Well Dang, Christopher Reeve died

[Darth K'Trava]

Bummer.

May he rest in peace.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Well, he helped people, that's true. But until he was paralyzed himself he didn't lift a finger to help people who wre paralyzed. By helping them he was helping himself. All the praise is undeserved, IMO.

Torms point is good:

Ever seen the episode of Friends where Phoebe is telling Joey that it is impossible to do a selfless act, because people do supposedly selfless acts in order to feel good about themselves?

It isn't about whether he was selfless, or whether he did good the whole time - in the end, he did good.

And maybe it isn't that his praise is undeserved. Maybe its that more people deserve praise than actually do get it?

I will add:
Most the time, people don´t think about people they don´t know and maybe will never know. Thus, they don´t care about them, regardless if these people have an enjoyable life or suffer, do something great or make terrible mistakes or crimes.
Reeve did probably know no (on a personal level) paralyzed people before he became one. Until he did became one, he had no real reason to care, or better said, he had no interest in them. As my teacher once explained: Interest comes from the Latin "Inter Esse" (or something like that, I never had Latin), and means something like "in between" - he wasn´t between them, he had no interest.
Yesterday, a local radio station reported about his Death and a few sayings of him regarding paralysis and medicine in general, and he said that before he became one, he didn´t knew about the kind of problems that existed here.

wow... well, 10 years is a long time to suffer like that - time to rest.

Maybe - but I guess he had prefered to live a bit longer and possibly see the advancement in science that might help him or others. From what I gathered the past days, he seemed to have a lot of hope left...

May the things he did have a positive meaning, and may he rest in peace.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Rest in peace Christopher Reeve.

Long live Superman!

 

[iblis]

Rest in peace. It is always encouraging and uplifting to see people truly doing good for others, and it's a shame you couldn't see the realisation of one of your greater dreams in this world. Maybe others will though, thanks largely to people like you.

Hey it's not often I engage in dialogue with a dead guy. You should be flattered.

 

[Chun-tzu]

Well, he helped people, that's true. But until he was paralyzed himself he didn't lift a finger to help people who wre paralyzed. By helping them he was helping himself. All the praise is undeserved, IMO.

Torm and Mustrum make good points above, but I'd add this: a valid mark of heroism is how one handles adversity. Reeve handled his situation admirably, not giving up, and using his unique talents to best advance a noble cause. The cause wasn't entirely selfless, no, but dude, this kind of work is hard and generally unappreciated. It's damn hard making people care about a cause, when there are so many others just as worthy. It's not generally the kind of thing anyone gets involved in, unless there is some kind of personal motivation. I have little doubt that his work as an advocate made a significant difference.

 

[Ranes]

One particularly sad aspect of the timing of his death that struck me was this:

Last week, I happened to catch a BBC news item in which a professor was being interviewed about a medical breakthrough. He was explaining that healthy stem cells extracted from the nasal lining could be re-implanted in a patient's spine and that they could, through this new treatment, reconnect nerve endings, something which until now has been impossible. He said human clinical trials would take another couple of years.

Then the interviewer said, "What kinds of people will this treatment help?"

The professor answered, "The kind of people it will help are people like Christopher Reeve."

He went on to add that he knew Mr Reeve, who supported the professor's work.

 

[BOZ]

if you saw Smallville last night, there was a dedication to the man.