Our definitions of loaded terms such as “hero” depends heavily on the context, or in theorist Judith Butler’s words “frames”, through which we view them. A Clint Eastwood movie titled “American Sniper” has recently hit theaters and has incited controversy surrounding the Islamophobic mindset that some claim it promotes. The film is based on the Navy Seal sniper Chris Kyle and his career in the Iraq War during which time he killed around 160 people, including civilians. While many U.S. conservatives have perhaps unsurprisingly hailed Kyle and “American Sniper” (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-30923038) as heroic and patriotic, groups such as the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee have brought awareness to some of the hateful consequences of this riling film.
In the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center, many recognized the first-responders as “heroes” who risked their own lives to save that of others, even going so far as to suffer the effects of the polluted rubble from the collapsed buildings. U.S. soldiers are also often referred to as “heroes” for fighting to keep their country safe, and to protect (and spread) the Western notions of democracy and freedom. While some may count Chris Kyle as being among these heroes, it can be argued that his violently prejudiced attitude toward the Muslim people he killed makes it difficult to label him a hero.
One of the criticism of “American Sniper” is that it promotes Islamophobia, and glorifies the harmful world-view of “us” vs “them”, the very same post-9/11 view of the U.S. and it’s relationship with the rest of the world that was used to justify the various wars the country waged in the Middle East. Such racist and controversial mindsets continue to provoke hate crimes against people of color (http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-30972690), and clash with the idea that we must count every life as a human life, a theme in Butler’s book Frames of War: When is a Life Grievable?

For another perspective on these weighted terms, I highly recommend Alana Redka’s blog post on the term “hero”, which ties it into Jonathan Safran Foer’s novel “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close” (https://blogs.ubc.ca/alanaredka/2015/01/15/what-is-a-hero-really/).