> The greatest challenge to overcome is disbelief that you can do something.
I'm deeply skeptical of this. I don't want to assume your background, so please don't take offense to this. But I can only imagine someone is able to seriously believe this if they've never had anything more challenging than their own self-actualization and ambition.
You can (and should) believe in yourself as fiercely as you'd like! But the blunt reality is that hunger, poverty, disease and a lack of familial support structure will break you down unless you're astronomically lucky. If the most difficult thing stopping you from achieving your goals is your own belief in your ability to do it, you're in an exceptionally privileged position.
I think we miss the forest for the trees on HN quite a lot. The modal commenter here is most likely to be affluent with respect to their local environment and wealthy with respect to the world. We don't often have people commenting here to share experiences of the real obstacles someone like Jackie Chan had to deal with growing up.
I would argue the opposite (that self-belief is the hardest challenge in those in objectively bad circumstances), precisely because of what you phrase as '[these things] will break you down unless you're astronomically lucky.'
The manner in which they break most people down is by circumscribing ambition and self confidence.
A large part of my family goes into the hills of dirt poor mining Appalachia, so I wouldn't say I'm speaking to this from a privileged position.
When no one in your family has ever gone to college, why would you even think you could? Or have a different profession than your father? Or start a business? Or move to another town? Etc. etc.
There are certainly structural roadblocks that make things easier or harder, but I have yet to see someone succeed in something they never start. And a large reason they never start is because they don't believe they could ever succeed.
And that was my point. That heroes help us dare to believe, moreso that we otherwise would.
I think this is the crux of the difference in viewpoint between you and who you're responding to:
> I have yet to see someone succeed in something they never start
It's reasonable to say that the will/drive/impetus/etc. to succeed is _necessary_ for success.
And because it is necessary, it's good to have heroes — makes sense to me.
But the other fellow is saying that while it may be necessary, it is not _sufficient_.
If you never play the lotto, you'll never win, it's true. But just because you do play doesn't mean you'll win either. Playing is necessary, but not sufficient.
How much you think it's valuable to parade around the winners and say "this could be you!" is, I think, proportional to how much you think an individual has control over the game they're playing.
For the lottery, it's easy to show that you have zero control, so parading around the winners (or "heroes") is a bit silly. For other types of success, it's less clear. But there is certainly a decent argument to be made that liklihood of overcoming structural and institutional biases is luck-heavy. If you think it's mostly luck, then hero-worship is not so valuable.
Certainly the biggest heroes in improving the human condition are not the successful outliers like Chan, but those who believe in equality and put the work toward furthering it. There is no slavery in the US any more, and the thanks for that does not lie with outlier heroes who happened to luck out in the slavery game.
> I get what you're saying, but in any system having an aspirational role model is a benefit!
I will say there is a benefit but whether it's a net benefit is not always true as we can't ignore the downsides.
For example, if everyone believes that you can just work hard and succeed, then they may choose to ignore the great disadvantages certain people have. Indeed this isn't just a philosophical issue as this is the reality even in American politics with regard to having social programs.
I think this is actually even true of people whose stories qualify them to become "heroes". Often because they were able to do something they think it must be possible for everyone else without realizing how many things were working in their favor. There's a psychological phenomenon describing how people who went through the same experience as you are actually less likely to help you because for whatever reason, they seem to remember it was being easier than it was.
The issue I had, and why I originally commented, is it seemed people were being intellectually dishonest in denying any benefits of aspirational heroes, because they felt doing so would lend approval to an unjust system.
Which seemed... incomplete and unfair. Both to the heroes (Chan deserves better than to have some New Republic writer denying Chan's opinion of his own life's work) and to the people whose life might be changed by having a hero.
In reality, we can work towards both greater equality of opportunity AND highlight aspirational heroes.
I don't want to ascribe motivation, but I wonder how many people casting stones have ever been so down and out that they can't even imagine any success in their lives. Because I feel that's the reality for a lot of people in truly bad situations. And when you've given up trying to improve your life...?
I'm deeply skeptical of this. I don't want to assume your background, so please don't take offense to this. But I can only imagine someone is able to seriously believe this if they've never had anything more challenging than their own self-actualization and ambition.
You can (and should) believe in yourself as fiercely as you'd like! But the blunt reality is that hunger, poverty, disease and a lack of familial support structure will break you down unless you're astronomically lucky. If the most difficult thing stopping you from achieving your goals is your own belief in your ability to do it, you're in an exceptionally privileged position.
I think we miss the forest for the trees on HN quite a lot. The modal commenter here is most likely to be affluent with respect to their local environment and wealthy with respect to the world. We don't often have people commenting here to share experiences of the real obstacles someone like Jackie Chan had to deal with growing up.