glenn1
Lifer
Remember this famous photo? "The new Iwo Jima"
Well, a statue is being commissioned to commemorate it. But the NYFD has requested that the statue not reflect the original men in the photo, but rather men of 3 different races. Do you think this is appropriate? Why or why not?
Story Link
Firefighters Dan McWilliams, Billy Eisengrein, and George Johnson were captured in a now-famous photo, raising a flag, Iwo Jima-style, over the ground-zero wreckage. Copies of the photo--both legal and illegal--have spread throughout the world; the Record, the New Jersey paper that holds the copyright, is not enforcing it. So it would have seemed reasonable for the statue commemorating the moment, a model of which was unveiled on December 21, to have replicated the photo exactly.
Not so. At the request of the New York Fire Department, the sculptors who worked on the statue replaced McWilliams, Eisengrein, and Johnson--all white--with firefighters of three different races, because people of all races contributed to the rescue effort. While that is certainly true, the fact remains that it was those three firefighters who hoisted the flag. After all, the men depicted in the Iwo Jima monument, fashioned after another famous photo, are the individuals shown in the picture.
But perhaps we should just be grateful that the artists from Studio EIS, who created the statue, kept the firefighters male. In an effort to counter the ubiquitous images of male heroes at ground zero, the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund has produced "The Women at Ground Zero," a video showcasing women working at the crash site.
Well, a statue is being commissioned to commemorate it. But the NYFD has requested that the statue not reflect the original men in the photo, but rather men of 3 different races. Do you think this is appropriate? Why or why not?
Story Link
Firefighters Dan McWilliams, Billy Eisengrein, and George Johnson were captured in a now-famous photo, raising a flag, Iwo Jima-style, over the ground-zero wreckage. Copies of the photo--both legal and illegal--have spread throughout the world; the Record, the New Jersey paper that holds the copyright, is not enforcing it. So it would have seemed reasonable for the statue commemorating the moment, a model of which was unveiled on December 21, to have replicated the photo exactly.
Not so. At the request of the New York Fire Department, the sculptors who worked on the statue replaced McWilliams, Eisengrein, and Johnson--all white--with firefighters of three different races, because people of all races contributed to the rescue effort. While that is certainly true, the fact remains that it was those three firefighters who hoisted the flag. After all, the men depicted in the Iwo Jima monument, fashioned after another famous photo, are the individuals shown in the picture.
But perhaps we should just be grateful that the artists from Studio EIS, who created the statue, kept the firefighters male. In an effort to counter the ubiquitous images of male heroes at ground zero, the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund has produced "The Women at Ground Zero," a video showcasing women working at the crash site.
