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Banksy Rails Against One WTC in Rejected NYT Op-Ed

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Today, Banksy penned an op-ed rejected by The New York Times (now posted on his website) in which he sharply criticized One WTC, calling the nearly completed building "104 floors of compromise."

The controversial street artist whose month-long "residency" on the streets of New York is coming to an end, wrote:

"It would be easy to view One World Trade Center as a betrayal of everyone who lost their lives on September 11th, because it so clearly proclaims the terrorists won. Those 10 men have condemned us to live in a world more mediocre than the one they attacked, rather than be the catalyst for a dazzling new one." He went on to call the building a "shy skyscraper," beseeching New Yorkers to "let the kids with the roller poles finish it off" because, according to him, the construction of One WTC boldly reads: "New York—we lost our nerve."

This, of course, is pretty ironic coming from a guy whose "street art" many New York graffiti writers associate with "whimsy and even gentrification—things the mainstream considers socially good, or at the least, nondestructive."
· Better Out Than In [Banksy]
· "Why taggers hate Banksy" [NYP

One World Trade Center Freedom Tower

72 Vesey Street, New York, NY 10006