Bolder than brass

Bravery is a virtue that does not seem to enjoy the same standing in society as it once did.

Back in the day, there was no greater measure of a man’s might than his willingness to put himself in harm’s way.

To sacrifice one’s own flesh for something higher was the ultimate sign of character. It put a person right at the top of the pecking order; sort of like a good moustache in the ‘70s.

Nowadays, though, our modern world places much less currency in physical courage.

Or, at any rate, Ireland at this precise historical moment does.

For those among us who in past generations could have made fabled fighters or storied soldiers, but today find themselves slamming on a keyboard or flying about in a forklift, this shift is rather unfortunate.

However, for the majority of us – who, let’s face it, are cowardly by constitution – our culture’s revision of the qualities it values cannot be something that gives us much cause for complaint.

I, for one, am more than content that people’s perception of my manhood is not determined by whether or not I am up for riding a horse into a hail of falling arrows.

Truth be told – and I’ve never said this to anyone before – I don’t even own a horse.

But, despite my general relief that bravery has lost its spot at the top, when you do see somebody put on a display of truly outstanding courage these days, it is all the more impressive.

The other night, I stuck on the film ‘Veronica Guerin’.

The movie was made in 2003 and, yes, you guessed it, it tells the story of Veronica Guerin.

For the benefit of my younger readers, which it does my ego good to imagine I have, Veronica Guerin was an iconic never-say-die juggernaut of a journalist, who ended up being assassinated by the heroin-peddling criminals she attempted to expose. She was killed in 1996. The year before I was born.

If you consider yourself a person of above-average chutzpah, stick that film on, imagine yourself in Veronica’s shoes, and ask yourself: At what point during the Dublin dynamo’s last two years would you have decided to put your notepad in your pocket and let the gangsters do their thing?

If by the end of the 98 minutes – after the death threats, beatings and non-fatal shooting – you think you still would have been knocking on the gangster’s doors, then you are either delusional or one of an infinitesimally small number of people made from the same stuff as Veronica.

Since being murdered at the behest of psychopathic drug baron, John Gilligan, the iron-willed, quick-witted, indefatigable Guerin has become a symbol of what is possible through courageous reporting, but also what can happen to those who get too close to the flames of Ireland’s criminal underworld.

If nothing else, the film – which I understand only gives an artist’s impression of who she really was – made clear to me the chasm that separates your average coward from those capable of putting principle above their instinct for self-preservation, particularly when the stakes are life and death.

“Not a chance could I do that,” I admitted as I watched her pursue her relentless line of inquiry, half-wishing I possessed whatever quality it was she had, while also being quietly glad I don’t.

Watching her sprinting head-first towards her fate, I could see why some people say bravery is just a dignified sort of foolishness.

However, foolishness implies blindness or ignorance. To me, it seemed she was all too aware of the gravity of the risk she was running.

After all, Guerin was killed two days before she was set to speak at conference in London. The topic of her segment? ‘Dying to Tell the Story: Journalists at Risk’.