Posted on 01/18/2002 7:24:28 AM PST by Starmaker
From the moment I saw the first plane hit the World Trade Center on television, and went outside to witness, to my horror, the second one aim for the next tower, time became a ghastly blur. I don´t remember whether it was days or weeks that went by without the stench of burning in the air and my view of the New York City skyline obscured by the smoke of flesh and steel.
But I do remember one thing very clearly. Out of the unspeakable horror rose a phoenix, in the form of an American flag, raised by three of New York´s bravest. I remember it like a cherished photograph, a poignant spark of hope and life amidst the inconceivable evil that brought death and destruction to my beloved country. Now some misguided people want to erase that one memory of goodness and replace it with something false.
The three men who raised the flag above the World Trade Center were many things. They were Americans, they were fire fighters, they were rescuers, they were New Yorkers, and they too, were victims. By happenstance all three men were Caucasian. At the time, no one questioned their race. It was irrelevant.
Now someone has made a statue to commemorate that one triumph, the one precious memory of hope and life coming out of that vast abyss of death and hatred. But the statue is a false memory. It doesn´t depict the three men who raised the flag. It depicts a politically correct version of someone´s vision of an ‘ideal.´ Instead of three Caucasian men raising the American flag, it has one Caucasian, one Hispanic man, and one Black man. However, upon closer examination, even that so-called ‘ideal´ is far from politically correct.
I watched some interviews regarding the statue controversy. Supporters of the statue claim that it is representative of all Americans. How can I put this strongly enough yet printably polite? Ah yes.... HORSE HOCKEY PUCKS!
If the proponents of said statue really wanted to be representative of the American people, they would have made at least one and one half of the people in it women. The argument against so doing is that it wouldn´t be representative of reality. My response is — so this is??? Where does one draw the line between reality and fiction? Women were victims, women were rescuers, and women serve as fire fighters, so how come no women?
Okay, let´s forget the women argument. How come no Orientals or Native Americans? Why only a Black man, a Hispanic man, and a Caucasian man? It can´t be because they make up the majority of the New York City Fire Department. Blacks and Hispanics only account for around 3% of the force. The rest are Caucasian. If the artist of said sculpture and its proponents wanted to be really politically correct, they wouldn´t have left out the original Native Americans, nor the Orientals, who make up a large block of this country.
This statue doesn´t belong as a symbol of America´s spirit in the face of adversity. Rather, it is a sadly accurate representation of that misbegotten idiocy of the late twentieth century called political correctness. In an attempt to be even-handed, some people with waaay too much time on their hands (and probably nonexistent love lives) decided to take the flavor, the zest, and the life out of this country. By denying and/or suppressing ethnic and racial differences, they have been trying to turn a vibrant and wonderfully diverse land into a tasteless melting pot of thin gruel.
A better place for this sculpture would be in the Museum of Incredibly Bad Ideas. Place it right next to such other reality distorters as Mein Kompf and the manifesto of Unabomber Ted Kaczynski.
Nobody could have seen the first plane hit live on television. It was shown much later on tape. Is this writer exercising dramatic license?
I'm pretty sure I saw it, days after the attacks.
She forgot to mention Lennon.
That was the beginning of a video made by a Frenchman who was accompanying an FDNY trainee on his rounds. That scene was in midtown, north of WTC. The FDNY people he was with then raced to WTC and he continued taping ... and got some of the most vivid scenes of the event. The complete video is making the rounds in FDNY firehouses but has not yet been shown publicly. Let's hope it is not buried.
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