The official name for this particular crime is mischief – something that brings to mind naughty children playing “nicky nicky nine doors.”
The unofficial name is a lot more accurate – vandalism. It hearkens back to the sack of Rome in the mid-400s. A quick check of any history book or Wikipedia reveals that a Germanic tribe named the Vandals pillaged the city for two weeks, during which time they knocked down all the city’s aqueducts, carried off a number of Romans to sell as slaves, took immense quantities of valuables, destroyed works of art and looted temples – even going so far as to take half of the gilded bronze roof tiles from the Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus.
The tribe’s name has come to be used for a deliberate act of destruction of public or private property – everything from defacing signs and walls with spray paint, to smashing windows.
Most of us can understand theft – not condone, but understand. People take something because they want it, or can sell it for money. They either lack honesty or are in a sufficiently desperate situation that need takes precedence over scruples.
Vandalism, on the other hand, gains the perpetrators nothing. They smash, slash, deface and contaminate. What makes the name of that ancient Germanic tribe live on in infamy was not winning the battle or stealing the loot – it was the wanton destruction of temples and works of art. The Romans could have understood them making off with valuable statues; smashing them was utterly incomprehensible.
Vandalism as we know it is often considered a senseless act but the perpetrators usually have a reason for what they do. The original Vandals certainly did. There was more to the sack of Rome than a gang of barbarians wreaking havoc for the fun of it. The Vandals got caught in the middle of a Roman power struggle and sent a very clear message they were a force to be reckoned with when it came to alliances and peace treaties, especially when a broken promise of an important dynastic marriage was involved.
We might like to think of their modern counterparts as drug- and alcohol-addled adolescents, without a thought in their little foggy heads, but most have a purpose to their actions.
Acts of vandalism are committed by gang members marking their turf, like dogs do with urine, except humans, being visual creatures, use spray paint instead of stink to send a message.
Some vandalism is done on a dare, by bored kids trying to prove how brave they are – if any act of petty destruction done in darkness, in such a way that the culprits cannot be identified, could ever be called daring.
Such acts are committed as hate crimes, by people too cowardly to openly state their views about certain individuals or groups.
The common theme seems to be a feeling of frustration, of anger and of striking out against a someone perceived as more powerful, wealthier, or better connected – or scary enough that attacks are best done anonymously.
In this, vandals have much in common with cyberbullies – hate-filled trolls who hide behind fake user names and electronic walls while firing off modern-day “poison-pen letters.”
The bottom line is, vandalism hurts. The damage may seem petty – after all, how much does it really cost to replace a window, mailbox, flag or gravestone? As the Vandals who sacked Rome knew, the real damage is not the cost of repairs, but the shock of the attack.
One can only hope that any would-be vandals with a half-baked plan to destroy or deface someone’s property, be it the Parliament Buildings, a local flag pole, or some rural mailboxes, gets hit with a timely burst of common sense, not to mention awareness of the laws of the land.
Despite its name, mischief is a real crime that does real harm. And it has real consequences.
There are ways to express disagreement, or even anger, that do not involve spray paint, Molotov cocktails, broken glass… or criminal charges.
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Pauline Kerr is a Local Journalism Initiative Reporter currently working for Midwestern Newspapers. She can be reached at pkerr@midwesternnewspapers.com.
