run in with the law in their lives.
If we all took a second and stepped back to think about why do people like to discourage graffiti and streetart, we might find that most of these speculations are not valid. If people took the time to do so they might find that graffiti and street art is not all that bad. Yes there are criminal aspects to these artforms, but there are ways around it to make it legal work and if people looked at it from a more artistic perspective they might come to conclude that it is not much a criminal activity at all, but rather a form of art.