Death does not make you a better person

Last week, it was "Israel Shabbat" at Hillel, where along with Hillels across country, we were honoring some American guy who fought in the Israeli Army, came home and advocated for peace by organizing campus events (which, as I will likely post on later, is 7 times out of 10, a largely masturbatory gesture, especially when it is centered around something as nebulous as "peace"), and then was killed by a drunken driver.
And the reason we are celebrating this particular person, though one person said that I should say this out loud when I brought it up, is essentially because this guy happens to be dead.
I discussed this in a earlier post about the renaming of part of Martin Luther King Boulevard to the JJ Seabrook Bridge, and I'll say what I implied then: By virtue of dying, your accomplishments while living do not increase in importance. Or, to put it simply, death does not make you a better person.
   I'm not talking about martyrdom. People who die defending something they believe in are excellent fodder for honoring dinners and the like. I use the word "fodder" to emphasize what these people tend to become. While they may actually have believed in something during their lifetime, they have, in death, become only a symbol used for some political cause.    I am also inclined to question the efficacy of such a symbol. As in an example, I recall from many years ago in which an American went to great lengths to fight in the Israeli army and died in the line of duty, who became the topic of his sister's speech at an event I was attending. As I sat there in the auditorium listening to this guy's sister laud her late brother, I wondered the purpose of the speech. Was his example supposed to inspire me to go join the Israeli army? Was it saying, "Look at what he did for Israel, the least you could do is buy Israeli chocolate."? At least in my case (and I suspect, the case of many others in the room), I only felt some combination of annoyance that I was having to listen to this guy's dull story, jealousy that he was probably a better person than I and distraction by every other thing in the room.

In the case of the Israel Shabbat honoree, he doesn't even get to count as a martyr for dedication to Israel because he died by an unrelated incident. Despite this, it is expected that we should give him this special honor, while others who fight in the Israeli Army or advocate for peace are given no such honor, and indeed, are often overlooked entirely. I said something similar in the article directly preceding this one.

If the only reason someone is being honored is that they happen to have died after doing a good deed, perhaps the honor should be reconsidered.