It seems that an 18 year old Potomac student has been charged with plastering swastika stickers all over Potomac High School. Apparently this vandalism happened between April 15 and May 5 and were put on a resource police cruiser as well as exit doors to the building, lockers, doors and other conspicuous places.
The student, Joseph Barnes, was named since he is 18. It makes one wonder what possesses people to do something this stupid. Did he do it on a dare? Was he bored? Is he disturbed? Was it a senior prank? Or is this kid a Nazi sympathizer?
According to the News & Messenger:
On Tuesday, police arrested 18-year-old Joseph William Barnes of 2493 Fraser Court in Woodbridge in class. He is charged with five counts of destructing and defacing property, said Hernandez.
He was released on $3,500 bond and is scheduled to appear in court June 24.
Police said he was not charged with a hate crime because the vandalism was not aimed at any single “race, religion or creed.”
In August, four teens were arrested after police found sod that had been formed into a swastika in the parking lot of Sinclair Elementary School near Manassas.
In addition to the swastika, sod was also used to form “KKK” and “white power.”
There were 263 incidents of hate crimes in the commonwealth that year, according to FBI crime statistics.
Nationwide, there were 7,783 reported cases of hate crimes in 2008, according to the FBI.
Regardless of his reason, this stunt seems like a very immature thing to do. It sounds more like something an 8 year old would do, not an 18 year old who can legally vote. Now there’s a scary thought!
Er, if my 8-year-old drew a swastika ANYWHERE, I would be concerned.
Anyway, this guy is an idiot.
He’s going to be real popular in prison. And if this doesn’t put him there….I predict that he’ll get there eventually.
When my brothers and I were coming along, 8 year olds used to love to draw swastikas on things. I have no clue why. Maybe they no longer do that. People are far more conscious of symbols of hate now than they used to be.
I just rewatched the movie ‘To Kill Mockingbird.” What a great movie. In many ways it was so unsophisticated. In other ways, it was so typical, even of times I can remember in the south.
As I watched it, I was thinking how people used to let their kids run all over the place and no one worried, they were safe. I am not so sure everyone’s kids always were safe. Whatever became of author Harper Lee? Wasn’t she a friend of Capote?
Harper Lee was friends with Capote to the end of his life. She helped him with “In Cold Blood.” She herself started two more books but neither was ever published. LBJ appointed her to the National Council of the Arts; but from the 1970’s onward she retreated into private life. Still alive and living in New York City and Monroeville, NY, I believe. A quiet and private life. She apparently has nothing whatsoever to do with anything concerning her one great novel.
Doggone it, Moon. You continue to tempt me with questions like that and I am going to be able to get a BA in American Lit just through computer research!!
Little miscreant belongs behind bars for defacing public property.
I haven’t been called a temptress in many year, Wolverine. 🙄
Thanks for the info.
@Moon-howler
I recall kids doing that, too, but on paper, not on buildings. I also recall trying to copy them, but I never could. Something about the straight lines…
I had no idea what I was attempting to duplicate. I suspect Barnes did, though.
@cargosquid
Cargo, any hope for intervention before that happens?
As my church believes….repentance and penance is always possible……
Only an individual can change, one cannot MAKE them change.
Maybe if he takes the junk out of his face and joins the Marines……..
@cargosquid
Why would you wish such an idiot on the Marines? The Marine Corps doesn’t need or want trash like this. Maybe he could join some Foreign Legion somewhere. Now if you want a Marine to stomp the crap out of him that’s something different.
George, you know darn well that the Marines can take a guy like that, break him down to a nubbin, and then rebuild him into a man. That’s always been their stock in trade.
Too funny, George and Cargo. Miserable little toad. Too much face metal doing strange things to his brain.
Well, as I mentioned about repentance and penance, the Marines will take your SORRY butt and make you regret former life decision. What they make you do then will definitely be a penance.
My brother left a Jesuit Seminary and joined the Marines during the Vietnam war. My mother always thought that he had changed religions. He later mentioned that both the Jesuits and the Marines were fundamentally very similar. And that is all he would say about that….
@Posting As Pinko
Lol I am the “child” that did it. Why I did it was my own personal opinion. Thank you
Putting stickers on things is just immature when you are 18. However, how many people around this area are white supremist? Is this kid one? Is he just seeking attention?
I am not sure I understand the difference in modern day swastika party people, kkk, and all the other ‘I have a bone to pick with someone’ types.
Where did you all get this Marine Corp. idea from ..? He wanted to join the ARMY , he was a transfer student from TX from a AJROTC to my school NJROTC . He didnt do the smartest thing and i warned him not to do it because i told him this sort of thing would happen, he was just a white supremicist. But yeah , he only made a decision that would very much nearly destroy his life. You dont need to keep trolling on him over the internet, If your going to say something impolite say it to his face, And if you jus say ” Well i dont live near him ” Then that just proves your just as much a loser as he is hiding behind a keyboard over the internet . He was a friend of mine and he may not have been the smartest of them , but he of all things doesnt deserve to be bad mouthed by people he doesnt know . ESPECIALLY if you try to bring religion into it , Your just a very sad lonely person if you have to get pleasure off of someone elses decisions that werent of the smartest choices , im personally dissapointed that he did this but seriously , you guys really need to get out and realize that there’s a world outside of your laptop or computer. If you think its alright to bad mouth someone you dont even know for doing a stupid decision you really need to look in the mirror , feel free to defend your oppinion , but in the end you already know you were wrong.
Mitch, ordinarily I wouldn’t have let your post go through. However, sometimes our readers need to see the trash we have to deal with. Your post exemplifies it.
It truly sounds like you need to make better choices also–Better choices in friends, better choices in what to write, and studying harder in school. If you knew your friend was doing things like this, you should have reported him. As it is, it sounds like you are complicite.
Any time something evil shows up in our county, know that I can and will discuss it on the blog. The fact that you have made bad friend choices does not mean we will push evil under the rug.
Hey Mitch,
Why isn’t bringing religion into a good thing? I said it in jest, but, repentance and penance do wonders. He did wrong. Shouldn’t he change his ways. And the Marine Corps idea came from the idea that the Marine Corps is very good at making men out of boys…..
Just a white supremicist? And you don’t see anything wrong with that? We’re not bad mouthing him. We are commenting on his actions. Very public actions. I’m very glad that you are so certain that we know that we are wrong. You say “you guys really need to get out and realize that there’s a world outside of your laptop or computer”….
Boy, you need to grow up and join reality. There are hundreds of years of collective experience commenting just on this post. Once you break the law, you get to be a target. He did a stupid thing and now you want us to forgive and forget and leave him alone because you think we’re badmouthing him? Are you going to ask the law if they’ll just forgive him. What he did is a precursor to worse things. First, he is a white supremacist. Second, he vandalized property, insulted others, and associated himself with one of the worst, murderous, vile, and evil philosophies in modern history. And you admit that you knew that he did was going to do it. You had foreknowledge and did not notify the police. That makes you an accessory. And you just put that out on the internet.
Grow up.
Joseph, perhaps you would like to clarify why you would plaster hate messages all over your school. Help me understand why someone would do something like that. Tell your reasons.
Oh, and as a 25 year vet, let me tell you that we don’t want want racists in the military. So, we won’t mind if you guys stay civilians.
I would like to know why he did it, too. Seriously. I mean, if you’re not a neo-nazi or something, what possible reason is there to choose that particular symbol? I seriously just don’t get it.
As to children drawing swastikas (as in a 8-year-old), I can only say if s/he knew what it means and did it anyway, then s/he had some kind of issue. Kids don’t inherently hate particular ethnic groups. They learn that behavior.
Incidentally, I used the word “idiot” because if Barnes knew what he was doing and think he wouldn’t get caught, he was deluding himself. But maybe he wanted to be caught? Again, I just don’t get it.
“and thought” that is. Sheesh.
Cargo, excellent post. Good male answer for a boy who needs to sit up and listen.
Pinko, the kids I knew who drew swastikas weren’t white supremacists. It was a time when kids were fascinated with war stuff. Many of their fathers were vets. Later kids I have seen do it…not so sure. I think people who do it now have darker thoughts than little boys who are interested in war.
Do we know whether Mitch is for real? IF he is, then suggesting someone is “only” a white supremist, like that is O.K. , is extremely troublesome to me. Did Joseph Barnes do this stupid act out of maliciousness, well, we don’t know, he hasn’t given an explanation. For whatever reason, this act will follow him for the rest of his life. I hope he can figure out a way to change the path his life is on, maybe getting caught will create an opportunity for him to grow and change, maybe even contribute something to society in a postive way.
Joseph, if that is really you, let me tell you something. At a time when I was not much older than you, I stood in a part of the rubble of what was once the center of the great city of Berlin. The Russians and East Germans left much of it there as a stark reminder of the evil that had caused it, for the same reason West Berliners left the ruins standing of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church on their side of the Berlin Wall. In order to get to that rubble in East Berlin, I had to pass through that wall, through the barbed wire and tank traps, and guard towers and the machine guns pointed right at me. As I started to pass through, I saw a sign handpainted on the West Berlin side of it. That sign read: “Freedom Shall Not End Here.” And then I found myself in a part of that great city where families and loved ones were separated from each other and could only reunite if they had the courage to try to run a gauntlet of death. I remember one young boy about your age who almost made it to freedom. He got as far as the barbed wire before the bullets caught up to him. He was left to bleed to death on that wire.
My first instinct then was to blame those on the other side of the Wall, the ones with the guns and the widely displayed portraits of Marx and Lenin. They certainly did deserve my disdain and hatred. But, as I stood in that rubble, I knew that the true cause of all this grief was that very symbol which you plastered on the school. That symbol was the mark of shame which not only killed millions of innocents in the death camps but also, in effect, nearly physically destroyed a country and was the ultimate cause for a people, including some of my relatives, being separated for nearly half a century.
I have a dear friend who was orphaned as a small boy in Latvia. When the Nazi army retreated from Latvia and the Red Army entered, the people panicked. They had been for a long time virtually helpless pawns between merciless great powers. All my friend had left was his grandmother. She begged and pleaded with the captain of the last ship leaving Latvia and succeeded in placing him alone on that ship. That was the last time he ever saw anyone of his family. The destination of that ship was Hamburg in Nazi Germany, where my friend was placed in an orphanage for war refugees. And eventually the waves of bombers began to strike at Hamburg. My friend recalls coming out of the orphanage in panic and seeing people being literally disintegrated in the streets by those bombs. My friend thankfully survived. When the war ended, he was adopted and brought to America by an American couple. He spent the rest of his life under the blessing of Old Glory. He was a darn lucky guy, and he never forgot it.
That symbol you plastered on the school stinks for a whole lot of reasons, not the least of which is the unbelievable number of deaths it caused. My wife had an uncle, a young German-American farmboy from Kansas, who died under the guns of that terrible symbol, shot down as he tried to rescue a wounded comrade on the battlefiled. Another uncle just passed from us who carried painful shrapnel in his legs from the day he was wounded at the Battle of the Bulge. That symbol you plastered insults not only our Jewish bretheren but a whole lot of other people who fought against it or who lost loved ones in that terrible ordeal.
Placing that symbol on the school is not a joke for a whole lot of your fellow Americans and for a whole lot of people elsewhere on this earth. Memorial Day is coming. Go to Arlington and look at all those tombstones. Ask someone if they can point you to the grave of a guy name Audie Murphy, the most decorated soldier of the European Theater. Learn something about that guy’s courage. Then cross the Potomac and go to the Holocaust Museum. There you will get your second lesson in courage and understand the pure evil of that symbol.
Another very important history lesson just given. Thanks Wolverine. I hope young Joseph is taking the metal from his face and listening.
2 things struck me, however. 1. Those young communist soldiers who shot the boy really had no choice. I am sure they were drafted into the army and would have preferred to live in freedom also. 2. How many Hispanic families are forced to live apart? We can’t solve all the world’s problems but sure aren’t going about our own border issues with a great deal of success either.
@Moon-howler
I agree. Kids in the 70’s were too busy worrying about being wiped out by nukes in the cold war.
@Wolverine Wolverine, thank you for the heart wrenching post. Sometimes I think it’s easy for angry people to take their hate in a direction they know will get to people. Yet, these angry people are so far removed from our history that they are callous to what symbols like the Swastika mean.
I don’t know if movies or books like “Diary of Anne Frank” will move these kids. I don’t know if personal stories or museums or monuments will, either. Is history just a fairy tale to them?
The older I get, the more I understand and can visualize history. Now, I can’t go to the Viet Nam Wall, the Holocaust Museum or the piece of the Berlin Wall at CIA headquarters and not cry. I can no longer watch the movies. History has become more and more real to me (hence, my book). I can only hope the same happens to Mr. Barnes.
Incidentally, I think the piercings are cool, but I am not really mainstream in a lot of ways. Piercings and tattoos don’t really mean anything. The Swastika, however, DOES.
Pinko — Here’s something which may shock you. Mrs. W recently came home from a day of teaching history in high school. She was shaking her head in disbelief. Part of the day was spent showing a film about World War II. She told me that many of the kids did not even appear to know who fought on what side during that war. Maybe all of us are part of the problem as well. Perhaps we ought to reassess how we are teaching our own children.
ARRGGGHHHHHH! And as I say that, I have to admit to myself how very little I know about WWI. Nada. I might be able to get the main players right but thats as far as it goes.
What a shame and as the last of those who fought in WWII are no longer with us, the stories become part of the ages. However, they left their mark on history unlike any other generation–to be called the Greatest Generation. When I was coming along, it wasn’t history…it wasn’t that old to be history. Every conversation in my house began, ‘During the war…..’ I was primed. However, I expect my little brother didn’t get nearly as much of that. My kids got none of that even though I did the coming of age thing during Vietnam. Different. How do parents teach kids about WWII? I am not sure.
@Wolverine
I have to blush because I can’t memorize things like that, Wolverine. It’s one reason I focus on people’s stories and not logistics–for that, I have to constantly look up the details. I mean, I have memorized the basics like we came into WWII late and I know about Pearl Harbor and the main ideas. But if you asked me to list all the countries involved and who was on what team, I would have to look it up for the zillionth time. Are these kids the same way, or are they hearing about this stuff for the first time at an older age?
Maybe I need to attend your wife’s class and she can drill me. Then the info would stick in my head for at least a month or so : ) My mind is too often a sieve.
@Moon-howler
We talk about WWII in terms of the Jewish Holocaust, the Nazis and why people act the way they do. We talk about Viet Nam because we have Viet Nam vets in my family which makes it more personal to them. We talk about the war in the Middle East. We visit Arlington Cemetery, the WWII Memorial and the Viet Nam Memorial. We’ve gone to Civil War re-enactments and museums. I would not know any other way to do it because I know I could never understand history from just reading a book.