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Old 11-03-2018, 09:56 AM
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rcmigpilot
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Join Date: Feb 2002
Location: Berwick, LA
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Default How a Wal Mart static display can go very wrong

This thread is not meant to be political or stir the pot in any way, shape or form, only to inform others so they do not have the experience we did. I hope any political comments are deleted by the mods. I’m a member of the WARPS RC club in Berwick, LA. We host 2 fly ins every year, one in the spring to coincide with a local festival and one in the fall, usually the first or second Saturday in November. The Saturday prior to the fly ins, weather permitting, we do a static display at the local Wal Mart to hand out flyers and promote the events. We’ve done this display for years without incident, this year was different. We had been set up for about 2 hours when two ladies who claimed to be managers came out and asked if we had permission to be there and who had given the approval. Our club secretary who had obtained permission from the store manager spoke with the ladies. One of the ladies said we could not have political displays this close to an election. Apparently the 1/10 scale 727 done up as Donald Trump’s original private plane was considered by them to be political advertisement. Not sure how as he is not on the ballot and even though we did not agree with their objection we agreed to cover the Trump name on the side of the plane. At that point the other manager said we could not display swastikas or other racist symbols and had to remove two other planes. When we asked what racist symbols we were displaying she pointed to the two ugly sticks that were done in the traditional red and white with iron crosses on the wings, fuse and tail. When I pointed out that they were iron crosses, the German air force national insignia which is used to this day on all German military aircraft, and not swastikas we were informed we were causing a disturbance and had to pack up and leave or they would call the police. While we started packing up our club secretary tried to reason with the two managers, to no avail. One of the ladies stated that even though they weren’t swastikas someone might mistake them for one. Shortly after that the ladies left, and as we continued to pick up two sheriff’s deputies arrived. The managers had called the police on us, even though no voices were raised, no threats were made and we were cooperating. The deputies treated us with respect, understood the situation and were just doing their job, but the fact they were called in the first place is an issue.

I understand that it is their property and they have every right to decide what’s displayed there, and with the exception of the 727 that was just recently finished, this display was no different than any others we have done in the past. My advice to any clubs that do this sort of display is to get your permission for the display in writing and make sure the person you get it from is the final word, as apparently at Wal Mart any manager can call the police and throw you off the property.

I’ve attached pictures of our display, including one showing the Trump covered up. We didn’t have any German WWII planes with swastikas on the tail or any allied warbirds with swastika kill markings.




Last edited by rcmigpilot; 11-03-2018 at 09:59 AM.
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