Moral Heroes

I spent much of today watching Superhero movies, but I feel like it should be noted that not all of the "heroes" I watched always act heroically. Specifically, I watched The Guardians of the Galaxy, Volume 2 and Avengers: Age of Ultron. In these movies, the heroes help their friends and save the day, but they otherwise don't all seem very concerned about questions of morality. Most of the Guardians of the Galaxy spend at least parts of the movie acting like jerks to each other and to other people, and Tony Stark deliberately side-steps complex moral questions in order to pursue the goal of creating artificial intelligence. It's worth remembering that the superheroes we root for aren't always heroes at all. Yes, they do good things, and we should follow those examples, but they also do some bad things, and we shouldn't follow those examples.

As with everyone, our heroes are complex. The best characters have some good traits and some bad traits, and it should also be remembered that traits that are good in some contexts can be bad in others. As with everything, we should try to take the good and leave the bad, using the spirit of discernment to determine which is which in any given situation. It's good to look up to and learn from our heroes, if they are acting heroically, but during those times when they aren't as heroic (and no one always is), we should learn not to follow their bad examples and strive to be even more heroic than they are.