LAHORE – WW2 kiss statue is vandalised with “#MeToo” graffiti. A hashtag used with sexual abuse stories was sprayed on the statue.
The incident happened a day after the sailor, George Mendonsa, died at the age of 95.
There has been controversy about whether the photo celebrates sexual assault since the pictured nurse, Greta Zimmer Friedman, said during a 2005 interview with the Veterans History Project that it was not her choice to be kissed.
“Suddenly, I was grabbed by a sailor,” she told Veterans History Project in 2005. “It wasn’t that much of a kiss. It was more of a jubilant act that he didn’t have to go back.”
The sailor was “very strong,” she told the Veterans History Project.
“He was just holding me tight. I’m not sure about the kiss… It was just somebody celebrating. It wasn’t a romantic event. It was just … ‘Thank God, the war is over.'”
Mendonsa’s recollection is similar. “So we get into Times Square and the war ends and I see the nurse,” he told CNN in 2015. “I had a few drinks, and it was just plain instinct, I guess. I just grabbed her.”
