Who are the real heroes of history?

[Screaming Lord Byron]

Which individuals have survived all the revisionism, all the misinterpretation and slander to shine through as genuine heroic figures? Which heroes are flawed, diminished and tarnished by their actions? Which individuals deserve heroic status? Who has that status but is not deserving of it? What is a hero?

Here's a few to start the ball rolling.
Who's the great Scottish hero of the following?
William Wallace, second son of a minor noble with no military training who defeated the most powerful army in Europe, but later may have devastated the northern shires of England in a manner indistinguishable from the actions of his enemies?
Or is it Robert Bruce, an aristocrat who murdered his main rival in a church, but led the Scottish nation to a lasting victory and a peace treaty as the finest infantry commander of his day?
Or David Hume, a key figure in the development of philosophy?

Who is the great French hero from this list?
Charlemagne?
Jeanne d'Arc?
Napoleon Bonaparte?
Charles De Gaulle?
Rousseau?
Voltaire?

Who is the greater native hero, Sitting Bull or Tecumseh?

[July]

1. Raoul Wallenberg. n/t

[Screaming Lord Byron]

4. Most definitely.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

2. Thinkers all the way

Hume and Voltaire.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

3. Yeah, I think that's where I would be going.

Comparing Hume to Wallace and Bruce may seem bizarre, but for me personally, Hume fits the requirements of a hero.

[T_i_B]

26. I guess it depends...

...whether you agree with the thoughts of the thinkers as to whether or not you consider them heroes.

Myself, I'll take Adam Smith and Thomas Paine. :-)

[Enraged_Ape]

5. Bob Denver

So he smoked a little pot. I challenge you to come up with anything actually bad about the man.

For the record, it was Bob Denver himself that demanded that the producers change the lyrics in the Gilligan's Island theme from "and the rest..." to "the Professor and Mary Ann".

[HalfManHalfBiscuit]

58. Bob Denver was sure as hell better than John Denver

I'm not sure if Bob is still alive, but I'm damn sure he did not croak crashing a little kite-plane. And he damn sure did not sing any fucking "Rocky Mountain High" type songs. And he did not wear those fucking pussy round glasses.

I fucking hate John Denver. Bring him up again, and I WILL be coming after you.

[Enraged_Ape]

59. Take a chill pill, Biscuit man

and kick back with a little "Annie's Song"...

You fill up my senses
Like a night in the forest
Like the mountains in springtime
Like a walk in the rain
Like a storm in the desert
Like a sleepy blue ocean
You fill up my senses
Come fill me again

Come let me love you
Let me give my life to you
Let me drown in your laughter
Let me die in your arms
Let me lay down beside you
Let me always be with you
Come let me love you
Come love me again

Let me give my life to you
Come let me love you
Come love me again

You fill up my senses
Like a night in the forest
Like the mountains in springtime
Like a walk in the rain
Like a storm in the desert
Like a sleepy blue ocean
You fill up my senses
Come fill me again

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAHA HAHA HA!!

:evilgrin: :evilgrin: :evilgrin: :evilgrin: :evilgrin: :evilgrin: :evilgrin:

[terrya]

6. Rosa Parks is and always will be a true hero.

What she did was utterly and completely courageous. Her simple action (refusing to give up her seat on the bus) kicked off the civil rights movement in the 50's.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

7. That's a good definition of heroism.

The personal risk factor is a large part of heroism.

[LynneSin]

8. That mayor in SF - the one that decided to allow same-sex marriages

I kinda thought it was almost on the level of what Rosa Parks did. There was no way our government was ever going to allow a law that permitted same-sex couples to marry.

And like Rosa Park a generation ago did, sometimes you just have to screw what the law says and do what is right. I'm not sure of the name of the mayor in SF (aren't I the sucky liberal), but he's a hero. I hope he runs against the gropenator for governor.

[YellowRubberDuckie]

17. African Americans are pissed that the Gay's struggle for civil rights...

...are being compared to their struggle. I don't get it, but ok.
Duckie

[Mrs. Venation]

24. I Don't Think That's A Reasonable Statement

Coretta Scott King is on our side, for example. It would be more accurate to say that some African Americans are unhappy with the comparison.

Just my 2 cents' worth.

[YellowRubberDuckie]

51. You're right....Some....

I'm sorry. I was too general.
Duckie

[terrya]

27. Discrimination against a group of people is wrong and should be addressed.

Period.

Terry

[Katha]

60. You're thinking of Gavin Newsom

and while I don't believe what he did was on Rosa Parks's level, he was certainly courageous and took a big risk -- he's definitely a hero of mine.

[seventhson]

9. Varian Fry(and others ) who ran an underground railroad out of Nazi-Eur

http://chambon.org/fry.htm

Americans and an international cast ran one of the most daring rescue operations of WWII by smuggling ant-fascist writers, activists, artists, Jews and others out of Nazi-occupied Europe.

An almost unknown story.

A valuable lesson for us today.

Among the rescued: Hannah Arendt, Konrad Heiden, Thomas Mann Jr., Marc Chagall, Max Ernst, Andre Breton, Franz Werfel, Alma Mahler, Lion Feuchtwanger and Victor Serge

[Screaming Lord Byron]

10. Very Interesting. Thanks for the link.

[seventhson]

11. I have interviewed several of these people for my upcoming book

which covers this story.

It is an AMAZING story.

And these folks KNEW about the Wall Street (Bush, Rockefeller, Morgan) ties to Hitler. THAT is what they were up against.

[bobbieinok]

15. Arendt and others - incredible!!!!!!

[seventhson]

18. Here's a short list of those rescued by American Mission Impossible Team

http://chambon.org/2000.htm




Some of the 2,000 people assisted by Varian Fry

and the Emergency Rescue Committee









(in alphabetical order per category)





Art

Marc Chagall, artist

Marcel Duchamp, artist

Max Ernst, artist

Wifredo Lam, artist

Jacques Lipchitz, sculptor

Chaim Lipnitski, photographer

André Masson, artist

Hans Namuth, photographer

Charles Sterling, museum curator

Bruno Strauss, art critic

Paul Westheim, art critic

Ylla (Camilla Koffler), photographer





Writers, Publishers, Editors

Hannah Arendt, writer

Georg Bernhard, newspaper editor

André Breton, writer

Heinrich Ehrmann, economist

Lion Feuchtwanger, novelist

Leonard Frank, novelist

Giuseppe Garetto, novelist

Oscar Goldberg, scholar

Hans Habe, novelist

Konrad Heiden, writer, biographer of Hitler

Wilhelm Herzog, anti-fascist writer

Berthold Jacob, pacifist, journalist

Jean Malaquais, novelist

Golo Mann, historian

Heinrich Mann, writer

Valeriu Marcu, historian

Walter Mehring, poet

Hans Natonek, humorist

Ernst-Erich Noth, writer

Hertha Pauli, novelist

Benjamin Péret, poet

Alfred Polgar, essayist

Hans Sahl, writer

Jacques Schiffrin, publisher

Victor Serge, writer

Franz Werfel, writer

Kurt and Helen Wolff, publishers

Theater, Music

Hans Aufricht, theatrical producer

Edvard Fendler, conductor

Erich Itor-Kahn, pianist

Heinz Jolles, pianist

Siegried Kracauer, film critic

Wanda Landowska, harpsichordist

Lotte Leonard, singer

Alma Mahler Werfel, muse

Poliakoff-Litovzeff, theatrical producer

Science, Philosophy

De Castro, Secretary of the Faculty of Science at the University of Madrid

Emil S. Gumbel, statistician

Jacques-Salomon Hadamard, mathematician

Alfredo Mendizabel, professor of philosophy at the University of Madrid

Otto Meyerhof, physiologist, winner of 1922 Nobel Prize for Medicine

Boris Mirkine-Guetzevitch, Sorbonne

Peter Pringsheim, physicist

Bruno Strauss, psychiatrist

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Spider Jerusalem]

12. Winston Churchill.

One can make a strong case for Churchill as saviour of Western civilisation, I think. His inspiring leadership gave Britain the courage to fight on when the odds seemed hopeless, averting an otherwise likely negotiated peace with Germany at a time when France had already capitulated. Lord Halifax, the Foreign Secretary, was arguing for negotiation of terms at the time of the Dunkirk debacle; had Chamberlain still been Prime Minister (as he was only days before) this view probably would have won out, the Battle of Britain would have never happened, Hitler wouldn't have had to divert troops to Greece and Northern Africa in response to British military activity, and would have been able to invade Russia with his army and air force intact and no opposition in the west of Europe. The US might not have gotten in the war at all, and Hitler's invasion of Russia would have been a more likely success; we can thank Churchill, I think, that this didn't happen, and I would certainly say it's worthy of the label "heroism". (Of course, that's just my opinion.)

[Screaming Lord Byron]

13. Churchill is a massively complex character.

He thrived in wartime, and disappointed in peacetime. He was capable of heroic action when pushed, no doubt about that.

[bobbieinok]

14. ambivalent about Churchhill because of his attitude toward Gandhi

[Spider Jerusalem]

20. Why?

Surely you can realise that consistency is a little much to expect? Abraham Lincoln was a racist who though blacks were inferior and should be deported to Africa. Martin Luther King was a plaigarist and a serial adulterer. Do these things make them any LESS heroic,? After all, whatever else they may have been, they were still human. Same goes for Churchill, obviously....

[Sequoia]

30. Churchill wanted to get rid of England's

undesireables but they had to surpress the info since Hilter thought along the same lines. Yes, there's dirt on Churchill alright. I seen to recall reading this on one of these forums a coulple weeks back.

[SiobhanClancy]

35. He sent the Black and Tans to Ireland...

and that is enough to seriously tarnish his reputation. His role in WW II was certainly his "finest hour",although it is arguable that it redeems him altogther.

[felonious thunk]

16. Alexander Solzhenitsyn

His beliefs got him imprisoned. His will got him through it. His strength helped him write a book about it, dispassionately, that opened a lot of eyes to atrocities no one knew about.

[mobuto]

21. Yeah, but

Actually, it wasn't his beliefs that got him imprisoned, but the fact that he wrote a letter in which he made fun of Joe Stalin. I like Solzhenitsyn's writing and his works were very important, but he's not a good guy by any stretch of the imagination. He's an ultra-conservative religious fanatic, something of an anti-Semite, and generally an unpleasant person to be around. He was right about the Soviet Union, but his own beliefs are almost as noxious.

You want a real Soviet dissident hero? Try Andrei Sakharov.

[libertad]

19. Harriet Ross Tubman

and a second for Raoul Wallenberg

[bedtimeforbonzo]

22. Rachel Corrie

n/t

[Whitacre D_WI]

23. To answer your last question....

I am from southern Ohio.

Techumseh kicks Sitting Bull's ass.

[Snow]

39. Good point - but nation-building is easier for farmers than for

nomads. Or were you referring to Tecumseh's military prowess?

[Whitacre D_WI]

46. Both.

Yes, nation-building is easier for farmers. But Techumseh managed to cobble together a coalition of many different tribes, who varied greatly in their degrees of agriculturalization. Many of them had long-standing and deep-seeded hatreds for each other. Nonetheless, he held them together for a bit.

And anyway -- Tenskwatawa was way cool.

[Snow]

53. The Prophet? I guess - sounded very weird, though,

from what I remember of my admittedly biased Indiana History that I got in high school. Might've been some slant going on, though.

[Snow]

25. I second Harriet Tubman, and raise you Sojourner Truth

and for an ambivalent hero, Anwar Sadat. Anybody seen the movie, long years ago, with Louis Gosset Jr playing Sadat? The man got on that plane to Israel, knowing he would die for it - and he went - and died.

And some Asian favorites: Hahm Sok Han of Korea, a philosopher and pacifist, who was jailed by every administration including the occupying Japanese up till the end of the dictators. Here's a book of his:
http://www2.gol.com/users/quakers/queen_of_suffering.htm

And an ambivalent hero - the last ruling queen of Korea, Myongsong Min - who tried her best to balance the forces wanting to take over her country and the bickering of her relatives, and actually succeeded at walking that tightrope for many years. She was killed in 1895, age 45, ambushed by ninjas in the employ of the local japanese administrator, who were likely linked to both the yakuza and the zaibatsu.

[tigereye]

28. I think there are many quiet heroes

that no one has heard of. People who do the right and compassionate or brave thing and don't expect to be lauded for it.

on the other hand

Charles Dickens
Benjamin Franklin
Gandhi
King
Mother Theresa
Rosa Parks
Patrick Henry
Carl Jung ( despite some of his views, a visionary)


Anyone who has stood up against injustice, tyranny, and bigotry

[Whitacre D_WI]

31. You didn't tell me you were a JUNGIAN!

Oh, dear....

[tigereye]

47. uh oh... there's a lot I haven't told you dear

Well how much time do you have... I am a uh, member of the mental health profession after all...

[Whitacre D_WI]

49. Well, my mother... no, wait, you're a Jungian.

So, my FATHER...

;)

[tigereye]

50. i'm not an analyst or anything

tell me about your childhood....

[Whitacre D_WI]

55. Huh-huh. You said "anal."

[tigereye]

56. see what I mean?

mean what I see

Mean what I say

say what I meme

say what?

been saladim

or something

[Sequoia]

29. Maybe Sitting Bull

because he had to put up so much BS.

Thomas Paine is a real American hero even though he was British.

[JohnKleeb]

32. Alexander Dubcek I consider one

Tried to in his words put a human face on communism however Moscow didnt like this so the Prague Spring was ruined. I think he was the only Slovak leader of communist czechoslovakia. Interesting guy, lived here in the US before going back in WWII and was a Slovak partisan when many Slovaks collebarted with the Nazis.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

34. Damn good call, John. Dubcek, Havel and Walesa.

[Snow]

37. Thoughts on Gorbachev?

I feel very ambivalent. But I'm inclined towards a lot of courage, if not outright heroism. However, I confess to some ignorance as well.

[JohnKleeb]

40. I consider Gorby a bigger personal hero than I do Ronny

:) then again I am sorta Russian and I am far left.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

44. I'm not well informed enough about Gorbachev to say.

I know what he did, but I don't know what his rationale was.

[terrya]

45. Do you think that when Gorbachev introduced glasnost and perestrokia...

that those events would begin the breakup of the Soviet Union?

Just curious...

Terry

[Snow]

54. That he knew the breakup would follow?

Don't know. He must've been aware that the union was put together by some major, continued brutality by Stalin, especially towards the muslims - and those tribal folks tend to have long memories. Let's ask him next time we see him.

[JohnKleeb]

38. I would have said Tito Bryon but I learned some not so

flaterring stuff about him and this coming from a first generation Serb and someone who is further to the left than me. Better than the crown man but not much I guess. Dubcek is an unsung hero, we dont learn him in school, well we dont learn Tito either nor do we learn about the Northern Ireland struggle, its a shame. I need to learn about Lech Walesa and soliditary though, and Havel.

[Whitacre D_WI]

33. Larry Flynt.

[northzax]

36. so why the picture of Stephen Hawking?

nt

[Whitacre D_WI]

41. It's a Simpsons reference.

[JohnKleeb]

43. lol

Larry Flynt is right you guys stink!
and I always thought he said Larry Flinch, tells you about my hearing eh.

[DrWeird]

42. Captain Michael Healey.

Despite a nasty bout with alcoholism, he was quite a romantic hero.

Look him up.

[laughing_dog]

48. MEDGAR EVERS

[AlienGirl]

52. Mahatma Gandhi

Rosa Parks
Harriet Tubman
Jane Goodall


There are many more, but in my undercaffeinated state I can't think of them right now.

Tucker

[Zorro]

57. Hernan Cortes

The conquest of Mexico was an extraordinarily heroic effort, notwithstanding the suffering that followed with the destruction of the Aztec empire.

Cortes was quite a tough and wily leader; he had to be, to lead a rough handful of soldiers against armies of thousands. It boggles the mind to consider what the conquistadores must have felt, being surrounded by millions of natives that revered serpent gods and whose priests practiced ritual human sacrifice on a daily basis -- from their Catholic perspective, they must have thought they were aligned against the very forces of Satan.

It was truly an amazing adventure, and although one might judge Cortes pretty harshly from a modern perspective, I consider him to be a hero of epic proportions. For better or worse, he is one of a handful of people that changed history.

[maveric]

61. And he slaughtered thousands for spain and gold.

I see him as an imperialist greed monger.
What happened to the Aztecs now?

[Zorro]

66. Kind of a conundrum

The Aztecs, after all, were also imperialists that likewise slaughtered thousands, both in territorial wars and by ritual human sacrifices. They were both a sophisticated and a savage tribe, and their savagery contributed to their downfall; it was the key that allowed Cortes to gain the necessary support from their enemies to defeat them.

I'm not about to defend the consequences of four hundred years of Spanish rule, but the conquest of Mexico is truly an amazing story. Bernal Diaz' record of the conquest (he was one of the conquistadores) is a remarkable account of what encountering a completely alien culture was like, and includes rather gruesome details of Aztec practices. Try to imagine what it was like to witness seeing hundreds of living persons having their beating hearts cut out from their bodies, and their bodies stacking up on the pyramid steps. It was a very cruel time.

So in hindsight one can find fault with the Spaniards' actions, but the Aztecs weren't exactly noble innocents, either.

[BlackVelvetElvis]

62. John Locke

without him and no you have no Thomas Jefferson
What a profound influence he had on modern democracy. Maybe even more than Rousseau.
If I look at it from a feminist point of view...the Enlightenment was a bad time for women. Rousseau particularly argued that women should stay 'in their place'. I have a hard time getting past that.
Out of your list of French heros, I'd have to say Jeanne d'Arc. She managed to unite the French into a nation (for the first time), win important strategic battles and become a martyr. Napoleon was responsible for spreading democratic ideas into Europe, but made most of Europe subservient to France and alienated everyone in the process. He was a highly flawed, but great man. A meglomaniac, if you will.

[Groosalugg]

63. Jesus.

Joan of Arc
Gandhi
Abe Lincoln
George Washington
T. Jefferson
King David

and many many more that I have yet to think of...

[corporatewhore]

64. Elizabeth Gurley Flynn eugene debs emma goldman Big Bill Haywood

[T_i_B]

65. Saint Gregory the Great

Pope from 590-604.

http://www.catholicism.org/pages/greg.htm