In the John O'Groat Journal

Quoted Text

Outrage after plaque defaced by vandals

Published:  03 November, 2010

VANDALS in Wick have outraged locals after defacing a memorial plaque to sailors killed during a heroic wartime act.
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Nine Caithness men lost their lives when the HMS Jervis Bay was attacked and sunk in the Atlantic in 1940 while single-handedly defending a convoy.

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MB

While I understand the emotion - is this not a bit of hype, and been blown up out of all proportion by one person, and because of the timing?

The report refers to vandals (plural) and and uses the word 'targeted' as if to suggest a team sitting down and planning this.

In fact it could have been one kid trying to prove he was 'kewl' to his mates, as the defacing is a tag and a childish 'joke'.

The matter could have been dealt with in a few lines, and in a few minutes by one of the specialist graffiti removal companies.

Now, 'kewl-kid' has had his action featured in the press, and his 'work' publicised for all his chums to gawp at, and give him a pat on the back.

I think it is probably because there have been a series of incidents involving war memorials over recent years and there have been calls for some sort of legal protection of them both against vandalism and also removal / destruction.  This one reason why there are attempts to get a register so that if there is any planning application for a site with a war memorial then protection of it can be included in the planning process.  Similarly it has been suggested that vandalism against them could perhaps be classed more seriously as other vandalism but probably all that is needed is courts to give out adequate punishments.

This does sound like mindless individual but could have been a group of people.

(I will resist the temptation to make any comments about Wickers!)

MB

Register sounds like a good idea.

More laws etc would be a pointless approach, as the current ones are not much good - it only takes a second or two for someone to 'tag' something, so not likely to be either seen or caught.

After all, if they can steal bronze gates and life-size statues of miners  - which mean lorries of some sort, a group of people, and more than 5 minutes to complete the job, then what chance of dealing with something that takes a matter of seconds.

Wiser locations etc would seem to be the way forward - memorials set in possibly isolated locations to mark the actual site of an incident will just have to take their chances (or be electrified - have to find a use for all that abundant renewable energy we will have soon ;) )