[Discuss Thrower]

I generally see ones dedicated to people who die young, as in kids, a few Monett people I know have the number of a football player and his name as a sticker as he died in a car accident, if I remember correctly. For that reason I don't find it too tacky, though I have the feeling I see a lot more that are due to illnesses and that's a bit dodgier to me for some reason.

It just seems to be the trend, we see it in the NFL with last year's GU, the year before it LH and 21, the year before that it was 42. The roadside memorial is the most grotesque (in the old sense of the word) for me given that it makes drivers aware of the fact that someone expired around that spot. We see it for the major tragedies, such as the OKC Federal Building fence memorial, the future WTC memorial. In some cases it's warranted, but I feel like our culture is on a trend towards memorializing everything and soon we'll just be out of space and nobody can criticize it because it has such importance to those who it has affected the most.