While this was obviously badly organized, putting a cenotaph from the local legion with a military relic, in a park literally called “Memorial Park” isn’t particularly offensive. The problem is just the fact that they decided to replace an existing (recently installed) garden without even informing the volunteers who maintain it.
There’s many ways to memorialize. Personally I find the the giant metal hunk of killing and destroying machine in a park context offensive, aesthetically as well as ideologically. But others may take a different view of course.
The fact that it is a giant metal killing machine is there to highlight the service of those lost, and the conditions those lost served in. We’re remembering the sacrifice that comes with war, fighting with weapons like that, or even the fact that many practically lived in these vehicles. In the same way, we often depict soldiers in combat, or with other combat gear - it provides far more context to what these men went through and how they served than just a name on a plaque.
You have no respect at all for people who served and died, and it shows.
You’re the exact type of person that would go “don’t record the horrors in the deathcamps, we should remember them not memorialize them”.
A memorial is supposed to serve as a reminder of what to avoid, not cater to your or anyone else’s current nonsensical ideologies or sensitivities.
It exists to inform and prevent acceptance of war, not to portray a ‘rewarding sacrifice’ when people are thrown into the meat grinder.
Your complete lack of understanding of this issue or your wilful mischaracterization is absolutely abhorrent and shows a total lack of respect and critical thinking education or a total lack of empathy, ignoring the suffering of others in order to pursue your own agenda.
I think the presence of a tank in a park facilitates acceptance of war - it does not prevent acceptance of war. That’s where I’m coming from. Monuments should be about remembering the sacrifices that were made in the service of larger causes (that’s what I meant by “important”), the lives lost, and preventing war. I think we’re just disagreeing on the effects of a tank in a park
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