Unsung Heroes of the Holocaust Memorial Museum

What would you die for? The question seems nebulous if pondered correctly, for there are surely various things we would all deem worth protecting with our lives. The lives of the innocent, however, put us all squarely on the same page. We give medals for it. We throw parades for it. We option TV movies of the week for it. We tell endless man-saves-child-from-train stories about it. Well, sometimes.

For $20 dollars an hour, Stephen Tyrone Johns, a security guard at the Holocaust Memorial Museum until last Wednesday, was shot dead in the line of duty. He had but seconds to ponder the question, what would you die for? Facing a hail of hatred-fueled gunfire, assisted by fellow guards paid no more than he, Johns stopped a determined mass murderer intent on voluminous destruction of human life. A murderer who succeeded only in taking the life of a father.

Sometimes it is difficult to tell if the current information overload we all experience as a result of more available points of access is a good thing or not. The stories we hear are often the ones we want, and the stories we need to hear often require a very targeted digging through the haystack of information. I heard of the shooting via email alert, talking on the phone at the time with my boss who got her notification by mobile phone. It’s all very “Star Trek.” Mr. Johns’ name, however, did not come to me by email, by text message, or over my cable news diet (admittedly shrinking post-election. Why do they all scream so much?). It came to me in a letter of apology from the killer’s son, where I read the word “brave” for the first time as a distraught son apologized for an unforgivable deed admitting that Johns “bravely sacrificed his life to stop my father.”

When Captain Sully landed in the Hudson we were quickly on friendly terms with him. We were quickly shown reenactments of his heroic feat. Is Mr. Johns’ salary not death defying enough to warrant 3D re-telling? Are the brave actions of his fellow guards, still nameless to me, not worthy of cable news speculation? I know Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck think the killer was politically left-leaning. I read the Left wants the revised version of Homeland Security’s once-lambasted report on domestic threats hastened. I know Fox News’ Shepard Smith got a lot of unfriendly emails for standing up for the report. I know the Army is being more careful about recruiting potential nuts. But after all this I do not know the names of the fellow guards who made a decision to stand and defend; I am not regaled with tales of how they carried out this honorable, noble response to their call of duty.

There is no denying that the hatred which sparked this terrible incident needs to be examined thoroughly and in the light of news coverage for all to see. However, there must be a significant space made in that coverage for the people who were prepared to give their lives for the very ideals being espoused in endless editorials and let’s-talk-about-hate articles (because hate is the new black) and blog rantings about the “Obama effect” on domestic terrorism. We are spending too much time focusing on a horrible old coward who valued no life, not even his own.

My last visit to the Holocaust Memorial Museum was in high school as part of a senior class trip. My boss’ first reaction to the news was a gasp at the possibility of children on school trips inside the museum. The thought of what could have happened is frightening. Focusing on that fear does nothing for the future of defeating hate. There is a myriad of reasons why we would be uncomfortable telling this story; someone died, after all. It’s not landing a plane in the Hudson. Someone died. However, if we are going to watch reality TV based on the lives of this or that has-been (be sure to catch MC Hammer’s new reality show), if we’re going to make a new “Twitter” graphic every time Ashton Kutcher name drops in a tweet, if we are going to gawk into the lives of vapid “real” housewives in New Jersey, or Orange County, or Atlanta, or wherever, we certainly have some attention span for three security guards who for no more than $20 an hour stood toe to toe with a maniac and saved countless lives.

A statement from the museum’s chief of staff sheds salient light: “Never take your guard force or your security people for granted.” We celebrate a lot of fake heroes in this country; one would assume we’d jump at a chance to celebrate such clear cut ones. Or maybe I missed the point, maybe you don’t get to be an American hero if your name is Tyrone.

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