Athletes are Not Heroes And Souldn’t Be Labled As Such

In our current society, we misuse the term heroes when we mention certain groups of people, including athletes. Part of the reason is that our culture has lost sight of what a hero is and that many of us have the potential to be heroes. The traditional archetypical energy of the hero has been cast on athletes and while it is great to cheer them on, they are not true heroes.

Heroes and Athletes

What does an athlete do? They sacrifice time, sweat and energy to band together with a team to play a game. Sure, there is pain and injury involved. However, they get a large payout for doing their job. Be it hitting a home run, or scoring the winning touchdown. The thing is they are only doing their job and getting paid to do it.

This brings up an important question, what are heroes? Considering that athletes playing their game doesn’t justify the term, it is important to understand. For many of us, the idea of a hero is a firefighter letting go of fear and going into the fire to save people. It is a cop who puts his life on the line to ensure someone else is kept safe.

Sometimes, heroes don’t fit the mold, but they are still heroic. It is the parent who works two jobs and struggles to ensure their child has the potential of a better life. It is the teacher who turns down a large salary to ensure that the inner city children know they too can make something of their lives and does it for the passion, rather than the pay.

What is obvious is heroes make a sacrifice for a greater good. An athlete playing a game on the field does not make them a hero at all. Instead, this is idolizing a person rather than showing them respect and admiration for the good that they do. When you consider many of the tales of domestic violence, illegitimate children, sex and drug addictions and their attacks on others, they are not who we should be looking up to.

Ancient tales that involved heroes often had a person who appears weak and has no understanding of their power going out in the world and doing incredible feats as they discover they have a knowledge or spiritual power inside of them.

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They would confront fear and selflessly save the lives of others, all in the name of good and the lessons they take away help them grow to become better people while they inspire those around them to live better lives. Heroes are the essence of good. The public behavior of many athletes would traditionally place them more in line with being the archetype villain in classic literature.

Another thing about heroes is that they typically perform tasks in a manner that replicate society’s traits in the historical moment. This is often defined by dominant religion and worldviews that are accepted at the time.

For example, Greek Mythology heroes are very different from the heroes from the 1800s or even more modern heroes like Luke Skywalker from Star Wars and Harry Potter. The key is there have to be authentic acts of heroism behind the individual for them to warrant the title.

Realistically, athletes are nothing more than entertainers. They do not produce anything outside of pleasure when people are watching and in most cases, they don’t offer any kind of positive impact on the world around them when they play their game on the field.

Even when an athlete steps up and donates a million dollars to a charity, they are a philanthropist but not a true hero. They have not put their life on the line or established a risk. In fact, many contracts require they do PR events where they give back, to establish an image of caring about the community in general.

That does not mean that heroes cannot be athletes. Patrick Daniel “Pat” Tillman is an example of a fine man and a hero. After September 11, he quit football and he went to join the armed forces. He ended up being killed in the line of duty. That is a hero.

It is important that we focus on saving the word hero for those who are truly heroic. Let the players on the field be athletes, which they live up to. They can enjoy their on the field rivalries, trash talking and all around antics and let their fans enjoy the persona. But when we speak of heroes, let us genuinely leave the title to those who have lived up to the definition.