How long do we have to wait to realize the greatness of a soul? A living hero is not so much a hero as a dead hero. But which one do we really need? The world is a noisy place, it can sometimes be hard to hear people out, let alone listen to them. We end up following the most exposed, the loudest.
Knowledge about the world is fed to us by the media. Maybe it's our choice whether to let it control our brain diet or not. When we're too concerned about right or wrong, we lose the wise wolf.
The recent passing of Indonesia's ex-president Abdurrahman Wahid, Gus Dur, was an unexpected unified flow of praise that he seldom got in life. In 2006, he was accused of blasphemy of the Koran. In other times, he was belittled for his incompetence as a leader for the reason that he is blind. It may be true that he wasn't the right man for the job at the time, but any negativity that blurs someone's truth isn't either.
To give a more global example, we have old Mike. No one got worked up when tabloids called him by "Jacko" or "Wacko Jacko", but see how many people tried to right this after his death? I saw a tweet from a DJ once that said, "You're not a true DJ if you only played Michael Jackson after he died".
Which dead person did you or do you wish to see?
