Police “will vigorously investigate” the vandalism of a war memorial. https://t.co/kgfnH7T3EI #Pennsylvania #MemorialDay2020 #MemorialDay— The Morning Call (@mcall) May 25, 2020
The war memorial, which featured the carved figure of a general infantryman, was designed to honor the combat sacrifices of 3,100 residents from a section of Pittsburgh who had fought in the First World War.
The First World War was one of the two defining wars of the 20th century, setting into motion the rise of the U.S. as a powerful nation. Evidently, the vandal or vandals had little regard for those who died during it, leaving behind a splash of paint and messages on the monument that decried American military intervention within Latin America in 1986.
And why might that be important? Well, Pittsburgh is, historically, a working-class city filled with non-Hispanic people. It is also part of Allegheny County, which has seen the following trend as of late:
In this sense, the act is symbolic: it targeted something that the vandal had no attachment to, contrary to the old American demographic, and replaced it with something that might have meaning and value to the new demographic.
But are we really surprised? Why would a monument to Pittsburgh's long-dead combatants, paying homage to American militaristic intervention, be any less of a target for vandals than any of the other statues that have been vandalized recently?
There is this trend where people attack monuments that feature Confederate plantation owners like Robert E. Lee because of the whole slavery thing; but for those who are not descended from slaves, and instead the children of those who have witnessed American intervention in South and Central America, which is more personal? From the controversy over the Panama Canal to Fordlandia to 'Operation Wetback' - all of this took place while the American flag was flying, not the Confederate one. And the same goes for the American military's legacy of intervention, which includes Chile, Guatemala, Cuba, Nicaragua, Grenada, Panama and the Dominican Republic. Nothing could be sillier that expecting the new demographic to focus on the Confederate thing, something as immaterial to the people and past they identify with as rice fields or the fur trade.
Expect more and more of this kind of realization and aggressive action towards America's World War I - and World War II - monuments. After all, what is there for the new demographic, or in fact anyone but the declining demographic, to identify with once the idea becomes crystallized that these men fought for American interests and expansion? Up until 1945, this is what the U.S. military still looked like:
Even after that, during the Korean and Vietnam War eras, White, Non-Hispanic Americans made up 88.6% and 82.9% of the U.S. fighting force, respectively. Now, their numbers are moving towards 60% - and their kind is demonized.
In other words, a lot of these memorials fall into the category of commemorating those who were "just" dead white men. I am sure people are evolving - or devolving - emotionally to react to pedestalizing dead white men in a World War I statue as if it were the same thing as bowing before them. Come to think of it, that interpretation fits the modern thesis of feminism and anti-colonialism so perfectly, I actually find myself surprised that rage-filled aggression towards World War I and World War II statues is not yet an everyday occurrence.
Of course, that connection goes a long way towards explaining why the mayor on site, Bill Peduto, a Democrat, would wish to quickly condemn the vandalism in the strongest of terms; if such left-minded vandalism does become a new norm, the concession is that America's legacy, signs and symbols - up until when the country tried to reinvent itself in 1968 - are all for the taking as a homage to the white male power.
