OxBlog

# Posted 5:29 PM by Ariel David Adesnik

ANOTHER KIND OF HERO: Millions of Americans know the name of Pat Tillman, and deservedly so. But how many know the name of Joseph M. Darby, the soldier responsible for alerting his superiors to the abuse of Iraqi inmates?

According to a profile in the WaPo, Darby was not the kind of person one would expect to become a lone voice for justice. He had a violent temper and seems more like someone who might express his anger by abusing the rights of those prisoners he was supposed to guard.

Yet when faced with a profound moral dilemma, Darby did the right thing. I'm not sure it is possible to explain why. There are simply some men and women who do not become remarkable individuals until faced with an unprecedented challenge.

Another hero of that sort, one whose name will live on because of his greatness, is Oskar Schindler. Why did he risk own life to save so many Jews? It is impossible to say. Schindler was not a particulary good or generous man before confronted by the Holocaust. Then he became one.

Conversely, there are those who become evil when confronted with moral dilemmas. I am sure that many of the soldiers responsible for the vicious abuse of Iraqi inmates were good, generous people before doing what they did. And some may not have been good.

But all of them had a choice. There is simply no way to claim that they and their superiors do not bear full responsibility for the horrific things they did. And that Joseph Darby has become a hero by letting the world know about those horrible acts.

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