Don't Do This In Remembrance Of Us

The politics of honoring the past and inhabiting public space for the present

Well, I thought I’d make a little more of a splash, so to speak, with my piece on the controversy over wading in the reflecting pool at the World War II memorial in Washington, D.C. I did on Twitter; so maybe nobody read the piece, or maybe magazine readers are more circumspect than Twitter users. (The second one, I’m sure.)

Maybe this is one of those local issues that doesn’t much matter to anyone outside of D.C., but every year, it’s a thing here. It’s hot, the part of the city with the memorial is pretty shadeless, and some residents and tourists always cool off in the reflecting pool, prompting anger from some veterans and people who consider it an affront to respect and gratitude. Wading is not allowed, per a sign—though dipping your feet in the water is, which is the technicality that got me started on this to begin with.

From the piece:

I was slightly befuddled by the signs posted there. They specify that sitting and dipping your feet in—which I did—is permitted. But they also say: “Honor Your Veterans. No Wading.”

I remember thinking at the time that this injunction was a little odd. First, it seemed odd that dangling your feet is okay but wading isn’t; and second, it seemed to suggest that the act of wading was somehow historically or generally understood as disrespectful to veterans in particular.

Maybe I was reading the sign too literally, reading a layer of meaning into it that it wasn’t intended to convey. But I was genuinely curious whether that sign was trying to convey some bit of etiquette that had been lost, or simply never communicated, to my generation. And so I turned to X/Twitter to ask: Why is walking in the water particularly disrespectful to veterans?

I find that this happens once in awhile. I’ll come across some apparently widespread, or once widespread, norm or bit of etiquette that makes absolutely no sense to me, and which nobody can really explain in a way that allows me to say, “Oh, okay, I get it.” Why dipping your toes is cool but wading is severely disrespectful? I dunno. I don’t get it. It would make more sense to me if you just weren’t supposed to interact with the water at all.

Maybe there’s nothing to the no-wading rule other than that it’s generally disrespectful and not befitting a memorial. But it was interesting how a lot of people answering my question didn’t say that, and instead said that my generation is stupid, or that the answer was arcane and complicated and too long for Twitter. Again, I dunno. As a conservative, I’m attuned to the possibility that there’s some piece of cultural knowledge here that hasn’t been transmitted to me, and I would like to know what that is. If that is the case.

As an urbanist, I think it’s a little bit unfortunate to see actual city residents in a heat wave being castigated by (mostly) conservative Boomers on social media. The idea that a rule that may or may not be more or less arbitrary is simply supposed to have a hold on how we’re allowed to use and inhabit public space…forever? As I wrote in the piece, does etiquette have a statute of limitations?

As people answered my original Twitter question about the wading rule, my particular audience ended up giving two sets of answers: conservatives, against wading. (Largely progressive) urbanists, pretty much indifferent to the whole set of questions around honor/respect/gratitude. It’s water. It’s hot out. Case closed.

I don’t like either set of answers. I’d like there to be a way to say, there is a set of rules somewhere that is true and real and specifies that we ought to honor the sacrifices of our ancestors, but a dispensation to those rules is given when it’s very hot out and there’s no shade and there’s clear, cool water right there. I wrote:

I found the arguments of the pro-wading contingent clearer and more sensible than whatever arguments the anti-wading contingent offered. But they also made me a little bit uncomfortable.

It almost seemed as though the people who care about cities, and their residents and visitors, have trouble with the ideas of honor, sacrifice, symbolism and deeper meaning—and in particular with the small-c conservative idea that these things still do or should exert some duty on us today. It gave me the impression that urbanism, at least in its typical left-leaning incarnation, is twinned with a practical, bare, unenchanted sense of the world. It reminds me a bit of the people you’ll occasionally see who suggest that cemeteries should be opened up for development because living people need housing. They do. But if that’s the whole story, what’s the point?

I think what I was trying to ask is, can we support urbanism without this metaphysical bareness sneaking in with it?

I’m exaggerating a little and also may be selling progressives short. Many of the pro-wading folks think the monument is simply a dumb design. They’re not saying “Go ahead, disrespect is cool,” like rebellious teens, but rather something like, “When large numbers of people ‘misuse’ your piece of architecture, that’s your fault, not the fault of the large number of people.” It’s a little like public and totally accessible sculptures that kids use as climbing toys, which make whatever space the sculptures are in stressful and inhospitable to parents and children alike.

I think most progressive urbanists would say the city and its public architecture should be kind and hospitable to its people. That maybe the idea of putting cool water there and then making it off limits—as if to invite the average person to share in the sacrifices of the past by purposely undergoing, or being made to undergo, some small but real discomfort—is an inappropriate principle for planning public space.

I think I agree. I’m not even sure if there are any anti-wading folks who think of it quite that way. So I’m still wondering if this is all a sideshow, or if I’m overthinking something simple—or if there are some real and very deep differences of values or understanding that “to wade or not to wade?” bring bubbling up.

Help me out here, leave a comment!

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Related Reading:

Benches For Whom?

Don’t Trad On Me

Can An Urbanist Be A Conservative?

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