Posted on 12/27/2016 7:42:27 AM PST by artichokegrower
A day after a young mother died in a possible DUI crash that also killed a teenage boy, her friends and family grieved the loss while enduring some harsh criticism on social media.
A roadside memorial of flowers, candles and beer containers sprang up on Capitol Expressway near Snell Avenue at the site of the fatal Christmas collision, where loved ones of Jessica Marie Zamora, 25, held vigils Sunday and Monday nights.
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
A roadside tribute to drunk driver that killed a young boy on Christmas Day complete with beer cans. Ain't multi-culturalism grand?
I’m kind of appalled at the placement of memorials at the side of the road for lost loved ones. I never saw it until I moved to KY. They are everywhere. And some have been up for many years, complete with solar powered lights.
That is what graveyards are for.
I’d like to see the governor ween the state off this sort of thing with a law permitting their placement to remain for a maximum of 90 days, followed a few years later by a law making them illegal.
Again, that is what graveyards are for.
Interesting comment at the drunk driver’s GoFundMe page:
$5
STOP DRIVING DRUNK
19 hours ago
STOP PUTTING ALCOHOL AT THE MEMORIAL WHERE A 14 YEAR OLD WAS MURDERED BY DRUNK DRIVER “PRIMA”. You are insensitive idiots. ALCOHOL CAUSED THIS and the boy’s family doesn’t need a reminder.
https://www.gofundme.com/33ecyc0
Ugly “memorial” and even though it’s off the shoulder I bet it is still an encroachment.
I agree. Where I live in PA, it started with a cross or ribbon on the side of the road where someone died. The state didn’t take the memorials away, perhaps out of the well-intentioned but ultimately misguided belief that it would remind motorists that people die on the highway. But then they started expanding with candles and flowers and other things that you would put at a grave. The beer doesn’t surprise me. If that is what this woman liked in life, people are going to put it there on the memorial. Once the state starts allowing this on the roadside, it opens a Pandora’s box. I think they should be removed, or the people putting it there should be politely told to put it on the grave instead.
You should see them in California. The Mexicans here turn them into shrines, complete with the tall Mexican prayer candles.
It’s a part of San Jose to stay away from
Yep, live not far from where this happened. I guess she drank Modelo beer as that’s what they were leaving at her roadside memorial so I hear.
Maybe someone will trash that memorial.
I’ve noticed a few crosses here and there...but the most peculiar (and organized) roadside memorial I’ve seen is a white bicycle:
Whenever I see one, I momentarily think there is a person riding a bicycle...about to enter traffic.
“Ain’t multi-culturalism grand?”
Pouring alcohol on a friend or colleague’s grave has been a tradition for thousands of years in all of Europe, north to south, and in most of Eastern Asia. This tradition continued even after the introduction of Christianity to Europe, and only slowed down after Protestant puritanism associated liquor with the devil.
They need to make white crosses with the inscription “drunk Mexican” on them.
Alcohol no more caused that tragedy than guns cause the deaths in Chicago every weekend. It is caused by BEHAVIOR.
How apporpriate.
I would like to see a torture penalty for all persons who kill another under the influence of a casual drug like alcohol. When you take a drug that causes you to lose control by the amount you voluntarily ingest, it's no different than a person with a gun going to a mall, putting a blindfold on, and firing randomly.
It's not the gun or the alcohol that does the stupid—it's the stupid person.
Roadside memorials are a distraction to drivers and should be banned. We don’t see these memorials in hospital rooms or other places where someone has died and the roadside should be no different. I agree that grave yards have a purpose. My front yard is not a grave yard and please don’t expect me to allow someone’s family to place a memorial to their loved one’s place of death there.
You should see what they do to the Catholic cemeteries at Christmas and Easter. It's appalling. I go to place flowers on parents' graves next to the San Fernando Mission and there are freeking Christmas trees with flashing lights and plots fenced in covered with tinsel and everything imaginable. It's pagan and the Dioceses that run those cemeteries need to put their foot and set some standards.
And they get shabby looking, after a time. Not a particularly attractive way to remember a soul.
We dont see these memorials in hospital rooms or other places where someone has died and the roadside should be no different.
I suppose they think the memorials will cause others to be more careful, but I think that is a very dubious claim. I see them on a lot of the curvy twisties where I drive. The accidents were the result of texting, falling asleep or drinking, with the rare deer hit that resulted in human deaths.
i.e. they are not really going to reduce that sort of thing by their mere presence.
I absolutely detest these road side memorials. It is almost as though the person who died was buried where they died. We passed by one such shrine not long ago to see that several cars had pulled off the highway and appeared to be having a party or commemoration of some sort - beside an extremely busy highway - and a State Trooper had pulled over to tell them to leave. I’m sure it didn’t go well as we could see beer cans and bottles in everyone’s hands.
It may be insensitive of me but I have an urge to completely destroy those things and wish that they were not allowed at all.
Peach
My son would be 30 today if I hadnt lost him in a car accident. I have never been to the site. I know where it is and avoid it. I don’t know if any of his friends did one of these memorials but they are common here. If they help someone with healing or closure or whatever then maybe that’s OK. Personally I think they’re tacky.
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