Heroes and the End of the World

There are plenty of scary, horrible things going on in the world around us. Capitalism run amok threatens to undo social progress and usher in a sort of pseudo-feudalistic Neo-serfdom. Algorithms squeeze our perspectives through corporately owned media content funnels. AI threatens livelihoods, built on the shoulders of human creativity in violation of social contracts we always assumed were sacred. The world is teeming with violence, and disease, and poverty, and injustice, and inequality.

The more you’re paying attention, the scarier it is. And the internet makes it really hard not to pay attention.

But I don’t buy this idea that the world is careening off the ledge into oblivion.

We may live in unprecedented times, but that doesn’t mean we should feel hopeless. Our species has navigated nothing but unprecedented times over the centuries. We have proven ourselves to be a resilient species.

Hope is the Thing with Feathers

The challenges before us as individuals and as peoples, as a globally connected society, are undeniably big ones. But these are not insurmountable. It’s easy to fall into the trap of hopelessness. It’s easy to want to run away and hide from it all. To give up. To give into despair.

But I think that’s the wrong take. I don’t think humanity is doomed at all. As John Green put it, the world may be broken but hope is not crazy.

I could point to statistics or anecdotes. But let’s do something different. Let’s take a quick trip to the bookshelf.

A Trip to the Bookshelf

In addition to making video games I’m a writer, and my current bag is YA fantasy. Fantasy, like so many other genres, traces its roots back to our stories of old. Folk tales. Myths. Legends.

We’ve been telling ourselves stories for a while now. The earliest record we have of a story in the modern sense is the Epic of Gilgamesh, but it’s hard to believe that this was the first of its kind. It just happened to survive into the modern era. But let’s suppose that it was the first. That means we’ve been telling stories of heroes overcoming adversity for over 4000 years.

Hero. Now there’s a loaded word for you. Some heroes come in spandex, some carry a sword, some are born in a manger. From Achilles to Robin Hood to Spiderman and all the stories in between, humanity has been obsessed with the idea of heroes for thousands of years. The hero is somebody who, despite all their flaws and shortcomings, fights for what they believe is right. Who stands up in the face of forces that seek to tear down what society has built. Somebody who says no, absolutely not. Not while I still have the strength to stand.

The hero faces impossible odds. Failure or death are their most likely reward. But a hero stands in defiance anyways, staring down the gathering darkness.

What does it say about humanity that in every culture, on every continent, across every period of recorded history, there are stories of heroes?

I think it says a lot.

The Hero as a Symbol

The hero as an archetype is not some magic solution for all of our problems. We don’t love Spider Man because he can stop inflation or war. He takes what he has been given and does what he can. Right where he’s at.

A hero is a symbol. He or she is all the hopes and virtues of a society simmered down and concentrated into a singular person who can represent that culture and face the challenges of their world.

Believing in heroes isn’t silly. It isn’t escapism. It’s hope personified.

It’s a model for the rest of us.

Having Perspective Doesn’t Diminish Reality

The world is changing faster than we can grasp right now. Evil with a capital E is in our news feeds. But this is nothing new.

If it’s scary to live through the current era of fear and uncertainty, remember how terrible it must have been to live through the World Wars. Or to be a slave on a sugar plantation. Or to watch your whole village succumb to the ravages of the Black Death. Or, frankly, to live through any of the other periods of war, disease, famine, or rebellion.

See, this isn’t the end of the human story. We’re still somewhere in the middle. And the hero reminds us that we only fail when we stop trying. The true enemy is apathy, and the only way society loses is if we give up hope.

Our job is not to be heroes in the fantastical sense of the word. But it is our job to stand, wherever we are, and to stare down the darkness. To choose the righteous paths laid before us. To use our voices and our talents. To help one another. To choose family and community. To build up instead of destroy.

If we have anything to lose today, its because those who came before us fought to give us those things. If we are facing setbacks or lost battles, that doesn’t mean all is lost. It just means we have to buckle down.

This is Not the End

We are not the first generation to think humanity might be cooked, and we won’t be the last. We’ve always come through those unprecedented times that came before because humanity persevered. Because we outlasted it. We have built a better world over and over again because there is more good in us than there is evil. And despite what the pessimists might tell you, no matter how bad it seems, no matter how dark it gets before the dawn, the bad guys always lose in the end.

That might sound like a naive statement, but that is the human story so far. We made it to today, where we still have things to lose.

We wouldn’t still be telling the same kinds of stories otherwise.

We would have forgotten about heroes if we didn’t still believe in them.