The Flight 93 "Memorial"

I am not a big fan of memorials placed where bad things have happened. The OKC Memorial is the only example I have seen in person; it is beyond maudlin. I do understand that they provide closure or whatever. I am of the school that says if you need a memorial at the World Trade Center, put it on the 110th floor of the rebuilt towers, next to the Patriot missile battery. Or you could engrave all the names on the anti-aircraft guns and be done with it. But put the towers back up.

The 'Crescent of Embrace' planned for Shanksville is nothing but a memorial to the scumbags who hijacked Flight 93.

This is beyond just being a tacky memorial. There are elements of this design that seem to be directed towards honoring Islam; for example, the crescent in the design points towards the big cube in Mecca within a couple of degrees; it is a mihrab, which is a crescent muslims use to orient themselves so they can point towards the cube to pray. Also, a line drawn across the crescent seems to point at the terrorists target - DC. The crescent is even red, built using imported trees. One of the other elements is forty-four glass blocks showing the flight path in the design, which seems to indicate the number of people on Flight 93 - including the terrorists.

There have been a couple of changes made since the first introduction of this memorial; it is 'The Bowl of Embrace' instead of the crescent. Some trees were added, but there is no significant change.

There is more info here.

If you'd like to voice a comment on this memorial, you can go here.