Alec Rawls and the Crescent of Embrace

Thought the controversy over the Memorial to Flight 93 had died down? Guess again. Alec Rawls appears to be thoroughly committed to the idea that the Memorial will be a nefarious shrine to "Islamofascism." (Dr. M wrote about this back in September: Dumb and Dumberer....psuedo-Islamic crescents and right wing idiocy.)

Rawls has written a number of posts over the past few months that try to argue the Memorial (both in its original and revised forms) has been designed in such a way that Muslims would be able to use different features of the Memorial to do salat. For example, that the orientation of the crescent allows Muslims to determine the proper Qibla (I'm not sure Rawls is aware of the term Qibla, as he occasionally uses the term Mihrab erroneously, when he should have used Qibla instead), and that the "Tower of Voices" is a sundial that will allow Muslims to determine by the shadow the proper prayer time.

Redesigned Flight 93 memorial still an Islamo-fascist shrine
Crescent Tower is Islamic prayer sundial
Tower of Voices also oriented on Mecca
44 dead people, 44 translucent blocks on the flight path

Apparently, Rawls hasn't considered the fact that many Muslims already know when the exact prayer times are each day - obviating the need for a "sundial" - or what happens on an overcast day and the "sundial" can't be used - I grew up a few hundred miles away from the site of the Memorial, and am well familiar with that part of Pennsylvania and its climate. I also don't think Rawls has considered more fundamental issues, such as the fact that Muslims don't pray to people, like Christians do, including martyrs, and even there I don't know of any Muslim who considers the 9/11 hijackers as such.


Of course, a couple of blogs have had a field day over Rawls' writings. Many comments question Rawls' sanity.

Committed Wingnuttia
Lunacy abounds
There's misogyny, and then there's Alec Rawls

Enjoy! ;)