Who is your hero?

SJ has a provocative post on heroes, wondering if it is even possible to name a living individual as a personal hero.

While it may be “jaded” to say: “there are no heroes,” it is certainly false to say so.

A more appropriate question to ask is may be: -Where have they gone?
In this age where entertainers, celebrities, professional athletes and political demagogues so easily capture our imaginations; our attention once held by accomplished persons, scholars, civic leaders, inventors, artists, writers, doctors, healers, and yes Presidents, -where are those individuals we would call heroes without embarrassment, qualification or excuses?

Who can I name without feeling like some silly thoughtless flatterer in search of someone to worship?

-And that’s the real truth isn’t it?

It feels weak, even juvenile to name someone a hero today. Perhaps, in our modern insistence on sober equanimity and self-reliance we just can’t afford them anymore.

Read the whole thing.

I don't have an answer, but I can offer these thoughts:

The reason it seems that we don't have heroes like our parents or grandparents did is that today, potential heroes can't hide their feet of clay like they could 50 or even 20 years ago. The moment someone in our 24-hour-news culture steps forward, she is stripped naked, every blemish exposed. Difficult to maintain a heroic posture throughout that.

Relatedly, the speed of information today means that today's hero disappears in the shadows of tomorrow's hero, who is long forgotten by the time we're praising next week's hero. New York State Senator Diane Savino was my hero for the superb speech she gave in favor of marriage equality, but then U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, I-VT, became my hero for standing up in the Senate and demanding radical health care reform.

Who is your hero?