I read the statements made in yesterday's paper by Tyler Britten ("WTC firefighter statue overly politically correct") and they infuriated me.

The statue erected in memory of the firefighters lost in the attack on the World Trade Center was meant to do just that — to commemorate the brave and dedicated men and women that lost their lives in trying to save many, many more.

New York is one of the most culturally diverse cities in the world, and it is demonstrated more profoundly in the ethnic diversity of the police force and firefighters.

Despite the fact that the artists involved in the design of the memorial statue had chosen three distinct men to celebrate in their valor and selflessness, an erection of such magnitude should have made attempts to accurately depict the situation: that many people of all races and ethnicities worked together to make the very best out of the very worst of crises.

The statue stood, in all its splendor, as beautiful and commemorative as it did inaccurate. There was no one man or woman (or any group of three, for that matter), that gave anything short of their all in trying to save the lives of their fellow citizens. They all did everything they could, and so should all have been represented fairly.

To be honest, a statue depicting just three men of three different races is not even entirely accurate.

There were many men and women of many different races that were intimately involved in this tumultuous struggle, and have in turn ,lost their lives.

Perhaps we cannot expect a single statue to be able to fully captivate the beautifully diverse population of Americans who fought to their ends on Sept. 11, but at least we can now say that we have taken a step in the right direction.