Heroes, by Martha Thomases – Brilliant Disguise | @MDWorld
June 2, 2012 Martha Thomases 14 Comments
Memorial Day passed me by. I didn’t write about it last week. It makes me sad to think about the millions who have died in wartime. There is too much war. And I’ve had enough death, thanks.
And I certainly didn’t spend the Memorial Day weekend watching talk shows discussing Memorial Day. So I missed most of the hubbub about Chris Hayes’ comments on MSNBC.
First, a confession: I don’t watch a lot of MSNBC. I know that makes me a bad progressive, because they are supposed to speak for me. They don’t. I watch Chris Matthews because he’s the personification of Inside-the-Beltway Conventional Wisdom, which I feel obliged to keep up on. The others, for the most part, annoy me in direct proportion to how much I agree with them (and it doesn’t help that so many of them have Howard Fineman on every single day). That is, the more I agree with them, the more they annoy me. The exception is Rachel Maddow, but by the time she comes on at 9 PM, I’d rather zone out on a Law & Order re-run.
People tell me I would like Chris Hayes, and they may be right. I don’t expect to start spending my weekends checking him out, but it could happen.
In any case, this is what he said that caused the flap:
“Why do I feel so uncomfortable about the word hero? I feel uncomfortable about the word hero because it seems to me that it is so rhetorically proximate to justifications for more war. I don’t want to obviously desecrate or disrespect the memory of anyone that’s fallen, and obviously there are individual circumstances in which there is genuine, tremendous heroism — you know, hail of gunfire, rescuing fellow soldiers and things like that. But it seems to me that we marshal this word in a way that is problematic. But maybe I’m wrong about that.”
By Monday, he had apologized.
I don’t understand this. I mean, he used a lot of big words, and it’s kind of hard to parse what he meant in the first place. If, however, he is saying that not everyone who served in the military is a hero, he’s right. My own father, who was in the Army during World War II, would be the first to agree. He served his entire time as a cook in Harlingen, TX. It meant he made fantastic scrambled eggs, but he didn’t think it required any bravery or sacrifice.
Among my peers, almost all the men who served were drafted, and didn’t have the conviction or the connections to get out of it. My heroes were the ones who resisted, who went to jail or to Canada rather than participate in what we thought was an immoral war.
Today, we have an all-volunteer army, and, as a result, those who serve have a variety of reasons to enlist. Many do so out of patriotism, but not all. Some enlist because they can’t find a job. Some enlist because a judge “suggests” it is preferable to jail (which was also popular in my day).
And some enlist because they want to be heroes, and our society often suggests that soldiers (and sailors and marines and members of the air force) are the only heroes. You can only be a hero if you are armed and put yourself into a violent situation. There can only be heroism where there is death.
This isn’t true. Everyday, we can make heroic choices. Every day, we can stand up against hatred and bigotry. Every day, we can extend ourselves to help those who are unable to help themselves.
It’s not either/or. Acknowledging the heroism of a Gandhi or a King doesn’t take anything away from my dear friend’s brother, Richard Turner (who died in Viet Nam). There is no finite supply of heroism. There are not simply a few pieces of the pie.
There’s plenty for everyone. Bake your own.
—–
Media Goddess Martha Thomases thinks her husband was a hero for lying to his draft board and getting a deferment.
Mike Gold
June 2, 2012 - 9:17 am
A lot of men and women who enlist do so out of BOTH a need for a job and out of a sense of serving the nation. Of course there are a lot of other ways we can serve our nation, so deciding to put your feet in the close vicinity of IEDs takes a certain type of courage and dedication.
But courage and dedication alone do not make you a hero. That has become a much abused word ever since 9-11, and for some reason beyond my understanding we have conflated the word “hero” with the word “victim.” The people who died on those airplanes, in the WTC and in the Pentagon — and the people who died helping the people who died — aren’t necessarily heroes, but they are victims. If you want to know what a hero is, check out http://www.cmohs.org/
And remember, the definition of hero is directly related to who’s ox is being gored.
Martha Thomases
June 2, 2012 - 10:53 am
One of my personal heroes was Ralph DiGia. He was a conscientious objector during World War II, who went to jail rather than cooperate with the draft board. And while he was in jail, he organized a hunger strike to integrate the dining room.
Don’t know if I would have had that much courage during that particular war.
Howard Cruse
June 2, 2012 - 11:42 am
I watched a lot of people behave heroically down south during the Civil Rights era. I think that application of the word “hero,” like standing ovations at Broadway plays, is a form of approbation that’s widely overused. People who genuinely do heroic things are heroes. People who fall in a certain category of people who find themselves in situations that sometimes but not always call for heroism — not automatically so. This is not to deny that most deserve admiration if they meet their responsibilities admirably.
Ed
June 2, 2012 - 1:12 pm
There are so many wonderful, and more precise, words available in the English language, that I think we ALL end up overusing “hero.” How about admirable person. Very admirable person. Role model. Incredibly brave. Just a few that come to mind. But the news media, especially tv, have trained us to grab for the most dramatic word. Same goes for “miracle.” Trucker jumps out of his truck to stop a runaway baby carriage from careening into traffic: the guy’s a hero and the baby’s survival was a miracle!
Completely unrelated is the fabulous Italian deli on Route 22 heading up to Berkshire County. They have fabulous hero sandwiches, all named after notable Italians. All except my favorite, which is called the Ulysses. No amount of arguing on my part could convince the deli owner that Ulysses was Greek, not Italian. But you have to admit I was a hero for trying.
Pennie
June 2, 2012 - 2:54 pm
Ulysses is a man for all seasons–and my favorite book. I admit to being completly prejudiced here.
Pennie
June 2, 2012 - 3:37 pm
Funny…Mike G and I have been having a running dialogue about heroes off-line, then this appeared. I have so many heroes–musical, political, artistic…most of them left us something meaniingful…substantial.. Bravery, honesty, character and creation seems to be a binding theme for me. And Martha fits the bill quite well.
Pennie
June 2, 2012 - 3:47 pm
One other thing–most of my heroes questioned previously held assumptions; questioned authority; challenged boundaries and created new frontiers. I am grateful for those who have protected us in wartimes–all of them I’m not as familiar with many of them as I could be. But I know bravery when I see it. Mea culpa. I am far more familair with Rosa Parks than Sargeant York.
Mike Gold
June 2, 2012 - 4:08 pm
Originally a conscientious objector, Sergeant York got drafted into World War I, eventually hanged his mind about the CO thing, becomes the most decorated American of that war, and got himself the Medal of Honor, which to me is a hallmark of heroism.
He was never pro-war; he saw his work as saving lives. I gather in the aggregate; he was one of the Army’s greatest marksmen ever.
Hey, you know how it is with converts.
Pennie
June 2, 2012 - 4:34 pm
Thanks Mike.Learned some things I never knew.
Elizabeth
June 2, 2012 - 5:45 pm
You always go straight to the point, Martha. I, too, feel like there are heroes among us who are never acknowledged. Those who have fought against oppression, war, human rights violations and human annihilation across the globe are heroes in my eyes. I agree that it takes nothing away from Rich and others like him to acknowledge them.
mike weber
June 3, 2012 - 10:05 am
And remember: According to Saint Ronnie, Ollie North was a “true American hero”.
Kind of tainted the word for me.
Ellen Tebbel
June 4, 2012 - 8:29 pm
I am so ashamed. I can’t remember the name of one if my heroes who fought the good fight for wages etc, for the poor Farm Workers. Murrow did a wonderful piece on them “Harvest of Shame. Oh. now I remember the man, Ceaser (SP?) Chavez. When he said don’t buy grapes, I didn’t buy grapes.
That was my only way to help. Don’t patronize Wal-Mart.
Ellen Tebbel
June 4, 2012 - 8:36 pm
Another good thing to do is fight prejudice at the time it occurs. When someone tells the funny joke that aint funny, say so. I have done it, and will continue to do it. At least I hope it has good effect on perpetrator.
Whitney
June 7, 2012 - 9:33 pm
Divine Ms. M –
I’m embarassed to confess how much I enjoyed “Battleship”. Maybe it was because I saw it at the Casino theater on Catalina Island (LOVE art deco…) after passing the USS Iowa that was moored off San Pedro getting its hull scrapped before it came into port.
But I think the real reason was that they cast veterans in key roles. Could care less about the John Carter lead guy. The wrinkled dudes who lit up the steam turbines with a match and the Colonel who lost his legs to an IED and is momentarily mistaken for a cyborg…Heroes have a characteristic of causing others to follow them, to want to be like them.