So... It Looks Like They Want To Tear Down Newtown Elementary School And Rebuild It...

[WillyT]

That's the voting so far, but it has not been finalized.

Link: http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2013/05/10/sandy-hook-school-demolish.html

And I definitely understand the thinking... But...

How would YOU vote on this...

I can sympathize with moving on, but I'm not sure I would want the memory permanently erased.

What say you.

7 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Raze it and build a new school.
	4 (57%)
	Leave it as is, and as a reminder.
	1 (14%)
	Obligitory Other.
	2 (29%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
Show usernames Disclaimer: This is an Internet poll

[Buzz Clik]

1. No opinion at all. It's a decision solely of that community.

All other opinions are meaningless, particularly mine.

[WillyT]

8. Agreed... But This Poll Attempts (However Lamely) To Ask The Question...

Which is the smarter, or more appropriate, move?

I agree... in the final analysis... it's up to Newtown.

[Brickbat]

2. Other: This is so far out of any experience I have had, and I am so removed from what that town is

experiencing, that I find it meaningless to come up with an opinion on it.

[El Supremo]

3. Build a new one but rename it.

After Joe Biden.

[NYC_SKP]

4. I'll leave it to that community. (nt)

[Skittles]

5. I think they are making the correct decision n/t

[cliffordu]

6. Tear it down and build a memorial.

[glowing]

7. It's for that town to decide and heal from.

[Renew Deal]

9. It's the least bad option

All options are bad. I think it would be hard for people to send such small children back into the same building.

[WillyT]

13. And That's Why I Asked The Question... They Just Put The Topping On The 9-11 Tower...

It measures 1776 feet. It's cALLED THE "Freedom Tower" and it's a GIANT FUCK YOU to those that attacked us.

And...

We did not rename Pearl Harbor...

The Germans did not rename Dresden.

The Japanese did not rename Tokyo. Or Hiroshima, or Nagasaki...

We did not rename Selma, Dallas, Memphis, Los Angeles, Kent State, Virginia Tech, Columbine, Ruby Ridge, Waco, Oklahoma City, New York, Aroura, Fort Hood...

Off the top of my pointy head.

[Renew Deal]

15. I didn't mean all options in your poll

I mean the options for the community.

[Tx4obama]

10. Tear it down, erect a memorial - and build the new school at a different location. n/t

[AndyA]

11. I think they should update the building

Repaint, move some walls or something to give it a different look. Tearing it down is wasteful, harmful to the environment, and an expense that the community shouldn't have to bear.

The building is not responsible for what happened.

I understand all too well what the survivors are going through, I lost my Mother when I was 17--she was shot in our home. Tearing the house down would not have helped anything. I drive by it from time to time, and the new owners are taking good care of it, and love it as much as my Mom did when it was hers.

[longship]

12. You forgot the option for...

None of these options will bring them back.

Only responsible gun legislation will help make sure that such a thing might not happen again.

Only the total malignment and evisceration of the NRA agenda to turn the US into an armed camp will help.

The superstitious tearing down of a building and rebuilding it will do nothing.

This, especially when the grounds itself have been defiled. Maybe a priest ought to bless the land or the building or both.

Or maybe people ought to eviscerate the NRA... I like that option the best.

[Uzair]

19. +1000000000000000 (nm)

cfgn

[Ilsa]

14. Renovate it. Build a memorial. nt

[rgbecker]

16. Tear it down, Build a memorial to the NRA...the only winners so far.

[onehandle]

17. Tear it down and send the bill to the NRA. nt

[Uzair]

18. So Goddamn stupid

It's just a building. Clean it up and reopen it. The're going to spend millions of dollars because of some emotional superstitious nonsense? What do they think, it's haunted now?

This is like the ridiculous hoopla over where to bury Tamerlan Tsarnaev. Sentimental bullshit.

[Contrary1]

20. Leave the building, sell it, and erect a new school somewhere else.

Change how the exterior looks, renovate it. Maybe to an assisted living facility.

In the end, it is up to the city, but I hate to see any building torn down that can be put to good use.

[petronius]

21. I think if I lived there I'd want to tear down that portion of the building(s) and replace

the area with a memorial garden, reflective space, and perhaps a library and/or small theater. But I don't think I'd want the entire school to be erased...

[WillyT]

23. I Might Too... Unless Somebody Conviced Me That That's Probably What The NRA Wants Too...

They would LOVE to have this memory erased.

[Igel]

22. Leave it.

As with other things, the memory is only important to a small number of people living there now and many more who can make use of that memory to achieve their own goals. In 100 years, there'll be a plaque, a new school, and people won't give a tinker's damn about what happened there.

Think of it this way: It's hardly likely that those kids will be mourned more in 100 years than all the dead of WWI are today. The mourning that remains from WWI is largely not in the US, and even then it's mostly either lipservice to an idea borne of WWI or traditional and ceremonial.

The same is true of the wars fought 70 years ago and 60 years ago.

So to be honest, that "100 years" is exaggerated. In 10 years any remaining grief will be private. No political mileage will be obtainable from it except as part of a list of events so those professing suffering will be those who actually did suffer and haven't healed. In 30 years any remaining personal grief that bears the title will probably be classified as mental illness.


In 500 years, there won't be a plaque and when this century is summed up in the equivalent of 1000 pages it won't bear mentioning.

Life wins. It forever forgets to yield and limit itself simply in order to appease death and death's demands.

[Blue_In_AK]

24. They didn't tear down Columbine

My grandson will be going there in about 10 years.

I guess maybe they want to tear down the elementary school because the kids are so young and impressionable. I have mixed feelings about this, so I guess I'm an obligatory other.

[WillyT]

26. It's A Tough Question... Which I Leave To The Actual Community Of Newtown...

Yet... I wanted to hear what people here had to say.

[tammywammy]

25. I think they should renovate it like Columbine was.

Seems wasteful of resources to tear it down and rebuild. In the end, it's not my decision.

[Jenoch]

27. How would

tearing down a building permanently erase the memory of Sandy Hook?

[WillyT]

28. Great Question... It Wouldn't...

[Jamastiene]

36. I don't think it would.

It might make it so when residents drive through that area, they are not slapped in the face of that terrible day, but renovating it and using it for something other than a school could possibly serve the same purpose.

[sarisataka]

29. I can see pros and cons

to tearing it down, leaving it or renovating. Honestly I cannot say which is the better course.

This article which goes into how the school has become a tourist attraction makes me physically ill. http://news.yahoo.com/relief-newtown-over-plan-replace-school-massacre-023733921.html

[DevonRex]

30. I am glad we still have Columbine.

Good and bad things happen in buildings all over the world. The children who were there had to learn a very hard lesson about death in December. Now I think they deserve to learn the lesson of life that follows it. Life does indeed go on and your classmates still live in your memories. Razing the school in an attempt to erase one bad memory may seem to children to be an attempt to erase the good memories of their friends and siblings who were killed, too.

[krispos42]

31. Raze it.

Having their memories pressing down on the staff and students every day will not help anybody learn or concentrate better.

Build a new one on the same campus, but in a different spot. Rework the playgrounds and parking lots as needed.


Put a memorial on the footprint of the old school. Something nice, with lots of greenery.


Name the new school after the first person killed, if they can figure out who it was. "Dawn Hochsprung Elementary School" or "Mary Sherlach Elementary School". "Hochsprung Sherlach Elementary School" if they can't. (Alphabetical order).

[cherokeeprogressive]

32. I think it should depend on where the money comes from.

Building a new school in its place shouldn't negatively impact those students in the same school district who weren't directly impacted. By that I mean the funds to build a new school should come from somewhere other than the school district budget, and/or the STATE budget.

Otherwise you're simply negatively impacting children, present and future, who weren't impacted in any way in order to satisfy the emotions of not only those who were, but those who feel like they were.

[MADem]

33. If the taxpayers of that community want to rip the thing down and move on, who am I to tell them no?

[JDPriestly]

34. I would not want my child to attend that school or any school erected on that property.

I would always think of the massacre.

I would not want my children to be thinking of it.

I've lived in a town that was devastated by the Holocaust. Never again.

They should build a memorial on that property and build a new school somewhere else.

[Throckmorton]

38. Agreed

I actually know three families that have children that went to Sandy Hook, all three say their children don't ever want to walk into that building again.

Some ground is indeed hallowed by the events that took place there.

[Jamastiene]

35. Remodel it and turn it into a memorial for gun violence victims.

In other words, don't waste the building, just don't use it for a school again and change how it looks. Maybe they could use it as something else, something meaningful, something that stands for the opposite of what happened there, just not a school.

[Raine]

37. It's entirely up to them in deciding whatever is the best way for them to heal. nt