Festivities/tacky trinkets at 9/11 memorial in bad taste?

The part of this which bothered me most was the idiotic party. Why? Why have it there? The persons involved in this could have had their 'thank you' party somewhere else. Further, they crossed other lines by denying people access to the museum as they prepared for their shindig. Laughing, boozing, hobnobbing next to the remains and on a spot where someone was murdered. Way to go people. Maybe they'd get the message if people headed to a local cemetery and did this sort of thing. Of course, those persons would be arrested.

The restaurant thing is kind of strange and I can't figure why it needs to be inside the museum. Makes no sense even if Danny Meyer wants to sugar coat it and lie like a madman. 'we're not doing this for crass and commercial reasons.' Yeah, sure, like he isn't in it to make money. Sure he says some proceeds will go to the museum. I believe that will turn out to be the sum agreed upon in his rental agreement and categorized as RENT.

Moving on to restaurant absurdity: "We're just trying to create a thoughtful experience and bring out hospitality..." Oh please! They are just trying to make a profit. And what 'thoughtful experience'? How will this happen? Quotes from victim families on the menu? Naming items after the deceased as a way to memorialize them? There is no way, no how, to make an on-site of the memorial restaurant into a 'thoughtful experience' To do so, there would be a need for somberness. Somber wait-staff, somber diners, somber cashier, somber kitchen staff...

'Hospitality' Huh?! Are they planning to offer free coffee or other beverages to all visitors upon leaving the museum? No, there is no connection between this tacky restaurant and it's planned hospitality and a museum of this nature. This is not the frigging Guggenheim or Museum of Unnatural History.

The museum gift shop is another matter. Although some of the items seem questionable in taste (a first responder stuffed dog) it's a museum and museums do have gift shops. The Holocaust Museum in D.C. has a gift shop. If the proceeds are truly used towards the museum in some way it might be acceptable. Given the price of entry to the place, maybe take the profits and use them for school children on class trips to be given free access.

In terrible bad taste, particularly if its used to raise money Tea causes.

Sounds at the least like a huge timing miscalculation, and a probable placement miscalculation - do they not have ears to hear and eyes to see how dumb? but at worst, everything you and Sturgis say and more.

I can see a walk through for the Bigs, but with retiring to another place for cocktails, celebration of the opening.

Wondering, was there some big party in front of the Vietnam Memorial when it was finished? I sort of doubt it, but don't know.


Adds, I haven't read the link yet so don't know if the partying part was somehow exaggerated (doesn't sound like it). I can see a relatively somber get together, maybe with wine, say, at an earlier date, or maybe later date, when the museum was closed to others.

The restaraunt thing seems weird too - not sure I could sit down to a nice meal right there knowing the somber feel of the place.

But people are weird - when I heard about it and then someone said that Guards were first posted at the tomb of the unknown soldier, after tourists had used the grave as a picnic table.

Now who would do that? So I thought gotta be an urban legend, but no -- here it is on the US military website about this tomb.

http://www.army.mil/article/38013/

Well, I t hought it was tacky and in bad taste when everyone had to run out and buy flags and yellow ribbons and **** to put on their cars, homes and god knows what else after 9/11 which somehow was supposed to show their "support".

What a bonanza for bumper sticker manufactuers, and people who had a billion flags sitting around in warehouses.

But, what do I know?