What Makes Us Human
What makes us human is that we care… And because we care, we never stop trying.
~Michael O’Hare, aka Commander Jeffrey Sinclair from ‘Babylon 5’
Babylon 5
Last year but not very long ago, I was introduced to a sci-fi series that I am now hooked on. Babylon 5 premiered in 1994 after the pilot film The Gathering took place in 1993, thus beginning a memorable yet challenging adventure into outer space where a space station called Babylon 5 was built and designed to bring together humans & aliens in order to maintain peace & harmony between the races. So far, I have enjoyed most of the episodes that I had seen on Babylon 5 while there are a few that I prefer not watching again because they have meanings or plots I have conflict with. However, I do appreciate each episode teaching important morals and lessons that we all need to learn whether we agree with them or not. Before then, I wasn’t very interested in science fiction like Star Wars, Star Trek, Babylon 5, or Stargate until a friend introduced me to a few of the series. Out of the four I had mentioned, I am more fascinated with Star Trek and Babylon 5 than with Star Wars. I watched two to three episodes of Stargate, but I haven’t formed an opinion yet.
Michael O’Hare
But, the focus of this page is not about which sci-fi series I enjoy. It is about someone on Babylon 5 whom I admire very much for the example that was taught and applied to my own heart. For some people who had seen Babylon 5, they would know Michael O’Hare as Jeffrey Sinclair, the commander of the Babylon 5 station in the show’s first season. Others would know him as characters he portrayed in other series, films or theatre productions. A brief fact: I had actually seen him a long time ago in one movie that my mom really enjoyed watching, called The Promise, which premiered in 1979. Until I started watching Babylon 5, it was the only movie I had ever seen Michael O’Hare in. When I saw him again in the series, he did look familiar to me—like I had seen him before in another movie. As I looked him up doing some research on Babylon 5 that was when I realized he was in another movie that I had seen before—The Promise.
When I learned he left Babylon 5 after season 1, I felt a little bummed because I really enjoyed seeing Sinclair as the commander of the Babylon 5 station. Though I like Captain Sheridan as the lead character, Michael O’Hare was always the commander of the series. After he left, no one knew the reason until he passed away at age 60 from a heart attack in 2012. In the first year of working on Babylon 5, O’Hare began experiencing delusions & other symptoms of psychosis; which worsened halfway through filming, therefore leaving the series. Besides his family & a few friends he could trust, there was only one person in the Babylon 5 series who knew of O’Hare’s mental health issues and kept it a secret until his passing. J. Michael Straczynski—the writer of Babylon 5—not only respected O’Hare’s privacy, but he also helped him with his problems.
In a private meeting, Straczynski offered to suspend Babylon 5 until O’Hare was in good condition after receiving treatment for his mental illness. However, the actor refused that offer because he didn’t want to be responsible for people losing their jobs on the show if it were canceled. Instead, he told his friend to write his character out and have another actor, Bruce Boxleitner (Capt. John Sheridan), take his place as the commander of the series. It must’ve been a really tough decision for him to make because he was a really good actor who did excellent as Sinclair on Babylon 5. Yet at the same time, he must’ve felt that it was the best thing he could do because he was thinking of others’ needs. Knowing that, I would call him a very noble man.
Upon my discovery that he left due to his mental illness and kept it a secret until his passing, I felt a sort of connection to Michael O’Hare. The reason is, though I never had an experience with mental illness, I know what it’s like to be different. I haven’t shared this with many people except on social media, but when I was 5 years old I was diagnosed with high functioning autism (aka Autism Spectrum Disorder). Growing up in Mexico as a child with a learning challenge was very hard for me because I was very different from other people who didn’t have a learning challenge, including those who were in my peer groups. I had a hard time understanding some of the basic subjects in school such as mathematics—the toughest I ever struggled with—because some of my teachers hadn’t had any experience with students with special needs and there were no resources I needed in the school I went to in Mexico. Other kids my age or close to my age bullied me because they didn’t see me good enough or cool enough to fit in with their groups. Though I was young and didn’t understand the social behaviors of others, I remember feeling left out, unloved, unimportant and unwanted when they were treating me that way. I didn’t feel special; I only felt like an outcast.
When I was starting 9th grade, I moved to northern California to live with my sister and my brother-in-law to escape the drug violence that was happening in Mexico. It was a very hard change for me to go through, especially as a 14-year-old girl with a learning challenge because I was not very used to change at the time. I was used to being in a routine that I was comfortable with. Being away from my parents who were still living in Mexico at the time of the violence was very hard for me as well. I worried for their safety every day ever since I moved to the United States.
However, it turned out to be a great blessing for me because not only did I get the help I needed to succeed in school, it was also a new beginning for me. After I moved away from Mexico, I didn’t want anyone to know about my autism. I was okay with my teachers, my high school principal & his assistants, and my youth leaders in the church I go to (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) knowing about it, but I didn’t want anyone in my peer group to know about my autism. I didn’t even want to say the word ‘autism’ because I didn’t want it to define me as a person. Instead, I pretended I didn’t have autism in order to not see myself that way. For me, it was better that other people didn’t know about my autism because I wanted them to see me as the person I was—someone who was kind, compassionate, gentle, funny, smart and cool. That wish actually came true for me. I made lots of awesome and outgoing friends who made me feel special. I’m even still good friends with them even though we now live in different places and don’t stay in contact with each other very much except through texting, phone calls, and social media. I also slowly realized that even if they knew about my autism, they would still love me and accept me as I was.
Now a grown young woman having graduated from college with a Bachelor’s degree, I am a little more comfortable talking about my autism. Although, I still don’t like to tell others about it sometimes because I don’t wish it to be the first thing for them to know about me. I only share that with people I feel I could trust knowing about it or people I feel I could relate to if they were having similar challenges.
In theory, that is one of the reasons Michael O’Hare never wanted any of the cast members, the crew or the public to know about his mental challenges. He wouldn’t want people to define him by the mental illness he was suffering from. That is something I can understand very well. If I were in his shoes, I highly doubt I would want anyone to know about my challenges. After all, it is a private matter that no one really needs to know except those who are trustworthy, including those going through mental challenges as well.
I mentioned earlier that I never had any experience with mental illness, so I do not fully understand it. I am afraid of being around people with these kinds of problems as well because I never know what they will do. However, I don’t stop caring for them because they do deserve my compassion and my respect for they are like us. They are human beings like the rest of us are. Don’t we all want to be treated like human beings—beings with feelings, conscience, and dignity?
I never knew Michael O’Hare personally, but from what I’d heard he was a good man who could bring smiles to people’s faces. Everyone who got to meet him had remarked that he was friendly, warm, funny and easy to talk to. And the people who knew him personally said essentially the same thing about him. These are the sources I rely on not only as a writer but also as someone who would like to know who this person is or was. Another source that seemed valid proof for me was An Audience With the Commander, a meeting that Michael O’Hare had with the fans of Babylon 5 on his visit to the UK. Throughout the video that I viewed on YouTube, it felt like I was actually seeing the actor as the man he was. He gave some good thoughts & advice to the fans, shared some of his personal experiences & interests with them, and acted silly in front of everyone, making them laugh even when he wasn’t trying to. He made me laugh too as I watched the video.
One of the highlights in watching that video was, I never saw the mental illness he had. I only saw a friendly man who was being himself and making people smile. If I ever knew him like his family & friends did, I would treat him like a friend no matter what. If I ever knew about his mental illness, I would do anything I could to help him even just a small thing out of kindness.
As human beings, we have the tendency to laugh, cry, hate, love, learn, ignore, dream, hurt, suffer, live and die. These are all the qualities of being human. We carry our own flaws & imperfections. But what makes us really human is the good within ourselves, including the light that we let shine upon others’ lives. If we want to make the world a better place, we start by seeing how things are in our society, treating others how we would want to be treated and standing up for what’s right. Not an easy thing to do, but it’s a start. It can help us to see things through from another perspective, therefore helping us to become better than we were before. Even if each of us makes a mistake, we should never stop trying to do good. My best advice to give is, learn from your mistake, apologize for any hurt you may have caused, change what you need to change and do what you can or need to do to make a better future.
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