Posted on 08/24/2006 10:53:16 AM PDT by areafiftyone
The 2,996 Project
The idea is simple, but powerful: have a special tribute for each victim of 9/11, with each tribute being created by a different blogger. We started 2,996 Project to coordinate the creation of the tributes, and that's what this site is all about. Here you can sign up to make a tribute yourself, on your blog (we'll randomly assign a victim to you). You can also browse or search through either the victims that have already been assigned, or those that have not -- and you can get pointers to more information on all of them.
A message from the guy who started it all...
For each of us something different about 9/11 brought the tragedy into focus. For me it was the sympathy and grief that poured in from overseas.
I remember a story on CNN that showed a Volkswagen Plant in Germany, where each employee brought a candle and placed it in the factory's entryway. I was staggered at the scenes of foreigners openly weeping. The closing visual of thousands of candles burning on the marble floor left me speechless.
The first tears I shed for 9/11 were as I watched the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace later that evening. That night the Queen had the Royal Guard play the Star Spangled Banner instead of England's Anthem -- a huge crowd of expatriates and British wept outside the gates. That tribute -- a national leader, even if for just a moment, diminishing their own national identity as a show of sympathy -- was one of the bravest and most touching political acts I have witnessed. And I remember wondering, if the situation were reversed, if we would have the courage to do the same.
Organizing this tribute has brought home to me, again, that these attacks, these pointless deaths, went far beyond merely a national tragedy. I have now personally signed up almost 400 bloggers. And as of this moment those 400 represent ten countries aside from the U.S. I have multiple participants from Germany, Spain, the U.K., Canada and Australia, plus one each from Portugal, Belgium, India and South Africa -- and I know for a fact that I'm forgetting some others.
In fact some of the most passionate pleas to join 2,996 have come from overseas -- people who weren't sure if their remembrances of that day would be suitable.
We in the U.S. often have a myopic view of the world and our place in it. But it would do us well to remember that we have family everywhere in the world, even though they may salute a different flag.
D. C. Roe
June 20, 2006
btt
I've read about 6 or 7 so far, only 2,990 to go. It really hits home when you read about individuals like this. And there's so many of them.
I'm honoring Ana Centeno.
I thought there was something wrong with it this morning too. What a shame. Maybe it will come back on. I hope so.
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