Today I sat through an interesting class discussion in my Sport and Society class. We were asked the question: "Are athletes heroes, role-models, or none of the above?" It really made me think about how society views athletes, especially how us in the United States, view our professional athletes. Are they heroes? The definition of hero is:
A person noted for feats of courage or nobility of purpose, especially one who has risked or sacrificed his or her life (from the dictionary)
Using this definition, are athletes heroes? Should we be allowing or encouraging our children to look up to athletes and glorify them? I thought about this a lot. There are some pretty amazing athletes out there. I was addicted to the Olympic Games in Beijing this summer and there were some awesome stories out there of athletes overcoming obstacles to make it to those games. I think that there are some athletes who make outstanding role-models. They seem to be fewer and fewer these days, but there are some. I just don't know if any of them are heroes. Maybe in their individual lives they do heroic things, but is playing a sport and winning a game a measure of heroism? What do you think?
2 comments:
I love sports and was completely addicted to watching the Olympics as well, but there is no way I would classify athletes as heroes. Being a hero has nothing to do with overcoming obstacles to achieve something like winning a gold medal. A hero is a person who does something completely selfless, and expects no rewards in return. That's my opinion anyway.
I agree with Cori . A hero is one who completey scarifices time, or even own life for the well being of others. The lady in India is a hero for she has sacrificed both time and money and given love with no expectations in return. The athletes usually do anything for fame honors and money with no thought for others in their quest.
Mom
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