Martin's Turn to Reflect On Africa

(digression over. End sarcasm.)

Glad you read the story. Thanks for humoring me. For a long time now, I've wanted to discuss our ideas about heroism on this blog. In the story you read which is my favorite of his works, Thurber gave the best depiction I've found of the American sentiment on heros. I think what he said was, "people who do great things have to be great people.  I'll get back to that in a moment but to answer your question, "The Greatest Man in the World" is his most culturally timeless piece aside from his depictions of the life of a dog and maybe his story of domestic unrest--titled, I believe, "The Unicorn." For five bucks you could buy a used copy of his complete works on Amazon. Or, I bet Tower Books has a copy. Is it still open?

Back to heroism and your comment on Martin, I too would like to see more people with wealth give back to the community and conduct their lives as a humanist does. In Kevin's case, his good character is unfortunately not what brings him headlines, it's his basketball skill that brings attention to his good character.  And it is this that I think is worrisome. Because I don't think players in the NBA conduct themselves less morally than any other group of young wealthy professionals and I think it is hurtful to our community to promote the idea that morality should be associated with any kind of uniform: not a soldier's, not a cop's, not a  basketball players or even the bespoke suit of a businessman. I make this statement with a disclaimer: I work on Wall St. and my sole duty is to monitor the electronic communications of the people who work here. I can't disclose any details, but you can probably imagine the endless list of horrible things the moral void in some of these folks lives inspires them to do.  But I also have just as many stories of people doing wonderful things for others.  And sometimes I can match a horrible act and an inspiring one to the same person.  

This leads me to believe that we should promote the good deed and the inspiration that deed brings, not necessarily the person who does it.

Image problems in the NBA, or any communiity for that matter, are products of the culture and the burden of changing those images should not rest on the shoulders of any person. (Thus my rant about heroes being a myth.) A sheikh from Iraq sums it up quite well, when he described American diplomatic efforts to promote certain leaders in his country. He said, "Americans like to create characters, like Disney cartoon heroes." It is this ilk in which I warn against creating the image of Kevin Martin.