ABSTRACT
This chapter scrutinizes popular perceptions of heroism through the act of personal truth-telling. It does so by conducting an analysis of a real-world example through the lens of one from popular culture; namely, the whistle-blowing of clandestine US surveillance programs by former NSA worker Edward Snowden for the former, with the egalitarian values and moral certitude of Captain Jean-Luc Picard in the television series Star Trek: The Next Generation for the latter. Through the work of utopian scholar Fredric Jameson, the chapter also locates the value of using an older text to articulate a newer example through a process of reverse historicization.
