Chris Hayes Is Right About Heroes

[[deleted user]]

On his show on MSNBC this Sunday, Chris Hayes dedicated an hour to the subject of Memorial Day. During the show, Hayes admitted that labeling all fallen American soldiers as "heroes" made him uncomfortable.

"It is very difficult to talk about the war dead and the fallen without invoking valor, without invoking the word hero. Why do I feel so uncomfortable about the word hero?" Hayes said. "I feel uncomfortable with the word hero because it seems to me that it is so rhetorically proximate to justifications for more war. And I obviously don't want to desecrate or disrespect the memory of anyone that has fallen. Obviously there are individual circumstances in which there is tremendous heroism. You know, hail of gunfire, rescuing fellow soldiers, things like that. But it seems to me that we marshal this word in a way that's problematic, but maybe I'm wrong about that."
Also read Digby on Chris Hayes, Social Distance, and the Tyranny of Personal Experience.

The backlash was as swift and fierce as one would expect.

http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum...

[Xdyj]

I'm not sure but I would guess many of the "bad things" soldiers did are probably just following orders or out of desperation. The people really deserve to be blamed are politicians who started the war and voters who supported them.

[Naomi V]

great article from Mother Jones. certainly not all soldiers are heroes. heroism implies some amount of self-sacrifice and nobility and you can't believe that everybody that signs up for the armed forces has those qualities. they are rare; which is one reason that we admire those qualities so much. you can respect a soldier without believing that s/he is a hero. of *course* the right would jump on this as an indication that Chris Hayes "hates" America and is unpatriotic. they have a very limited view of what makes a person patriotic.

[Xdyj]

I see, I guess it was some language issue. I thought "hero" just mean any good and altruistic person.