heroism in the time of a crisis

May 03, 2020

heroism in the time of a crisis

Presently, there are a lot of metaphors and allusions that are being used for the current pandemic; the most prominent being the references to war. We are seeing this treatment adopted by many politicians and people whose opinions matter; as a consequence, it gets funneled down to us via the various news outlets. Even to laymen, it seems like a sensible thing to do. It should be noted that this is not a metaphor that came about recently. A 2015 article in The Economist did a study on this titled, "Why pandemic disease and war are so similar" (Business insider). It was of course after the Ebola crisis of 2014. In the present day, one example of this would be the democratic front runner for the next US presidential election Joe Biden stating, "This is like a war", in one of the recent presidential debates (NY times) and how we should prioritize our resources accordingly to fight this disease.

However, as popular as this sentiment is, it is by no means universally adopted. In fact, there are many criticisms of the framing of the pandemic in this way. An article in The Daily Collegian states, "Let's not treat the pandemic in this way", (Daily Collegian) when referring to question at hand, as well as a Vox writer stating, " There are better metaphors for what is happening right now" (Vox). In particular, the Vox article does an excellent job of detailing the historical use of the metaphor as well as giving a linguistic treatment on the consequences of applying it in this way. This is a great read and I highly recommend anyone interested. The link is given at the bottom.

These are only a handful of examples that show the popularity of treating the pandemic as a war, as well as the problem with doing so. So, to avoid redundancy, rather than talking about the merits of choosing one way or the other, this particular article attempts to explore a topic in relation to this: heroism. Are the doctors and nurses dealing with the present crisis really heroes? What about other people working in essential sectors like grocers and water distributors? What actually makes a hero?

Below is an excerpt from one of my favorite books, The Pig that wants to be eaten and 99 other thought experiments by Julian Baggini:

It came as a great surprise to his family that Private Kenny was not awarded the Victoria Cross for bravery. After all, he had died smothering a grenade that would have killed a dozen or more of his comrades. If that was not a ‘signal act of valour or devotion in the presence of the enemy’ then what was? They demanded an explanation from his regiment. The statement issued by the army read: ‘It has been the practice in the past to reward such actions with the appropriate medal. However, we have decided that it is a mistake to consider such acts as requiring an exceptional devotion to duty. All military personnel are required to act in the interests of the whole unit at all times. To suggest that Private Kenny’s act was over and above the call of duty, therefore, suggests that it might be acceptable sometimes not to act in the interests of the whole unit. This is clearly absurd. Therefore, we no longer reward such acts with posthumous awards. ‘Although we appreciate this is a painful time for the family, we should also point out that Private Kenny would have died in the blast anyway, so it is not even the case that he sacrificed his life for his colleagues.’ It was hard to fault the cold logic of the statement, but in their hearts Kenny’s family were not persuaded that he had acted anything other than heroically. But on what grounds could they appeal?

This excerpt was taken from the section titled Ordinary Heroism. It basically wants to point out that in order for an act to be considered heroic, it needs to go "over and above the call of duty" and since the soldier in question was merely following his duty, he should not be awarded the Victoria cross for bravery. Harsh as it is, it is precisely this harshness that forces us to question our traditional beliefs. As Baggini points out, the problem here is whether to consider the Private's action as an example of 'supererogatory behavior'.

Perhaps another example would illuminate this better..

So, I have been reading The Plague by Albert Camus as just another instance of jumping on the bandwagon during the pandemic.; there, I found a particular passage quite interesting. An excerpt:

By attributing over importance to praiseworthy actions one may, by implication, be paying indirect but potent homage to the worse side of human nature. For this attitude implies that such actions shine out as rare exceptions, while callousness and apathy are the general rule.

To provide the context in as fewer words as possible: The town of Oran is under lockdown because of a plague. To combat this, a small group of townsfolk band together and form a sanitary group. They go from house to house checking on sanitation and the like. By doing so, they are directly in contact with the dangers of the plague and are essentially risking their lives. The rest of the town react to this action by showering praises and homages to this group. In the author’s words, “many of our fellow citizens are apt to yield to the temptation of exaggerating the services they rendered.”

While the thought experiment of Baggini forces us to find a line that needs to be crossed to be considered heroes, Albert Camus shows us the deeper social implications of the actions like that of the people of Oran. The key issue here being the brandishing of laziness as mediocre. It is as though sitting on our asses at home doing nothing (or maybe writing a silly blogpost) is the norm while the 'heroic' people are—in essence— simply doing their jobs and in effect, that not being a couch potato is true heroism.

A present-day version of this would be the countless pot-banging done around the world as a sign of solidarity to the health-workers in the front-line. It even led to the IAF showering flowers over hospitals in India and then, subsequently receiving a lot of flak for this gesture. So, does this mean we should withhold praise from such people?

Well, of course we should praise and respect the people who are grinding it out to save other people’s lives. But the concern here is that the rest of us at home should do a self-evaluation. We should reconsider the position of our personal bar when it comes to labeling an act as heroic. As Camus points out, we must not let the bad side of human behavior like inactivity and lethargy be the norm. Also, the government must not force the doctors and nurses towards an involuntary martyrdom but do everything they can to provide them with whatever they need like ppe and other necessary equipments to keep the rest of us safe. Afterall, they are just doing their job.