Is Heroism Defined by One Act or a Lifetime of Actions?

[Evo]

In '69-70 I dated a SDS member who refused to wear a bra or underwear. She was a sweet person, though her political extremism eventually came between us.

He and I never discussed politics. mainly we drove around in his old 50's chevy convertible singing "The Lion sleeps tonight", or at least that's my favorite memory.

Tell me this isn't the all time best song EVER!

 

[Integral]

He was unable or unwilling to put in the hard work required to excel at the academy. He ended up in the bottom 5 of his graduating class, and ended up with a highly coveted assignment, nevertheless. It is not "Swift-boating" to point out that his academic performance was terrible and that he got preferential treatment because of his connections. I have a friend whose service in Viet Nam consisted largely of being inserted into North Viet Nam alone, acting as a forward observer for naval artillery. When the VC figured out his position, he would call in artillery on his own position before scrambling. He is quiet and modest to a fault - and a hero.

Both U.S. Grant and Ike Eisenhower were low or middle ranked on graduation from West Point so it is not clear that ranking high is all that. (MAcArthur was #1 in his class, Custer dead last so that puts Mccain along side Custer.. Not good company)

Perhaps he did get preferential selection for pilot training. However, I will bet that a good number of his instructors were aware of this, he probably was held to a HIGHER standard once he in training. He finished, I'll bet Russ knows the wash out rate for pilot training. His father and grandfather did NOT help him accomplish that.

I see a lot of very broad strokes about vets in this thread. It is simply impossible to but ALL vets into a single box, they are a very large and extremely diverse group.

To ALL: You simply cannot generalize about vets. The group of vets is so large that it will be very difficult to tell the average vet from the average American.


Yes, McCain was a war hero.

 

[Evo]

I have very high regard for vets and people in the military, but does getting captured automatically make you a war hero? Not in my book.

A war hero, to me, is someone that intentionally risks his life to save others. Getting captured is just unfortunate.

McCain was just flying a mission when his plane was hit. He did nothing heroic.

 

[Gokul43201]

He finished, I'll bet Russ knows the wash out rate for pilot training. His father and grandfather did NOT help him accomplish that.

The Rolling Stone article posted in the other thread refutes this assertion. Have you read it?

 

[mheslep]

Forty years ago. Let me repeat, FORTY YEARS AGO. That's probably longer than you've been alive.

People grow up. They change. He's changed.

Yes, yes people change and people also stay the same. You know Ayers has changed how? Ayers wiped out the long ago argument with his blatant unapologetic statements in recent times.

What part of "Obama met him when they happened to work on the same committee on improving education" do you not get? Like someone else here said, if you voluntered to work on a project and a pedophile was also volunteering, then by your standards, you are a pedophile. Obviously, this is absurd.

No, that is a strawman, I do not say Obama is the same as whoever he associates with. I question his judgment. If I am in a responsible position and find that an ally in the organization is an unrepentant [1] 'pedophile', then I try dammed hard to get the guy removed from the organization.

[1] Its unclear to me exactly how Ayers feels about the past within the context of the quotes, the timing, and denials. I don't particularly care about Ayers politics, then or now. If he has changed, has apologized about the bombings and the people that died, the criminal acts, that changes things. Then let the past be the past.

 

[Integral]

I have very high regard for vets and people in the military, but does getting captured automatically make you a war hero? Not in my book.

A war hero, to me, is someone that intentionally risks his life to save others. Getting captured is just unfortunate.

McCain was just flying a mission when his plane was hit. He did nothing heroic.

In my eyes McCain is a war hero because of his behavior on the deck of the Forestall. He could have, and perhaps should have died there.

Of course I would classify the BMSA (Boatswain Mate Seaman Apprentice) manning a fire hose that day a war hero also. The BMSAs did not get medals, and their names are now lost to history.

(IF you have never been there, BMSA is just about as low as you can get, rank wise, aboard a US aircraft carrier).

 

[Integral]

The Rolling Stone article posted in the other thread refutes this assertion. Have you read it?

No, but will. What issue?

 

[WarPhalange]

I have very high regard for vets and people in the military, but does getting captured automatically make you a war hero? Not in my book.

A war hero, to me, is someone that intentionally risks his life to save others. Getting captured is just unfortunate.

McCain was just flying a mission when his plane was hit. He did nothing heroic.

I thought it was him not ratting out anybody that everybody was claiming made him a war hero.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

The definition of "hero" has always confused me, mostly because they always call Charles Lindbergh a hero. It seems like part of the definition must be directly exposing oneself to danger, which would fit both Lindbergh and McCain.

McCain would actually seem more heroic, because whereas Lindbergh might be said to have been seeking the fame and glory in his flight, I can't see that McCain was getting anything out of it personally to enter combat. So if selflessness is part of it McCain seems to fit that too.

I don't think that Vietnam was a good idea and obviously we now know that it was begun via political trickery. But whether or not the war was just I have to think that McCain at the time took part in it and exposed himself to danger out of a sense of duty rather than self-interest or any other craven motive.

A pivotal question is, is heroism intrinsic or extrinsic? Is it the hero's beliefs and the actions he or she takes in regards to those beliefs that makes the hero or is it external things - whether the war was just or whether the hero got killed?

(Of course, an interesting thing is that by this definition Ayers would also be a hero because he could've gotten killed with those other Weather Undergrounders. But if you wanted to say that Ayers wasn't a hero, by saying his cause was unjust, well then the Vietnam war being unjust would also discount McCain from being a hero...)

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[LowlyPion]

FYI: The RollingStone Article posted elsewhere

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/make_believe_maverick_the_real_john_mccain

 

[NeoDevin]

In my eyes McCain is a war hero because of his behavior on the deck of the Forestall. He could have, and perhaps should have died there.

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/make_believe_maverick_the_real_john_mccain

Then, in an instant, the world around McCain erupted in flames. A six-foot-long Zuni rocket, inexplicably launched by an F-4 Phantom across the flight deck, ripped through the fuel tank of McCain's aircraft. Hundreds of gallons of fuel splashed onto the deck and came ablaze. Then: Clank. Clank. Two 1,000-pound bombs dropped from under the belly of McCain's stubby A-4, the Navy's "Tinkertoy Bomber," into the fire.

McCain, who knew more than most pilots about bailing out of a crippled aircraft, leapt forward out of the cockpit, swung himself down from the refueling probe protruding from the nose cone, rolled through the flames and ran to safety across the flight deck. Just then, one of his bombs "cooked off," blowing a crater in the deck and incinerating the sailors who had rushed past McCain with hoses and fire extinguishers. McCain was stung by tiny bits of shrapnel in his legs and chest, but the wounds weren't serious; his father would later report to friends that Johnny "came through without a scratch."

The damage to the Forrestal was far more grievous: The explosion set off a chain reaction of bombs, creating a devastating inferno that would kill 134 of the carrier's 5,000-man crew, injure 161 and threaten to sink the ship.

...

McCain displayed little of Hope's valor. Although he would soon regale The New York Times with tales of the heroism of the brave enlisted men who "stayed to help the pilots fight the fire," McCain took no part in dousing the flames himself. After going belowdecks and briefly helping sailors who were frantically trying to unload bombs from an elevator to the flight deck, McCain retreated to the safety of the "ready room," where off-duty pilots spent their noncombat hours talking trash and playing poker. There, McCain watched the conflagration unfold on the room's closed-circuit television — bearing distant witness to the valiant self-sacrifice of others who died trying to save the ship, pushing jets into the sea to keep their bombs from exploding on deck.

As the ship burned, McCain took a moment to mourn his misfortune; his combat career appeared to be going up in smoke. "This distressed me considerably," he recalls in Faith of My Fathers. "I feared my ambitions were among the casualties in the calamity that had claimed the Forrestal."

What part of this makes him a war hero? Do you have another source describing the event differently? If he had risked his life to help stop the fire, I might agree with you... surviving doesn't make him a hero.

 

[NeoDevin]

McCain would actually seem more heroic, because whereas Lindbergh might be said to have been seeking the fame and glory in his flight, I can't see that McCain was getting anything out of it personally to enter combat. So if selflessness is part of it McCain seems to fit that too.

I don't think that Vietnam was a good idea and obviously we now know that it was begun via political trickery. But whether or not the war was just I have to think that McCain at the time took part in it and exposed himself to danger out of a sense of duty rather than self-interest or any other craven motive.

Not saying that they know his motives for sure, but you don't either:

The next day, McCain embarked on his fateful 23rd mission, a bombing raid on a power plant in downtown Hanoi. McCain had cajoled his way onto the strike force — there were medals up for grabs. The plant had recently been rebuilt after a previous bombing run that had earned two of the lead pilots Navy Crosses, one of the force's top honors.

His behavior after capture was a little less than heroic:

The Code of Conduct that governed POWs was incredibly rigid; few soldiers lived up to its dictate that they "give no information . . . which might be harmful to my comrades." Under the code, POWs are bound to give only their name, rank, date of birth and service number — and to make no "statements disloyal to my country."

Soon after McCain hit the ground in Hanoi, the code went out the window. "I'll give you military information if you will take me to the hospital," he later admitted pleading with his captors. McCain now insists the offer was a bluff, designed to fool the enemy into giving him medical treatment. In fact, his wounds were attended to only after the North Vietnamese discovered that his father was a Navy admiral. What has never been disclosed is the manner in which they found out: McCain told them.

...

"This business of my country before my life?" Dramesi [one of the few POWs who remained silent under years of torture] says. "Well, he had that opportunity and failed miserably. If it really were country first, John McCain would probably be walking around without one or two arms or legs — or he'd be dead."

Once the Vietnamese realized they had captured the man they called the "crown prince," they had every motivation to keep McCain alive. His value as a propaganda tool and bargaining chip was far greater than any military intelligence he could provide, and McCain knew it. "It was hard not to see how pleased the Vietnamese were to have captured an admiral's son," he writes, "and I knew that my father's identity was directly related to my survival." But during the course of his medical treatment, McCain followed through on his offer of military information. Only two weeks after his capture, the North Vietnamese press issued a report — picked up by The New York Times — in which McCain was quoted as saying that the war was "moving to the advantage of North Vietnam and the United States appears to be isolated." He also provided the name of his ship, the number of raids he had flown, his squadron number and the target of his final raid.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Yeah, you're right. He probably didn't even get shot down - he probably ejected on purpose to get the medals and recognition as a POW. It says in that article that he only got tortured for two years, not the full five and a half.

[/SARCASM]

It just seems to me that if there was really that much craven self-interest involved he would've taken the early release. Minimize it if you will; yeah, he could have been even more heroic, but I personally am not entirely certain I could have, and would have, done as much as he did.

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[Integral]

What part of this makes him a war hero? Do you have another source describing the event differently? If he had risked his life to help stop the fire, I might agree with you... surviving doesn't make him a hero.

I guess my 2 yrs aboard an air craft carrier, give me the right to disagree. Simply surviving makes him a hero, and I implied nothing else in my last post. As a pilot it was not his duty or responsibility to lead a firefighting crew, it was his duty to stay clear of the fire and not get in the way of those fighting it. Looks to me like he did exactly as he should have. But then, as I said, I only served aboard and air craft carrier for 2yrs so what would I know.

I was not a McCain supporter before I read that article. It certainly did not change my mind.

 

[Integral]

Yeah, you're right. He probably didn't even get shot down - he probably ejected on purpose to get the medals and recognition as a POW. It says in that article that he only got tortured for two years, not the full five and a half.

[/SARCASM]

It just seems to me that if there was really that much craven self-interest involved he would've taken the early release. Minimize it if you will; yeah, he could have been even more heroic, but I personally am not entirely certain I could have, and would have, done as much as he did.

As pointed out in the article, had he taken the early release, it would have been only after making statements that would have gotten him a Court Martial upon return home. Early release was not an option for him.

 

[Gokul43201]

If I am in a responsible position and find that an ally in the organization is an unrepentant [1] 'pedophile', then I try dammed hard to get the guy removed from the organization.

Obama was on CAC from 1995 to June 2001. Ayers expressed no regret about some of his activities as early as Sep 2001*. Got a time machine to spare?

[1] Its unclear to me exactly how Ayers feels about the past within the context of the quotes, the timing, and denials. I don't particularly care about Ayers politics, then or now. If he has changed, has apologized about the bombings and the people that died, the criminal acts, that changes things. Then let the past be the past.

Ayers did not conduct any bombings that killed people. He was never even charged with murder. His modus operandi involved destruction of property. The only people killed by Weatherman bombs were Weathermen themselves, and Ayers wasn't involved in those incidents. In fact Ayers took pride in conducting bombings with no harm done to people, as evidenced by this quote:

Although the bomb that rocked the Pentagon was itsy-bitsy - weighing close to two pounds - it caused 'tens of thousands of dollars' of damage. The operation cost under $500, and no one was killed or even hurt.

*Ayers has expressed regret about injuries caused by Weathermen bombings.

The strange thing about all these horrible people (Obama, Kerry, etc.) that have associations with detestable anti-war protesters (that killed no one) is the other side of the story; all the great associations people (Kerry, McCain, etc.) have with some wonderful Vietnam vets that tortured, raped and murdered thousands of Vietnamese civilians.

 

[Integral]

... with some wonderful Vietnam vets tortured, raped and murdered thousands of Vietnamese civilians.

I made a post earlier (perhaps another thread) about broad generaliztions about vets. Gimme a break... you have literary license to say things like this but please understand that you are talking about a very small precentage of Vietnam vets, this is the rare exception and not the rule.

 

[LowlyPion]

I made a post earlier (perhaps another thread) about broad generaliztions about vets. Gimme a break... you have literary license to say things like this but please understand that you are talking about a very small precentage of Vietnam vets, this is the rare exception and not the rule.

I appreciate that this is generally true. And I don't think anyone thinks that there were that many involved in My Lai type events, but I rather think the point was that John McCain arguably would surely have served at some point with some that were every bit as criminal and unrepentant in their war acts as what the McCain Campaign is trying to portray about Bill Ayers.

 

[NeoDevin]

I guess my 2 yrs aboard an air craft carrier, give me the right to disagree.

No, your living in a free country gives you the right to disagree, same reason I have the same right (though different free country).

Simply surviving makes him a hero

There is nothing heroic about simply surviving. I never said that he did anything wrong, but he did nothing extraordinary or heroic that I am aware of.

But then, as I said, I only served aboard and air craft carrier for 2yrs so what would I know.

And clearly you survived, so that makes you a hero too? Or is surviving only heroic if there's a fire?

 

[rootX]

There is nothing heroic about simply surviving. I never said that he did anything wrong, but he did nothing extraordinary or heroic that I am aware of.

And, he was surviving for himself not for the welfare of anyone else. A hero would be someone who intentionally risks/sacrifice his life for saving others.
Also, a person who is trying to make one innocent better off by making other (also innocent) worse off cannot be a hero.

 

[asdfggfdsa]

While I do wonder about him graduating near the bottom of his class, I don't think I'll pay that much attention to Rolling Stone; that is, until the same information is reported by something like the NY Times. (enough information flies around to make one want to protect one's own mind)

 

[Gokul43201]

I made a post earlier (perhaps another thread) about broad generaliztions about vets. Gimme a break... you have literary license to say things like this but please understand that you are talking about a very small precentage of Vietnam vets, this is the rare exception and not the rule.

I was mindful enough not to make the broad generalization that you've accused me of, but it seems that didn't matter.

...all the great associations people (Kerry, McCain, etc.) have with some wonderful Vietnam vets ...

I said "some", not 'all', not 'most', not any other generalization that you may have imagined.

 

[Integral]

Guys,
McCain was a pilot on an aircraft carrier. He did not hob knob with grunts "in country". Before being shot down had he even set foot in Vietnam? Once again I will point out the diversity of vets, this includes Vietnam vets as a subgroup. A major division that exists is officers and enlisted. There are rules against officers socializing with enlisted. The atrocities that were committed were done by enlisted, with poor or no supervision by an officer. (Yes there was a couple of officers involved in Mia Lie (sp). But figuratively speaking the grunts and their officers (major and below) live on the wrong side of the tracks from the viewpoint of a Navy Pilot. Navy Pilots place themselves in a category of military royalty. They DO NOT hob knob with dirty stinky grunts. (My apologies to all grunts out there, this is the view point of a Navy Pilot, NOT MINE!).

To imply an association between Navy pilots and atrocity committing grunts is silly, it just did not happen. Now if you want to argue that the pilots were the ones committing the atrocities.. That is a different issue.

NeoDevin.
The flight deck of an aircraft carrier is a dangerous place on a good day. Your dismissal of the fire is indicative of your lack of experience aboard a ship of any kind. You, of course, are free to have your opinion. I would suggest however that you make an effort to open your mind to understand the experiences of others.

In general I dislike this concept of Monday morning quarterbacking the military career of presidential candidates, or anyone for that matter. So please forgive me for defending a candidate that I do not support.

Vote Obama

 

[turbo]

I am friends with a real hero, and I hate to see the term over-used and applied to anybody with a reputation to burnish. If you want to know why Ed Feldman is a hero in my eyes, please to to page 39 of this PDF. This man has GUTS.

http://www.firstcoastdoctor.com/november_2006_issue_4.pdf

 

[CaptainQuasar]

@Integral: I have to point out that when you're telling other people they shouldn't be generalizing, saying things like "Navy Pilots place themselves in a category of military royalty. They DO NOT hob knob with dirty stinky grunts." kind of weakens your case. (Because you're generalizing about Navy pilots with that.)

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[Integral]

@Integral: I have to point out that when you're telling other people they shouldn't be generalizing, saying things like "Navy Pilots place themselves in a category of military royalty. They DO NOT hob knob with dirty stinky grunts." kind of weakens your case. (Because you're generalizing about Navy pilots with that.)

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Not as much of a generalization as you might think. Perhaps you would not have objected had I said "Navy pilots consider themselves as military elite"

As for hob knobbing that is not a generalization in the least. I covered that earlier in the post it is against military regulations for officers to socialize with enlisted. Then there is the fact that is true for ALL naval personnel aboard Vietnam Era aircraft carriers. You occasionally got to see Vietnam as a green haze on the horizon. Aircraft carriers did not pull into Vietnamese ports for shore leave. So there was NO opportunity for socializing even if there had been a desire.

A pilot may have been able to chat with an infantry officer while on R&R in Tokyo. However there were more then one or 2 of each it would likely end in a fight.

Let me make one other thing clear, the closest I ever came to Vietnam is when I was home on leave. I was aboard the USS JFK spending 15months in the Mediterranean sea. That along with 1 yr in Gitmo was my sea duty. Also I was a ships company Electronics Tech. The only time I spend on the flight deck was when all the planes were in the hanger bay or tied down.
A very good friend of mine was a BMSA aboard the USS Enterprise in 1969 when it caught on fire in a very similar manner as the Forestfire did in '67. So I have heard first hand tales of Fire on the flight deck.

 

[BadDog]

If you fly into harms way on a bombing mission you are a hero. If you put yourself in the line of fire for your country you are a hero. McCain is a hero; he could have died on that mission and others.
McCain was taken prisoner (victim of circumstance) like many others.
I don’t understand how being a POW makes ones character supreme.

Fred Thompson’s GOP speech...
“Now, being a POW certainly doesn't qualify anyone to be president, but it does reveal character. My friends -- (cheers, applause) -- this is the kind of character that civilizations from the beginning of our history have sought in their leaders -- (cheers, applause) -- strength, courage, humility, wisdom, duty, honor“.

Our troops today have fought and died honorably in the “Bush” Iraq war.
When I hear McCain and Palin campaign on how leaving Iraq today would be throwing up the white flag and surrendering to al-qiada without honor, it makes me as sick as when Bush and Chaney did it.

It just seems to me McCain feels he is entitled.
NO!

 

[NeoDevin]

Before being shot down had he even set foot in Vietnam?

Yes.

The fire blazed late into the night. The following morning, while oxygen-masked rescue workers toiled to recover bodies from the lower decks, McCain was making fast friends with R.W. "Johnny" Apple of The New York Times, who had arrived by helicopter to cover the deadliest Naval calamity since the Second World War. The son of admiralty surviving a near-death experience certainly made for good copy, and McCain colorfully recounted how he had saved his skin. But when Apple and other reporters left the ship, the story took an even stranger turn: McCain left with them. As the heroic crew of the Forrestal mourned its fallen brothers and the broken ship limped toward the Philippines for repairs, McCain zipped off to Saigon for what he recalls as "some welcome R&R."

NeoDevin.
The flight deck of an aircraft carrier is a dangerous place on a good day. Your dismissal of the fire is indicative of your lack of experience aboard a ship of any kind. You, of course, are free to have your opinion. I would suggest however that you make an effort to open your mind to understand the experiences of others.

I am not dismissing the fire, the danger, or claiming whether or not he did his duty in staying out of the way. What I am claiming, is that these actions are in no way shape or form heroic. If you are claiming they are, then I don't think `heroic' means what you think it does. Let me stress this again, I am not claiming that his actions on the Forestall were in any way improper, only that, as far as I can see, there is no basis in calling them heroic.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

I am suspicious that this judgment that he hasn't been heroic may be made on extrinsic factors - because his actions were taken during the Vietnam War or because he's a Republican.

Leaving aside everything except his imprisonment and torture - say, hypothetically, there was a Chinese human rights advocate who, in the course of fighting for her cause, was imprisoned by the Chinese government for 5½ years and tortured for two of those years. Wouldn't that person be a heroine? I would say so.

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[Art]

IMO heroism requires an active decision to do something which puts one's life at greater risk than one's compatriots.

Joining the military obviously fits this condition but in that case there are millions of heroes and so for the word to mean anything it is necessary to define it more closely as consciously putting one's life at greater risk than others doing the same job.

Being a prisoner does not require such an active act of selfless action. It is a passive act and so in no way incorporates the status of hero automatically. One can become a hero through imprisonment by accepting death or torture rather than reveal information to the enemy or by attempting to escape but there is no evidence McCain acted heroically in this way.

 

[Art]

Here's an interview with the 'lady' McCain corrected regarding Obama's parentage at his town hall

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nSdNVFoAMw&NR=1

She appears unrepentant and believes McCain was just being nice covering up for Obama

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Joining the military obviously fits this condition but in that case there are millions of heroes and so for the word to mean anything it is necessary to define it more closely as consciously putting one's life at greater risk than others doing the same job.

So risking your life and risking being tortured for your cause isn't heroic if there's too many other people doing the same thing? The Chinese activist is heroic if there are only a few other activists, but if there were thousands of activists or more the individual acts would no longer be heroic?

This would seem to mean that no fireman or policeman is heroic because there are so many of them all over the world facing high levels of risk to their lives.

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[Evo]

This would seem to mean that no fireman or policeman is heroic because there are so many of them all over the world facing high levels of risk to their lives.

But then you're saying every person that joins the military is a hero, which means saying McCain was a military hero means nothing more than he was in the military.

Sure, you can call McCain a hero, but it belittles the accomplishments of true heros.

The people mentioned in this thread I consider heroes. Now compare McCain to what these real heroes did.

https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?p=1674416

 

[turbo]

Sure, you can call McCain a hero, but it belittles the accomplishments of true heros.

That's what galls me, too. My friend Eddie removed a live mortar round from the abdomen of a Marine (both survived), and he was helicoptered into a hot fire-fight in which an Army unit was taking heavy fire. The unit was spread out and was getting picked off piecemeal, so he organized them and got them to move to a defensible position from which the wounded could be evacuated to field hospitals. He was a Navy doctor, not a warrior, but he had guts and initiative and he put the well-being of the troops above his personal safety. I maintain that if he had even 1/10th of McCain's connections, he would have been awarded two Congressional Medals of Honor as soon as he got state-side - one for each of these incidents.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

But then you're saying every person that joins the military is a hero, which means saying McCain was a military hero means nothing more than he was in the military.

I said nothing like that, any more than, as Art tried to imply, did I claim that all prisoners are heroes.

I'm saying that someone who intentionally risks and suffers imprisonment and torture for a cause they believe to be benefiting and safeguarding others - like the Chinese human rights activist or someone entering combat in a war they're fighting out of duty, rather than for plunder or something - is a hero. (Or besides direct combat otherwise exposing themselves like a nonviolent exemption combat medical corps or spies or the merchant marine blockade-runners during WWII.) And I think that simply risking that is pretty good cred for being a hero too.

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