Posted on 09/12/2005 12:10:14 AM PDT by spycatcher
Today is September 11.
Michelle Malkin and other bloggers are buzzing about the proposed Flight 93 memorial, which bears a striking resemblance to an Islamic crescent. Zombie produces an animated image consisting of the memorial (rotated so the arms of the crescent point to the right) overlapped with the crescent of the Tunisian flag. The juxtaposition is nearly perfect.
Zombie also links to this image credited to "Etaoin Shrdlu". What you're seeing is an azimuthal equidistant projection of the globe centered on the Flight 93 crash site. On such a projection, the concentric circles represent a fixed distance from the center, and the angle of a straight line from the center to any point represents the azimuth between the two points. Etaoin's image shows that a line perpendicular to the endpoints of the crescent (that is, the direction the crescent faces) appears to pass very close to Mecca. Mecca sits near Saudi Arabia's western coast with the Red Sea, and as Etaoin's image shows, the crescent points right at it.
But I've always been one to go for cold calculations over pretty pictures, so I set to find out if indeed the crescent points towards Mecca. Here's what I came up with:
According to this site, the latitude/longitude coordinates of Mecca are 21.4234, 39.8262 and the coordinates of the Flight 93 crash site are 40.052, -78.8963. Using the calculator from this site, I determined that the azimuth between the two points is 124.80°.
Next I went to the Flight 93 National Memorial website and found the biggest overhead view of the memorial I could find with north oriented up. I measured the distance from tip-to-tip of the crescent and came up with 64px east-west and 90px north-south. The arctangent of 64/90 is the angle between north and a line drawn between the tips, which works out to 35.42°. Adding 90° to this angle gives the direction the crescent faces as 125.42°.
Conclusion: the crescent points towards Mecca with an error of 0.62°, or 0.17%. If you take a circle and divide its circumference into 580 equal arcs, the angle subtended by one of those arcs is the error. (Bear in mind that any error in my figures could change this value; the figure most open to interpretation is the distance in pixels between the tips of the crescent.)
I don't know if the architect deliberately made his design look like an Islamic crescent, or if it's coincidental. I don't know if the architect deliberately made his crescent point almost directly towards Mecca, or if it's coincidental. What I do know is that a memorial in the shape of a swastika would never be permitted, whether the resemblance was intentional or a coincidence. Nor would a memorial resembling a Confederate battle flag.
The strong resemblance of this memorial to an Islamic symbol, whether intentional or accidental, is grossly insensitive to those of us who find it offensive. The commission needs to go back to the drawing board.
fyi ping
I, for one, do not need further symbolism beyond the crescent. The crescent, used in this memorial, is bad enough. Worse than bad. Absolutely tasteless.
" Grove of Peace?"
More like "Grovel", if you ask me (spit).
Why not a monument of the passengers beating the crap out of the hijackers?
however, dis te minorem quod geris imperas as they say...
I hold myself as lower than the Almighty Mods ;)
Maybe I'm the only one, but I like the idea of appropriating a Muslim symbol to memorialize our first victory in this war. While it could be a tribute to Muslims, I think it could just as easily be a jab. Just a matter of perspective, I suppose.
This looks like an urban legend in the making. Someone sees something that's not there, puts it on the internet and an urban legend is born.
Personally, I'm in agreement with that proposal! : )
See you later....must get to work. Have a good day you two.
Exactly. I know people who said, "what's the big deal?" when I first told them of this outrage.
They had no idea that a red crescent is a symbol of Islam.
Once they knew, they basically said, "maybe AQ is on the design team."
I understand that line of thought, but think of it via paralell...
A year-long contest whose purpose was to honor the victims of the Holocaust ended with the selection of a design featuring a swastika-shaped grove...
it just don't wash, NL
as you are awake and pinging...
Yep, there's a lot of acerbic wit over there- the comments are the best part of the blog, and they don't suffer fools gladly. The "Kos Kids" get a lot of well-deserved ridicule.
I actually find some very informative links there, too. Good reading.
Where did you find overhead images on their website? I haven't been able to find any. Nor could someone else on another thread.
Horrific BTTT!
I thought that might be a good idea:)..You have a good day!
THERE IS NO MISTAKE.
THIS IS 100% INTENTIONAL
THIS IS 100% AN EFFORT TO SPIT AT THE USA.
EVERY SINGLE BOARD MEMBER SHOULD BE REMOVED FOR ACCEPTING THIS AS THE FINAL PLAN.
THERE IS NO ACCIDENT HERE. DO NOT LET ANYONE SAY THIS IS UNINTENTIONAL. THIS DOES NOT PASS THE "DUCK TEST".
this has me very angry.
Thanks for the ping! Jeepers...
"per se" means he was DELIGHTED at the intentional match.
the architec is a liar and should be made a pariah for any other potential job.
Like asking Goebles to run a day care center.
But it isn't a minaret... not really...
Nice work King,
It isn't the debris trough direction from what I can tell. Look at the "star" of the crescent in the memorial plan drawings. It's the grove of trees at sacred ground zero (to which he crescent technically points (It's "alinged to" Mecca for all the "points to" terminology complainers). You'll see the flight path there is marked out by a walkway line at a different angle.
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