I told myself I wasn't going to respond to you, or the couple of others, who have taken issue (putting it mildly) with my aversion to calling Amanda Berry a hero. But I'm going to take one last stab at attempting to get you to see the difference between a hero and someone who does something remarkable in order to save her own life.
Excuse me, ma'am, but all you have is an opinion just like the rest of us.....nothing more; nothing less. Many people, including Webster's, do not necessarily agree with your conclusions re. Amanda Berry.
I have great respect for Amanda Berry. She endured ten years of torment, the extent and nature of which we may never know, and the likes of which we probably could not even comprehend. That took a measure of great strength.
She was finally able to escape that horrific situation and, by calling the police, gained freedom both for herself and for the other women who had been held captive by those three animals who dare to call themselves men.
She may well possess heroic qualities, but what she did in escaping from this particular situation was borne (and justifiably so) of a sense of self-preservation. The fact that the others were also saved was a by-product of her saving herself. She no doubt would have behaved exactly the same whether or not there were others involved.
Nonetheless, she showed great courage......which is Webster's definition of a hero:
a : a mythological or legendary figure often of divine descent endowed with great strength or ability
b : an illustrious warrior
c : a man admired for his achievements and ]noble qualities
d : one who shows great courage
merriam-webster.com
Again, for this I applaud her. I do not know whether I could have survived those ten years, sane and intact. She did.
However remarkable what she did was, it was not, by most definitions, heroic.
Actually, its not by your definition of heroism. Remember that's your opinion........not everyone else's.
Medal of Honor recipient Pfc. Ross A. McGinnis, who fell on an Iraqi grenade that had been tossed into his Humvee, absorbing all of the lethal fragments and the concussive effects with his own body in order to save his buddies, was a hero.
Audie Murphy, who, despite being severely wounded in battle, continued to make intelligent decisions, saving lives, capturing enemy soldiers, and directing mortar and gun battles, was a hero.
Everyday firefighters who enter burning buildings, putting their own lives at risk, often losing them, in order to save the lives of others, are heroes.
Harriet Tubman, who spent a good deal of her adult life working as a spy, a cook, a nurse, and a conductor on the underground railroad, often placing her life in great jeopardy, in order to ease the plight of slaves before, during and after the Civil War, was a hero.
Again, by your definition. Webster is far more liberal than you choose to be about the definition as I demonstrated to you up above.
Amanda Berry ... at least by her actions on this past week ... does not fall into that same noble category. She is most likely a strong, stoic, survivor -- possibly moreso than I. But her actions in this circumstance were taken to ensure her own survival.
Heroes need to be placed on a pedestal above the reach of the rest of us more 'normal' humans. If we lower that particular pedestal, we are denigrating their unique brand of nobility and sacrifice.
Whatever.
In closing, might I suggest that you construct your posts in a way that is more in keeping with your tag. After all, verbosity isn't always a virtue. |
