Three heroes in this world who are a million times better than George Zimmerman...

[MrScorpio]

That he'll never be:

Tennessee Titans Rookie Jonathan Willard Saves Family From Burning SUV
Jul 25, 2013 By Ruth Manuel-Logan

When Jonathan “Tig” Willard (pictured) was driving from South Carolina to Tennessee on Tuesday to fight for a roster spot with Tennessee Titans, he noticed an SUV that had flames shooting from its rear. Inside the vehicle was a woman, her three young children and their dog.

Instead of picking up his cell phone and dialing for help, the linebacker took matters into his own hands by saving the family himself, reports TigerNet.com.

Remarkably, the woman and her children were not aware that their vehicle was on fire until Willard began honking his horn to alert them about the situation. By the time the unidentified mom had pulled over, her SUV was engulfed in flames. The woman told the 23-year-old, 240-pound NFL player that she did not stop her SUV at first because she did not think her vehicle was on fire.

Willard and another driver who had witnessed what was going on acted quickly to pull the three children and dog out of the vehicle to safety. The young player then went back for the mom and took her to safety. The SUV wound up becoming totally engulfed in flames within mere minutes of the rescue and blew up four times after the family was rescued.

http://newsone.com/2642125/tennessee-titans-jonathan-willard-saves-family-from-burning-suv/

10-Year-Old Girl Catches Baby Dropped From Burning Apartment In Georgia
The Huffington Post | By Sara Gates
Posted: 07/26/2013 2:04 pm EDT

Zna Gresham may not think of herself as a hero, but she is certainly being hailed as one.

In a lifesaving catch, the 10-year-old girl caught a baby that was dropped from a second-floor apartment in Decatur, Ga., after the building caught fire, the Associated Press reports.

The family living in the apartment was trapped by the fire, which reportedly started on the ground floor. DeKalb County Fire Battalion Chief Christopher Morrison said the mother had no choice but to drop her three children out the window.

"The smoke was rising so quickly to the upper floors, they couldn't make their way outside their upper apartment into the hallway because of the smoke. They just went to a window and they threw the child outside to the people, to the neighbors, down on the ground," Morrison explained to WSB Radio.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/26/girl-catches-baby-dropped-apartment-fire_n_3659345.html?utm_hp_ref=black-voices&ir=Black%20Voices

Dovonta Andrews, 11-Year-Old Detroit Boy, Took Bullet To Save 5-Year-Old Friend
Posted: 07/25/2013 4:48 pm EDT | Updated: 07/25/2013 6:02 pm EDT

A heroic 11-year-old boy from Detroit is recovering after taking a bullet for his 5-year-old friend.

According to WDIV, Dovonta Andrews was on his neighbor's porch with a few other children Tuesday night, when a dispute, allegedly about money, broke out.

A man began shooting, and Andrews responded by pushing his friend out of the way.

"I pushed my little friend to get out of the way," Andrews told WDIV. "Then the bullet hit me."

The bullet went completely through his arm, according to the Detroit Free Press. He was brought to a local hospital with a 30-year-old man who was also shot. Now, Andrews is back home recuperating.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/25/dovonta-andrews-detroit-takes-bullet-for-friend_n_3653322.html?utm_hp_ref=black-voices&ir=Black%20Voices

[Fantastic Anarchist]

1. Happily kicking.

Thanks for posting.

Reccing, too.

[spin]

2. I am not exactly sure what Zimmerman did to be considered a hero. ...

Both my son in law and myself have stopped at an accident scene and helped the people get out of their overturned vehicle.

One time I stopped at a really bad accident and it was obvious that it would be have been dangerous to move the people. I applied pressure to a nasty head wound while my passenger directed traffic.

You stop at an accident and render assistance because it's what you should do.

[MrScorpio]

4. Except that Z's moment of "heroism" looked suspiciously staged by one of his cop fans

And it's curious that he could "pull" a family out of a crashed vehicle, but couldn't push a 17yo kid off of himself without shooting him to death.

He has blood on his hands that no amount of theatrics will ever wash off.

[spin]

5. I will agree that this accident occurred at a good time for Zimmerman. ...

But assuming that there was an accident and there is a police report, I find it hard to believe two adults would risk their life or health as well as the life or health of their children to stage an accident for Zimmerman's benefit.

If it was staged, surely we would have a video of the accident captured by a bystander showing Zimmerman playing a hero.

I should note that I am not a Zimmerman lover and have stated many times that if he had just stayed in his car, Trayvon Martin would be alive today.

[MrScorpio]

7. I'm saying that the accident was real...

However, the staged part seems to have been Zimmerman's part in the rescue effort.

Apparently, the crashed victims were already removed from the vehicle once he got there after been tipped off by a cop who was one of his fans.

Even after Zimmerman's so-called rescue was called into question, the family who was taken out of the wreck refused to participate in any publicity about the event.

When called into question the validity of that rescue story, they had good reason to.

[SunSeeker]

10. I agree, the accident was real, Z's "rescue" was fake. nt

[spin]

12. I hadn't considered that possibility. ...

It does appear that many of the local cops in Sanford supported Zimmerman.

[Generic Other]

8. He is no hero

The story totally fell apart because it was BS. Do you not think that if it was credible Hannity wouldn't be shouting from the rooftops about his hero? No, even the normal suspects are silent on this ridiculous story. The police report makes no mention of Z. or a fiery auto crash. Nothing about Z. The family in the accident cancelled a press conference to praise Z. They happen to be friends with the cop who was first on the scene and who is also a rabid Z. supporter. The cop has been accused of calling Z to bring him to the scene. The chief of police said he'd hardly call Z. a hero. A lot to be skeptical about in this story, but the fact the rightwing isn't crowing about it is the most telling to me. That's because it is a ridiculous lie that will not bear up to scrutiny.

I am unimpressed by his so-called heroism. It reminds me of arsonists who start fires then rush to save people.

[spin]

13. I don't think that helping people out of an overturned car is heroic. ...

I've done this in the past and I didn't think it was a big deal.

I think the early reports mentioned a car fire but not the recent one.

[truebluegreen]

19. As has been posted elsewhere,

"standing people up" after an accident is not the same as a "rescue."

But it seems some people feel the need to prop up Their Hero, Zimmer Man.

[JI7]

25. didn't the story about Zimmerman's heroics itself change also ? like the issue of whether

the vehicle was on fire is still in question. there was something about how he put the fire out with the fire extinguisher from his car.

do people normally drive around with fire extinguishers ?

also the press conference to thank zimmerman was going to be in front of Mark O'Mara's law office .

[Starry Messenger]

24. There's a right-wing macro going around Facebook.

I won't link it here since it is stupid and I don't want to give it more hits, but it has a picture of Zimmerman and a picture of Obama and the caption is "Zimmerman, saved four Americans from death. Obama, let four Americans die in Benghazi". Zimmerman is being raised on a pedestal over his "rescue".

[Blue Owl]

3. Heroes SAVE lives, not take them needlessly

n/t

[avebury]

6. There is a 4th hero.

Teenage Boy Saves Girl Abducted By Child Predator

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2362102/Pennsylvania-teens-save-year-old-girl-kidnapping-chasing-kidnappers-car-BIKES.html

Pennsylvania teens chase down kidnapper's car on their BIKES and save five-year-old girl

Jocelyn Rojas, five, was kidnapped from her front yard yesterday afternoon
Temar Boggs, 15, and a friend were riding bikes when they spotted the child in a car
They tailed the car for 15 minutes until the girl was let out of the car
Police are searching for the kidnapper, a man between 50 and 70 years old

[rurallib]

11. this one in particular was a gutsy move

chasing down that car.
Every day there are acts of heroism - people who give of themselves without thought to consequences or desire for reward.
I notice here that all the heroes are pretty young - may they all have very successful fulfilling lives.

And thanks for doing what you did.
I have a tear in my eye.

[Generic Other]

9. Mr Scorpio, no list like this is complete without Ann Coulter's list of black heroes

Black heroes mentioned in Ann's book Mugged: Racial Demagoguery from the Seventies to Obama include:

Blade, the vampire hunter
Ernie Hudson from Ghostbusters
Fat Albert
The guy who saved the women in Cleveland who loves McDonald's
Darryl Strawberry
Shaft
Mace Windu
Idris Elba
Clarence Clemons from the E-Street Band
T.I.

http://www.vice.com/read/ann-coulter-lists-her-favorite-unsung-black-people

Is it safe to add her name to the long stinking list of racist idiots giving white people a bad name?

[cprise]

18. I've been going through this observational phase:

Though I'm not a TV person, I do like to sample shows from time to time to see what kind of themes and subtexts are there.

Overwhelmingly, TV today seems devoted to portraying white, usually male characters as heroic. Black men are usually cast for roles as criminals or the obstructionist bureaucrat who gets in the way of our hero.

For years cable 'real crime' channels like 'I.D.' covered cases where the victims were overwhelmingly white until, I'd say, about this spring.

[Generic Other]

20. The shows reveal a lot about our fears

Now that you mention it, I will be looking to see if I detect this as well.

[cprise]

21. Mainly cop, superhero and thriller shows

engage in this bent. Other ones don't have it, or they play it in reverse like the stuff on HGTV. I don't think the dichotomy is of much help.

Some shows that come to mind are Arrow, Castle, CSI, among many others. I think it is not much different with movies.

BTW, I've sample about a season of Dexter and maybe its me but I detect a really strong bigoted subtext there. The writers seem to be saying that the hispanic-dominated bureaucracy is so backward/evil, that it would take a white guy becoming a serial killer to actually get the real bad guys. I think he is constructed as a conservative antihero, and perhaps unintentionally (i.e. the writing is pathological).

[Generic Other]

22. I have thought I had seen

a rise in African American supervisory bureaucratic type characters and attributed it to Obama. These characters are always problematic for the heroes and often more so than the villains. But it is interesting that such roles are reversed so it is black obstructionists who create problems suddenly. We can pretty well assume it is not the reality.

They are really working hard to deflect the blame.

Hollywood would call this reversing the stereotypes. Like when they make the women play the murderous obsessed stalkers.

[cprise]

27. Might be more of a shift than a reversal

After all, the heroes are still almost entirely white.

Another observation I've made is how foreigners are either morally dubious or evil. Russian characters in particular seem to follow a rule that they must be evil unless they are trying to escape their past in Russia (i.e. they are trying to become American).

[Sissyk]

14. No, they are not a million times better

because that would mean Zimmerman was at least a .0001 hero, and he is not. I hate to see the word hero and George Zimmerman in the same sentence.

However, these three are Heroes!! Real Heroes.

Our local sports radio show had Tig on this week talking about this and his upcoming season with the Titans. Great person!

[zbdent]

15. In a fair fight, Z MIGHT have had a chance against two of them ...

and been trounced by the third ...

[Turbineguy]

16. The right wing have lower standards.

[zeemike]

17. I have come to hate heroes myself.

It is this obsessive hero worship that made Zimmerman the monster that he is...he was looking to be a hero when he went on watch that night, and he staged his hero rescue because he thought he could make himself into one by doing it...
Fuck heros...any real hero would shun any attempt to call them that...IMO.

[freshwest]

23. I was going to say something ungracious about Z. I'll just kick this.

[CakeGrrl]

26. It's obscene/ridiculous to even THINK he's a hero

And the "rescue" is dubious at best.