Pokemon Go presence at Calgary military memorials irks veterans

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/pokemon-go-quebec-city-1.3710514

There are zero reasons why anyone need play this game. It is a nuisance, plain and simple.

If I catch anyone playing this game at or near a war memorial I will film them and then shame them publicly.

Millenials, idiots, people who could use their time more wisely, and those that lack common sense are just a few of my thoughts about folks who seek out Pokie-stupids, not just at war memorials, but anywhere.

Millenials!!!

Pokemon Go presence at Calgary military memorials irks veterans.

AUGUST 07, 2016

Canadian veterans and their families are expressing outrage that Pokemon Go trainers are hunting their digital prey at the nation’s military memorials.



Veterans Affairs Canada posted a tweet Saturday asking those playing Pokémon Go to “Please be respectful and refrain from playing Pokémon Go when visiting Canadian War Cemeteries & Memorials.”

Minister of Veterans Affairs and Calgary MLA Kent Hehr retweeted the plea, asking Canadians to “Please be respectful."

Calgary has several memorials honouring veterans and fallen soldiers spread through the city, almost all of which are Pokemon attractions.

Central Memorial park is the city’s largest with three “Pokestops” at separate memorials, including the cenotaph, where veterans and the public gather every Remembrance Day.

A nearby fountain overlooking the cenotaph is a “Pokemon Gym,” where players gather to do battle with other gamers.

As local veterans gathered in Calgary for National Peacekeepers Day Sunday, some echoed the call for the memorials to be left as places of remembrance.

“You don’t hide a Pokemon Go creature behind a monument,” said retired Lt.-Col. Rick Wright of the Canadian Association of Veterans in United Nations Peacekeeping (CAVNUP).

“That’s part of the problem, most people don’t understand what a memorial is, they think it’s a hunk of concrete.

“If you don’t have the background knowledge, you have no idea. To me, that’s one of the faults of the education system.”

Pokestops and gyms are places, generally landmarks, where Pokemon Go encourages players to visit so hunters can resupply items or battle their creatures against each other.

Memorials at Garrison Green — including Peacekeepers Park, where Sunday’s sombre ceremony took place, and Buffalo Park — are also “Pokestops,” as well as the placards placed on street corners named after veterans of Canada’s Peacekeeping operations.

Wright said some of the fault also lies with video game company Niantic, the developers of the popular game, for failing to know the significance of some landmarks.

The sister of one fallen Calgary soldiers agrees wholeheartedly with Wright.

Trish Hammond’s brother, master corporal Raymond Arndt, was killed while serving in Afghanistan in 2006.

“I would like it to be left as a memorial, not a playground,” Hammond said.

“It’s a sombre place, right? You come here, you remember, you reflect. I think it should be left as something like that.”

This is not the first time a Pokemon problem has been reported at Calgary monuments.

Last month, Pokemon players upset members of Calgary’s Jewish community by frequently visiting the Ashes to Life memorial, a sculpture honouring holocaust victims outside the Jewish Community Centre in Calgary’s southwest.

Much like the cenotaph and Peacekeepers Park, the Ashes to Life memorial is also a designated “Pokestop”.

Memorials in the United States have also been plagued by Pokemon players. The U.S. Holocaust Museum and the Arlington National Cemetery have previously asked visitors to refrain from hunting Pokemon while visiting the monuments.

For Wright, the message to Pokemon players is one of respect for the fallen.

“Stay away from the memorials,” he said.

http://www.calgarysun.com/2016/08/07/pokemon-go-presence-at-calgary-military-memorials-irks-veterans