Heros

Everyday heros.

 

As I sit here with my television on the History Channel I see and hear the images that commemorate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. These images bring to mind thoughts of heroism. Yes, some heroes take up their guns and charge in to stop the violence of evil. Some heroes run up the steps of the burning buildings while everyone else is running down. Some heroes, like Dr. King use their oratory gifts to raise the spirits and the conscience of humanity. But as I watch the images of chaos and brutality from the early 1960's I see something else. I see something in the images that has escaped my notice for all these years. I see something remarkable. I see white people; old and young, tall and short, men & women who left their comfortable existences. They came from peaceful homes where they were not oppressed or struggling and walked with the oppressed, bled with the oppressed and went to jail with the oppressed. They saw oppression and said, "That's not right!" and they did something about it. We will never know the name of the short, fortyish white man with the horn-rimmed glasses whose blood spilled on the Edmund Pettus Bridge or the housewife who was brutalized in the streets of Selma. We will never know who they were or where they lived. Many have probably gone to their eternal rest. All we will every really know is that there came a time when they said, "Enough!" With no obvious gain in sight and at great peril to themselves, they put on their shoes, got their coats and their purses and went to some place of suffering to say, "You are not alone!"

 

They were "good and decent people who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it."

Reviews

[Emily B]

And one hundred years before that, and a hundred before that even, abolitionists were working to see every one free and equal. The significant few is not so interesting as the commonplace many. Would you step up and do what's right? Would I? I would like to think so. The problem is having the clarity of thought to see through cloudy issues and know the true course. You're always giving us something to think about . . .

[C.R. Vard]

a very good summation of heroism, especially so close to Martin Luther King day. Sometimes I think that it may be for the best that these whites remianed anonymous. Imagine what would have happened to thier families...

[Joel]

You have to admire one of the greatest public speakers ever. The man could get the crowd's collective heart beating with each word.

[Kristina Moulaison]

This asks the question we must all ask ourselves. What would I have done? What is the call today...and am I on the right side? Who are the opressed, the ones with no voice? Will history find me standing with them?

[SPINNING ON that dizzy ..]

Thanks for writing this today to honor Dr. Martin Luther King. He was an amazing man who inspired many to march for those that needed a voice to command the attention this quest for equality. To think this was necessary in our land of plenty where we boast of EVERY American being equal. He was a mighty man and it is sad to think he was lost because he was not understood for the peace and love that was truly in his heart. I have an Uncle that got on a bus and stood in the crowd for the famous "I Have A Dream" speech. He counts it as one of the best moments in his life next to the birth of his children. The world would be a better place had he not been taken from us too soon.

This is a lovely tribute that I can truly appreciate.

Kath

[Debra Stevens Edwards (..]

This is the second piece I have read today about Dr king and both where powerful pieces and Where you wrote of the unsung heroes the other on the dream both were well written and infmormative pieces.
Hugs Debby

[JC]

Hero- One who shows great courage in the face of adversity.
I think society forgets the "everyday" Hero, so thank you for reminding us that a Hero lives in all of us, the ability to show courage in the face of adversity. Something to be applied to today's current events.

Great read.