*Who are your heroes? Do you have any? Why does it matter?
My first hero was a large black man named Roy. He worked in the engine
room of a freighter called the "Golden Bear", bound for the Orient, and
I, at seventeen, was the youngest member of the crew. Irreverent, tough,
yet kind to me, Roy seemed the perfect model of manhood that I wanted
for myself, a manhood that seemed out of reach to the nerdy, scrawny kid
I was. The second day at sea, another crewman threatened me in Roy's
hearing. In an instant, Roy slammed him against the wall, with his
forearm so hard against the man's throat that the guy's eyes bulged out.
Roy then unleashed the most magnificent cussing I had ever heard,
telling he man that if he so much as put his m-f hand on me, he (Roy)
would cut off the guy's m-f (private member) and cram it up his m-f ass.
I watched this in awe. That night, in front of a mirror, I practiced
what Roy had done. I slammed my right elbow against the throat of an
imaginary foe, then my left, then my right again. I looked as fierce as
I could and I practiced cussing just like Roy.
Roy was limited in many ways, but he was the warrior-model I needed when
I was seventeen, and his impact on me that summer of 1959 was an
important part of my growing up.
I found other, more complete heroes as I grew older, and their
inspiration and guidance helped me deal with things more important than
adolescent angst. In this I certainly haven't been alone. Since the
beginning of time, every culture has honored heroes as models of the
values that culture wanted to live by and to pass on to its young.
The classic hero in Western Christian tradition is Parsifal, and the
classic hero's story is the quest for the Holy Grail - the cup used by
Christ at the Last Supper. You may remember the story, most famously
told by Joseph Campbell in Hero of a Thousand Faces.
Parsifal was this gawky young man-he didn't look like a hero at all. He
lived with his mother in a land blighted by a terrible curse. Because of
this curse, the crops would not grow. There was disease and hunger and
the people were overwhelmed with despair. The curse could be lifted only
if the king drank from the Holy Grail, but nobody could find the Grail.
Every great knight in the land had tried and failed. Parsifal wept with
grief at the suffering he saw. Driven by his compassion, he resolved to
find the Grail himself, and save the kingdom.
His mother told him to stay home and be quiet. How could he, an ignorant
boy, she said to him, hope to succeed where great knights had failed?
Luckily for the kingdom, Parsifal ignored his mother and set out on his
quest, going through great dangers and obstacles until he found the
Grail and the curse on the land was lifted.
Parsifal is an archetypal hero. So is Frodo, of Lord of the Rings. So
is Harry Potter. The stories of Frodo and Harry are very much like
Parsifal's. All three are unlikely heroes, but they conquer indecision
and fear, undergo hardships and take risks to save others.
There are many other heroes' stories, over thousands of years. The
heroic values in these stories are much the same-courage and compassion
and service. And in each the hero gives others a template for living
their own lives heroically, for helping meet the challenges that test
them and test their times.
Who are the heroes of our times? The Giraffe Heroes Project, the
nonprofit I help run, has been asking kids that question for fifteen
years, as part of our schools programs. Many kids have no answer at all.
Those that do, often name celebrities-people famous for abilities in
music, sports or movies that usually have nothing to do with heroes.
Barry Bonds can hit home runs. Britney Spears can sing and dance. But if
you took away their skills at sports and entertaining, what would be left?
It's clear that the responses we get from kids reflect not just their
own attitudes, but the attitudes of their parents and other adults in
their lives. All those attitudes are rooted in a media-driven,
mall-driven culture that has little room for real heroes-brave
truth-tellers and active citizens focused on the common good. As a
result, too many people today have lost sight of heroic values-or don't
think that they are important or attainable anymore. They may take note
of the problems in our society enough to complain about them, but not
enough to take responsibility for helping solve them. They may not think
that ordinary citizens could do that-because they have no heroes to show
them it's possible.
And the problems mount-an outpouring of global support after 9/11
squandered by arrogance and ignorance. A national government buried in
corruption and incompetence. A widening gap between rich and poor that's
destroying community and pushing us toward class warfare. Media that
have slept as these problems grow.
We need all the heroes we can get. We need them in government and in
business, in county councils and PTAs, in media and the nonprofit world,
in professions and in the arts.
My biggest fear is that we are steadily destroying the ground in which
heroes can grow. Through our apathy and our votes, we've built an
electoral system that encourages politicians to serve their financial
backers, not the voters. Through our investment and purchasing
decisions, we co-conspire with corporations to focus on private gain,
ignoring the common-good goals buried in their charters. Through lazy
minds and lazy spirits, we've created a pop culture that promotes trivia
and blurs real with unreal.
We can fix this. We can bring back heroes and cultivate the ground that
heroes can grow in. Remember how this nation reacted to the heroes of
9/11? Remember how comforting, how inspiring it was to know that in that
crisis some people-very ordinary Americans, people just like us-could be
that selfless, that brave? Stunned and frightened, we focused on the
actions of these heroes and we drew strength from them.
There are heroes amongst us now-not firemen running into burning,
collapsing buildings, perhaps, but ordinary people who by their courage
and compassion inspire others. The Giraffe Heroes Project finds these
heroes (we call them "Giraffes") and tells their stories on our website,
in schools, in our books and in the media. They're young and old, male
and female, and from every ethnic and economic background. They're
working on every problem you can think of, from environmental pollution
to government corruption, from discrimination to poverty, from
homelessness to gang violence.
Giraffes are people like Casey Ruud, a safety inspector who put his job
on the line when he refused to ignore dangerous violations at the
Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington State. Hazel Wolf was a
Giraffe who stuck her neck out speaking truth to power and spurring the
powerless to action on environmental and other issues in the Pacific
Northwest. "Neto" Villareal, a star high school football player in a
football-crazy town, risked his athletic future when he led Latino
players in a football boycott in order to stop racist taunts from fans.
Our storytelling works. People who see or hear about Giraffes are
inspired to take on the challenges/ they/ see, from cleaning up a
wetland to cleaning up a city council. The Giraffe Heroes Project is
helping cultivate the ground where heroes can grow, be appreciated, and
lead. You can do the same, by acknowledging the heroes/ you/ see, and
getting their stories told on the Internet, in letters to the editor-any
way you can. Under all the distractions of our lives there is still
something that recognizes our need for heroes, and for the heroic values
that have always been a part of the American story, the American ethic.
Finding the heroes outside is important. But so is finding the hero
within. For me that chance first came at the US Mission to the United
Nations. As a young diplomat in 1980, I risked my career by secretly
organizing global pressure against my own government to help end
apartheid in South Africa. That experience was like learning to swim. I
couldn't forget what I'd done or how to do it. I couldn't forget the joy
and fulfillment I felt in making a difference like that.
Being a hero doesn't have to mean shifting global policies, saving
hundreds of lives or blowing the whistle on some huge crime. Most heroes
are very ordinary people who see a problem, large or small, near or
distant, and have the courage and commitment to take it on.
All of us see such opportunities around us every day, opportunities to
act with courage and caring to solve a public problem-to make things
better for other people-if only in small and quiet ways. The more years
that pass from that experience at the United Nations, the more I realize
that spotting these opportunities and acting on them is key to a
meaningful life. The biggest mistake any of us can make is to ignore
this quest, to just look out for Number One, to grow up and live and die
without every having made a positive difference on the world around us.
What are your opportunities? What can you do with: your talents, your
experience, your resources? In this dangerous, conforming,
buck-passing age, where can you be the kind of model this country
needs? Pay attention to that still small voice that says, or may someday
say to you: "Hey, hear me through all the uproar and clutter and
pressures of your life. This opportunity to be a hero-this one right in
front of you-is important, to others and to you. Stick your neck out.
Take it on."
John Graham
Copyright 2006 John Graham
jgraham@whidbey.com
Previous Stick Your Neck Out pieces available on request:
*#1 "Policies as Good as Our People" (fighting global terrorism takes
more than guns)
#2 "Dead Sons and Long Memories" (the seeds of Palestinian anger)
#3 "Go Seahawks!" (how the war imagery in pro football is poisoning our
culture)
#4 "War, Leadership and a Moral Life" (speech at U.S. Air Force and
Naval Academies)
#5 "Who's Watching the Watch List" (civil liberties under assault)
#6 "God and Politics" (what must be done to take our country back)
Books by John Graham
Outdoor Leadership (Seattle: The Mountaineers Books, 1997. To order: www.mountaineersbooks.org)
It's Up to Us: The Giraffe Heroes Program for Teens/ (Langley WA: The
Giraffe Heroes Project, 1999. To order: www.giraffe.org/ed_uptous.html)
Stick Your Neck Out; A Street-smart Guide to Creating Change in Your
Community and Beyond (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler, 2005. To order:
www.giraffe.org/1speeches_syno.html)
John Graham as keynote speaker? Visit: www.giraffe.org/1speeches_main.html
Subscribe Here: 
jgraham@whidbey.com
