Letter to the editor: Vandalism ‘only a petty annoyance’

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The Constitutional rights of private property were trampled over the weekend in the 1200 block of Pattee Street by unknown vandals who defaced two prominent Trump-Pence signs with symbols of racist hatred.

To the editor:

I generally prefer to speak of things that are known or can be known. I know what I don’t know.

More specifically, I will not presume to know the motivation of the sign vandal. Neither will I presume to know exactly why all these Trump signs are still up five months after the election and three months after the inauguration. Only those who let the signs remain and those who vandalized them can speak of their motivations.

Quite frankly, I would probably take their explanations here with a grain or two of salt. We may never know the entire story, but that doesn’t mean we are not free to speculate.

I’m not going to say I know anything when I don’t, but that doesn’t mean I don’t know how the game is often played. Follow me here. Suppose the signs were left up as bait. When considering all the hard feelings of the last election cycle, only a very naive person would believe the signs could be left up indefinitely without being vandalized.

Please, do not presume to think I condone such activities, but I’m quite surprised it took this long before someone took it upon themselves to be rid of the aggravation. If I figured the signs would eventually be molested, I find it difficult to believe those who erected them did not also consider the probability.

They want to prove a point. It’s all about what they call “cancel culture.” The notion is that the left is trying to censor and silence all the rhetoric and influence of the right. It is a societal form of gaslighting. Indeed, the right has been the master of gaslighting long before the term came into popular usage.

This is particularly true of those on the religious right. They have advocated their form of cancel culture for decades. They would determine which movies should be boycotted and which books should be banned.

Enough of all that, though. I digress. The signs are merely bait and should be left alone and unmolested. They are not worth all the turmoil. To be sure, they are only a petty annoyance. For that matter, so is their being vandalized.

It is rather childish for anyone on either side to be upset about this. They amount to nothing more than a carnival sideshow. Everyone should stand down. It’s really only such nonsense.

Nick Eakins
Perry

11 COMMENTS

  1. It could be argued successfully, I believe, that Trump/Pence signs are in and of themselves racist and unAmerican, i.e., fascist. The campaign is over. It is past time to take down political campaign advertisements. You want people to not deface your property? Try not publicly displaying racist symbols of hate, which many of us believe Trump and Pence to be.

  2. Remove any message I disagree with, or I will vandalize it. You just got to love how the left views “Free Speech.” lol

    • Normally, when comments are submitted under a fake name and a fake email address, as here, the moderator does not approve them because anonymous comments are prohibited. About 75% of comments are rejected by the moderator for this reason. In this case, the moderator approved the comment in order to illustrate the phenomenon. Although the comment by “Connie Vorstin” is very ordinary and in no way controversial, the person writing it lacked the requisite courage to stand by the comment and be publicly recognized for it, and so it is — or would be — rejected. Kindly stand boldly by your bold comments, or the moderator will not approve them.

      • Perhaps a letter writer commenting on cancel culture that involves vandalism does not feel safe to be public with their actual name.

        • Just as newspapers prohibit anonymous letters to the editor, so ThePerryNews.com prohibits anonymous comments. It is as if you wished to speak in the open forum of a city council meeting or school board meeting but without identifying yourself. In order to enjoy a right, one must accept its concomitant responsibility. The right of speaking bears with it the responsibility of identifying oneself.

  3. A letter writer only feels safe when commenting on cancel culture by using a fake name but instead of understanding why there is a need to do so the publisher admonishes the letter writer for doing so….the irony is thick around here….

    • We thought ThePerryNews.com was a safe space for conservatives to own their tender vulnerabilities, but it must not be safe enough for the dangerous critics of cancel culture. They only snipe in camo.

      • Really? “Sniping”? Can’t we all say vandalism is wrong and not deem it “sniping” when one says it is wrong? You really want everyone to share who they are so the person who committed that crime knows who they are and then can make a visit in the dead of night with their paint? Do you own a house? Are signs okay but not homes? My house or your house is where you draw the line at vandalism? But signs are okay, right? Scold me all you want, but I have a family’s safety to worry about.

        • You are drifting from the point. It would be safest for you simply to keep still and let the unmarried renters mount the bold critiques of cancel culture over their real names.

  4. I recognize the tone, phrasing and general cadence of speech the anonymous poster is using here. One’s written compositions are nearly as distinctive as fingerprints. I have had an exchange with this person lately. I questioned the person’s intestinal fortitude there, too, as he or she refused to self-identify. There’s definitely a double standard here. If I must silhouette myself on a ridge in order to wave my banner, why should we hand someone a microphone so they don’t need to leave their cave?

  5. In the past, campaign signs were to be taken down after the election within 10 days. If we reinstated that law, we would not need to worry about vandalism after the election. The campaign signs also could not be erected until 90 days before an election. This may have only been a law in Iowa.

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