RACIST VANDALS STRIKE AGAIN DEFACING FLOYD ART

(Ed.'s Note: No sooner does local artist Marcus Castro repair the vandalized mural of police-violence victim George Floyd, than a reactionary vandal or vandals working in the shadow of the night mar the voluntary art work throwing splotches of paint or – in the latest act of cowardice – spray lines on its finished surface.

This is the third time that the mural has been defaced. The last two times. Castro returned and repaired it.

Someone, apparently, is offended that a local artist is making a stand against police violence against black and latino victims and is using the cover of darkness to deface Castro's expression, an expression that has garnered the support across the entire united States. Why would they, we wonder?  

It's someone who obviously knows the inner city's alleyways well, who picks the time when no one is around the alleyway across 13th Street from the Brownsville Intermodal Transportation Terminal (the bus station), and who has the time to dilly dally in the area to inflict his damage on the work.

Is it one of the homeless from up north with a chip on his (or her) shoulder against minorities? Is it a local Hispanic resident with some unexplained envy toward Castro's work? Or is it just a racist thug who delights in destruction of someone else's work? Do they "glory in demoniac power, ditching civilization as a paranoiac boy puts a log on the track and derails the express train?"

Does he not realize that the mural is directly across the alley from the Immaculate Conception Cathedral where priests and volunteers weekly walk the downtown streets around the terminal passing out free meals to hungry street people? He may have been the beneficiary of that act of kindness only to repay that act of goodness with vindictive destruction.  

Each time Castro has gone back to repair his gift to the people of Brownsville and make his statement that innocent civilians should not die at the hands of those public servants who took the oath to protect an serve them. 

Just yesterday, he unveiled one featuring murdered U.S. Army soldier Vanessa Guillen combined with a depiction of caged unaccompanied  immigrant children with the statement: "Don't Stop Looking for Me. Don't Stop Fighting for Them."

All he asks is for people to "respect the work – to appreciate it and leave it alone – to learn to understand its message so others can enjoy it and grow."

Is that too much to ask?