Roadside Memorials and Shrines - Essay Example

?[Your full April 22, Roadside Memorials Roadside memorials, that mark the sites of fatal accidents, have become controversial. Whether roadside memorials should be allowed or banned is a hot topic of debate. On one side, roadside memorials store memories of loved ones for people, who tend them for months and years using flowers, religious symbols, and personal mementos; while on the other, they are a big distraction for drivers and road crews. They have also been criticized for improper display of religious symbols in public property. This argumentative paper argues that roadside memorials and shrines should be banned due to the dangers they pose to people, and also discusses some roadside memorials, whose images have been taken from internet search. MLA referencing style has been used properly, and the paper is summarized in a concluding paragraph. Tiernan, a lawyer in Colorado, says that the roadside memorials and shrines are “unconstitutional and a hazard” (para.3). According to him, there are three main reasons why roadside memorials should not be allowed to build and decorate. First of all, it is illegal to make use of public property to build shrines and memorials for private purposes. In other words, not an inch of public property can be used for private purposes without the consent of the owner, or court in case there is no owner. “…roadside memorials problematize some of our legal answers to debates about ownership, challenging our formal assumptions about the public-yet-anonymous nature of places like the highway or the street corner”, writes Wood (para.1). Hence, they are unconstitutional in this respect. Second, it is objectionable to use religious symbols like Christian crosses in roadside memorials. According to Tiernan, the use of religious symbols violates the constitution that demands separation of religion and state. Using religious symbols, like in figure 1, means promoting religion, and this is not allowed under constitution. Figure 1 shows a Christian cross as a memorial for a victim of a car accident on southbound I-684 in North Salem, New York. The cross has been decorated with flowers. Despite the fact that this roadside memorial is not big enough to cause distraction for drivers, yet it is making improper use of the Christian cross, which does not seem proper at public places. Third reason why roadside memorials should be banned, as asserted by Tiernan, is that they are a big distraction for the motoring public. A driver may get busy in reading the text about who got died, when, and how, written on the memorial, and may bump his car into something. And, if the drivers, for the sake of safety, are not supposed to slow down and read these memorials, then what is the point in building them at all? If the memorials are built on median strips along the highway, they are enough highly structured to be a disturbance for drivers. Also, if a driver loses the control of his car, and bumps into one of the symbols anchored into the ground, there are high chances that the driver will get seriously injured. Death may also occur from such an injury. Moreover, when mourners come to visit these roadside memorials to pray or leave flowers and mementos, they become a big annoyance for the traffic that may also get jammed, waiting for the mourners to clear up the way (see Figure 2). Roadside memorials become a bad sight for people when parts of them get stolen or broken. Figure 3 shows a broken Christian cross as a roadside memorial. When memorials with religious symbols break down, they not only become an unethical display of religious symbols, but also create a bad scene, which decreases the scenic beauty of the place. This makes them an eyesore rather than a pleasing memory. No doubt, there are other better ways of expressing love and respect to the deceased people, rather than making their deaths a source of constant annoyance for general public. Also, memorials decorated with stuffed toys and cartoon characters do not make sense at all. What is the point of mourning the death of a loved one by placing a teddy bear on the place of his death? It just does not make sense (see Figure 4). Clark (29-33) conducted a study on government policies about roadside memorials. According to her, government authorities are taking into consideration the building, maintenance and removal of roadside shrines and memorials due to the hazards that come with them. Government policies are being designed to limit the duration and type of memorials, and are considering removing them from crowded public places. Doss (391) has called it as memorial mania, because of the safety concerns. This memorial mania has made the issue of building and maintaining roadside shrines a controversial issue, both at individual and governmental level. Now, let’s have a look at a couple of roadside memorials, and focus on how they look like. Figure 5 shows a car decorated with flowers. This means that the victim died in a car accident. This memorial makes the family remember how the person died; and, for strangers, this memorial creates a terrifying impact. The negative effect that comes with it is that the onlooker might get terrified of driving, for good. Similarly, figure 6 shows a ghost-bike as a roadside memorial. This memorial means that the victim died while cycling. Although such memorials increase the aesthetic appeal of roadside, yet they tend to terrify people from driving and cycling. Summing it up together, roadside memorials are a hazard. They pose threat to drivers’ concentration upon road. They are also dangerous if drivers lose control of their cars and bump into them. They are not legal as they privatize the public property. They tend to disturb traffic flow. They make improper use of religious symbols, like the Christian cross. Broken memorials decrease the aesthetic appeal of the place. Considering all these hazards, it is recommended that government should take steps to remove and ban roadside memorials, once and for all; and, should discourage mourners to come on roads and annoy the traffic, instead of going to cemeteries for mourning. Figure 1: A roadside memorial to a victim of a car accident on southbound I-684 in North Salem, N.Y. Figure 2: Mourners are an annoyance for traffic < http://forums.vwvortex.com/showthread.php?5135612-Let-s-say-someone-put-a-roadside-memorial-in-your-front-yard.-.-./page2> Figure 3: Broken roadside memorial < http://tomeblen.bloginky.com/category/people/> Figure 4: Memorials not making sense http://photoartsmagazine.blogspot.com/2009_06_01_archive.html Figure 5: Roadside memorial car Figure 6: Roadside memorial ghost-bike < http://compleattraveller.blogspot.com/2011/09/new-york-city-ghost-bike.html> Works Cited Clark, Jennifer. “Views of the Verge: Roadside Memorials and Local Government Policies.” Journal of the Australasian College of Road Safety 18.2(2008): 29-33. Doss, Erika. Memorial Mania: Public Feeling in America. USA: University of Chicago Press, 2010. Tiernan, Robert. “Should Roadside Memorials be Banned?” The Opinion Pages. The New York Times, 2009. Web. 22 Apr 2012. . Wood, Andrew. “Should Roadside Memorials be Banned?” Woodland Shoppers Paradise. N.p., 2009. Web. 22 Apr 2012. . Read More