DescentBB

EDIT: What an idiot, i forgot to post the link
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2004/time100/

I've been bed ridden for a while due to a bad case of the flu so i've actually been going to other places on the net rather than the DBB, and came across this crap on CNN. I know, i know, it's all a load of bollox, but it got me to thinking a bit.

Of all the influential people that affect me personally, and that is what this list is about, they're people that affect me in a negative way.

For instance, Bin Laden, for me is the most obvious one of late. This tosser has influenced me 'cause i can't walk down the street in any capital city without having his intentions niggling away, however small in the back of my mind. Call me paranoid if you want but there it is.

Arafat and various leaders of Israels government for obvious reasons (please don't make this a thread issue).

I can't think of one positive influential person in my life, and thinking about it maybe theres a difference between me and guys who are trying to help out under terrible circumstances in a war torn country, and i just don't know them. Is that a reflection upon me though, that i have no positive influences or upon the world we're living in.

When i was a kid Kerouac, Dylan, Bowie and Hemmingway were my heroes....maybe when you grow up you just don't get influenced anymore. Thats sad in a way. Ramble Ramble Ramble

Ok i'll leave you alone now, I'm off to feel sorry for myself.

FC

The media dwells a lot on the negative. For every Bin Laden in this world, there are millions of people are there doing good and helping others. You just never hear about them. It's part of the heroic characteristic though. So many of these actions are thankless, and heroes generally don't want the spotlight for their deeds, whereas egomaniacs like Bin Laden can't live without the attention.

You don't know their names. They are the "scientists" or the "volunteers." But they are out there saving the world in their own small way.

http://www.tibet.com/

there's this little known guy they called the dalai lama who is an unbelievable example of wisdom on this planet.

there's one.

Real heros don't want to be noticed. They do their good deeds and wander off. ("Who was that masked man?")

edit: skimmed, Kyr already said this...

pat tilman.

I know this is going to sound trite but here goes.

There are two people who influence my life on a daily basis.

One is my baby daughter. She is teaching me what true joy is. In my world of work and grad school I tend to get very stressed and much too busy to really enjoy the little things. Then I see her completely absorbed in and fascinated by a blade of grass. Things like that touch me in a profound way. No matter how busy I get, I spend at least a half hour a day (separate from the feeding, changing, and bathing) just being with her doing her thing. It is a wonderful experience. For those of you with kids I highly recommend it. Spend time with them on their level, doing what they do. Let them teach you. You will be amazed at what you will learn.

The second person who influences my life is my Mom. Even though she died last September, there isnâ??t a day that goes by that I donâ??t think about here and talk to her. The lessons she taught me while she was here are going to last a life time and I use them every day.

I canâ??t really think of any â??famousâ?

Ded, thats cheating, but certainly not trite, i'd say exactly the same thing.

So what makes heroes? Just the media? Here we go again. It seems to me that many threads here in EnC boil down to the crap that we're being fed by media outlets. We are our own worse enemies. We watch we complain, yet we can't stop.

Global gossip.

EDIT: link provided above....duh!!!!!

Cheating huh? Ok, fair enough.

If I have to pick someone famous it would be Lance Armstrong. Not because he is an athlete in my favorite sport but because of what he has accomplished. He has come back from near death to attain the highest level his profession has. He has shown people with life threatening illness' that they can be fought, and beaten. He has also shown what one can accomplish with the right attitude and outlook.

I highly recommend reading his first book. Even if you are not a cycling fan you will find it inspirational.

The only heros (as in presented by the media as such) that people know about right now are all dead.

I don't know about that. Every now and then, the media spotlights a common person who is out there doing good. See the report on ABCNews tonight about the black woman who fought against the Shell Corporation for thirteen years because a massive, Blade Runner-style plant they used was polluting the air around her neighborhood, and won. Shell still denies there was any wrongdoing and that the neighbors who died of respiratory failures were the side effect of something else. But they were countless studies made by curious scientists who refuted their internal investigation.

Root for the underdogs in this world.

I don't really have any one hero. Certainly, the firefighters and emergency personnel who rushed into the towers are my heroes. The people on the ground fighting in Iraq are my heroes, and those are just people in extraordinary positions. It's to say nothing of the scientist who works to cure cancer, the mother of three who takes in a forgotten foster child, or the social worker who tries to work with troubled youth. You rarely hear about these people. And frankly, I think they like it that way.

a hero is someone you admire for their qualities or actions right?

i'd say that anyone taking a resistant stand against overwhelming power is heroic. be it against a big company or what-not, like in Kyouryuu's example.

but what's a hero? i don't think i've ever really had to use the word before, not quite sure what it is.

i often see ppl doing heroic hard things against great odds, and then they are slandered and cut down by their ultra-strong enemies.
but i don't really consider it a mark against their character, it just makes them normal people.
maybe what i'm saying is that i don't believe in the existance of "heros", i believe in normal people doing the right thing.
there's more of them than often we are lead to believe.

i guess what i'm saying is that i believe that people of the world are essentially good.
infp

(edit: the closest thing to an actor i admire would maybe be Angelina Jolie (based on the making of tomb raider 1 + 2 dvd extra, but really: who knows how true that really portrays her) or jackie chan coz he's real modest.

How many people in today's world are really heroes? When I think of that term, I think of people sacrificing themselves for something they believe in strongly. I think of Martin Luther who defied the Church, William Wallace defied England as did the founders of our country and all the colonists who fought ill trained and scantly supplied. But those are considered heroes because of the forceful approach they took. What about Ghandi, or like meat said, the Dalai Lama?

Hemingway is still a hero of mine. In a time when everyone was writing in such a superflurous way, he came along and wrote like the common man. He bucked all the trends, fought all the "classics" and did what he wanted. It's all in how you look at it, but I don't think there are many today. If there were any, it'd be the 343 men that ran into burning buildings without hesitation.

Flabby Chick wrote:Ded, thats cheating, but certainly not trite, i'd say exactly the same thing.

So what makes heroes? Just the media? Here we go again. It seems to me that many threads here in EnC boil down to the crap that we're being fed by media outlets. We are our own worse enemies. We watch we complain, yet we can't stop.

what makes a hero? that's a tough one.
i'm going to rattle on about my life now, like a good narcissist

a hero is someone who stands by what they say, what they believe. a "not a sell-out". on this very dbb lothar and drakona are "not sell-outs" even if i don't agree with them at times. they are very true to their belief system.

prince (the musician) is a hero of mine because he has never been afraid to be himself. he did what he wanted while taking flak from black and white (he is of italian american and african american origins) and christians alike, and he is very much a christian (jehovah’s witness). he brought to light, in a very public and dramatic way, the "pay clique" system that the recording industry is. no one could do it like him because he is a pop star, master of the fusion of music, and is successful as a real musician (someone that can play a musical instrument). he is an ego-maniac, for sure, but can back up his ego with skillz. in the late 80’s he turned down a contract with the coca-cola company for some diet-coke ads worth 17 million dollars… he turned it down because he is a musician not some soda-pop salesman. ever seen your favorite pop star in a commercial? it’s really sad.

the dalai lama.
what can you say about a human that only thinks and speaks in a logical and positive tone?
not like the corporate workforce kind of “positive”… the smile that is not a smile. but a human that always looks for the half full glass. even when his homeland is being raped of natural resources by slime playing greed politics. even when his belief system is being attacked. he simply will not consider violence. it may seem impractical to you as we are a warring tribe. but to me he is a hero because he helps the whole planet with his real smile, and his never ending benevolence.

pat tillman.
a real person in 2004 who was of conviction and action. not some internet debater. someone who “did something about it.” someone who gave up the gold chains and strippers for the concept of a perfect world.

Would you turn down a multi million dollar contract, the fame of playing in the NFL to join the army? I agree with Cops; Tillman is a present day example of a hero.

My idea of a hero isn't someone why is stronger and better like hercules. I say a hero is the person who is scared half to death but still holds the line. If this is the true definition of a hero, then every normal soldier in every war is a hero.

How is Tillman any more heroic then any other soldier that has given up his or her life? Is the fact that he could have been raking in millions of dollars for considerably less risk somehow making him a better hero then someone who didnâ??t have the option of becoming a celebrity? Does how much money and fame that a soldier could have made as a civilian matter that much? He gave up no more then any other soldiers that have lost their lives. To define him as a true hero overshadows many other heroes who also fight and die for us. I for one do not think that celebrity or riches matters all that much compared to peoples lives, saying that he gave up so much when he went to war instead of going to play a game, I just donâ??t see it as sacrificing any more then the next soldier to come home in a casket. I see it as an insult to the poor American soldier that the rich get so much more attention.

krom,
tillman's story is amazing. that's all.

every soldier is a hero, some more than others. Pat Tillman was a bit different from your average soldier in that he didn't join up straight out of HS or college, he joined up after 9/11 when he saw the need, even though he had a lot of easier (and better paying) options. There's something special about that... and that doesn't devalue the sacrifices other soldiers have made; I'm sure if any of us knew another soldier's name we'd have given it (of course, *why* we know his name is a whole 'nother can of worms I'd rather leave closed for the moment.)

Another hero I'm surprised nobody has mentioned: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (check out http://www.stanford.edu/group/King/ -- great archive.)

Lothar wrote:Another hero I'm surprised nobody has mentioned: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Funny you should say that. I mentioned him a long time ago in this forum in a similar thread and got slightly flamed for saying he was more heroic than american soldiers who died in battle.

I would agree with that.

Malcolm X's autobiography is filled with references where he says, "he knows this cause will take his life." That he knows that any moment he is going to die for his cause.

I am not trivializing a soldiers heroic choice, but choosing a life path that you know will lead to your death is a tad bit more impressive then putting yourself in a situation that might lead to your death.

An amazing story, yes it is, but I am sure there are many more other amazing stories out there that will never be told because they were not celebrities. Had it been someone else, the media would have simply stamped â??one US soldier died in Afghanistan todayâ?

there's always the Dalai Lama.

The good thing about the Tillman story getting so much attention is it puts a human component back into the story.
So often we think of casulties of war only as a tally, like ringing up items at a cash register. It's good to be reminded of the individual human cost of war.

As to the sacrifice, giving up your life, surrendering your future is a much greater sacrifice than passing on a multi-million dollar contract. It made his story more interesting though and being reminded that soldiers are people too is the silver lining to the story regardless of the motives of the story tellers.

roid wrote: i'd say that anyone taking a resistant stand against overwhelming power is heroic.

In that case many would consider Iraq's "freedom fighters" are heroic.

Lothar wrote:Another hero I'm surprised nobody has mentioned: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

I would consider him a hero. I just didn't want to belabor the obvious heroes in the world.

I also feel, as I said before, emergency personnel are my heroes. When most would leave, police officers rush into the domestic dispute. When the towers are on fire and debris is falling everywhere, the firefighters and medics rush in. It's completely selfless behavior. Selflessness is a common trait among heroes.

Mr. Perfect wrote:

roid wrote: i'd say that anyone taking a resistant stand against overwhelming power is heroic.

In that case many would consider Iraq's "freedom fighters" are heroic.

Heh!

Krom wrote:Just the way they seem to be hanging on it, I feel it’s disrespectful to him and to the sacrifices of others as well. I’d like to see the media try and name someone in the Special Forces that is not there by choice.

i may be waaaaay wrong. but to get into special ops you have to apply for it.
i know what you are getting at krom... there are hundreds of thousands of soldiers getting shot at. i'm not stupid... i thank them for real.
his story is amazing because he wasn't a cocky prick nfl player. he was a thinking man in a sport full of show boats.

anyway... i wasn't trying to ignore the sacrifices of people your age that are being killed. just to clarify.

I understand.

hmm... maybe heros are people we find inspirational.
it's good to have inspirations, gives you a goal to strive for. "i wanna be like him".

i guess a mentor?

Kyouryuu wrote:I also feel, as I said before, emergency personnel are my heroes. When most would leave, police officers rush into the domestic dispute. When the towers are on fire and debris is falling everywhere, the firefighters and medics rush in. It's completely selfless behavior. Selflessness is a common trait among heroes.

from what i've been reading recently, it seems that there are personality types who are predisposed for selflessness. the welfare/happiness of others is very important to them.

They say there are a finite number of personality types in the world. That which is predisposed toward selflessness is common among officers, firefighters, etc.

Krom wrote:How is Tillman any more heroic then any other soldier that has given up his or her life? Is the fact that he could have been raking in millions of dollars for considerably less risk somehow making him a better hero then someone who didnâ??t have the option of becoming a celebrity? Does how much money and fame that a soldier could have made as a civilian matter that much?

in this case i think it does. pat tillman gave up a great life to fight for our country, and alot of these common soldiers you refer to are common soldiers becuase they turned to the service so it could provide them a life they couldnt attain elsewhere. not all of them mind you, but a large margin of them. war is the downside to free lodgings, a paying job, non taxable income, a gi bill, free education, free travel, etc. pat tillman did not join the service for the same reasons as other poeple. he joined the army becuase he wanted to fight for the united states. that to me makes him more of a hero, even if only slightly, than the majority of the armed forces.

he's not a hero here. it's hard to define a hero when you're talking nationalism. sure he's a hero in his country, but outside of it, he's just a soldier, or even an enemy!

for me, i'd say he's heroic coz he gave up money to do what he really wanted. urg, but what he wanted to do was goto war.

but think of this, the culture encourages these 2 things. (1) making money, or (2) nationalistically kicking ass. so all he did was drop option 1 for 2. so i can't really say he's got my hero vote there, since i disagree with any naturally inherent nobility in fighting for your leader. (what... did he save a child or something? no)

rambo isn't a hero. he's a dumbass.

I'll go along the same line as Copsy. Anyone given the chance to suck the corporate cock for money, and declines, is a hero. Hmm..know what, I don't know too many of them...especially today's <sarcasm>artists</sarcasm>.

Heros are parents that manage to stay together and love each other and raise kids that don't @$%ing talk during a movie. Aren't enough of them, either!

Testiculese wrote:I'll go along the same line as Copsy. Anyone given the chance to suck the corporate **** for money, and declines, is a hero.

ya agreed