{"id":23871,"date":"2011-06-13T19:43:31","date_gmt":"2011-06-13T23:43:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=23871"},"modified":"2011-06-14T06:04:13","modified_gmt":"2011-06-14T10:04:13","slug":"when-hero-rings-hollow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=23871","title":{"rendered":"When “Hero” rings hollow"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dan Gomez of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) had an opportunity to write a column in the New York Times…and he blew it. The title of his piece is “When “Hero” Rings Hollow”<\/a> and he started it out alright, but he should have ended it after he wrote this part;<\/p>\n

Even though I didn\u2019t participate in any solitary acts of heroism, like jumping on a grenade or being the guy who got Osama bin Laden, there are many who would say I am a hero for doing what others would not while putting myself at extreme risk. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That’s the way most of us see it. Not many of us think we did anything out of the ordinary or anything that one of our buddies wouldn’t have done for us. Listen to Sal Giunta. But then Gomez goes off on a tear;<\/p>\n

Calling everyone a hero is unfair to the real heroes who accomplish extraordinary things. It\u2019s also unfair to the rest of us who do important work, only to have it wiped away by being equated to the work of everyone else. Yes, people\u2019s hearts are in the right place when they call us heroes. But I\u2019d much rather a person struggle to understand what military service is all about, rather than just assume it\u2019s all heroic, all the time. In a country where so few people serve in a military that plays such a prominent role in global affairs, a little understanding can go a long way.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Is it really “unfair” and being “equated to the work of everyone else”? Seriously? Gomez defined heroism as doing what others wouldn’t do…but, ya know what…that’s kind of the essence of heroism. Admiral Halsey once wrote \u201cThere are no extraordinary men…just extraordinary circumstances that ordinary men are forced to deal with.\u201d But, it takes a special person to seek out extraordinary circumstances – the people who volunteer to confront those circumstances…run towards the sound of the guns…are the best our country have to offer and deserve to be called heroes.<\/p>\n

Sure it would make them feel uncomfortable, but not so uncomfortable that they would run to the New York Times and write a column that makes the $8\/cup coffee crowd feel better about their own inadequacies. “Hero” only rings hollow when hollow people make it sound so.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dan Gomez of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) had an opportunity to write a … When “Hero” rings hollow<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-iava"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23871"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23871\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}