Everyone has a hero, someone they look up to and start reading about, and it tends to be then that you find out some awful fact about them that tarnishes their reputation.
So this is where we tarnish some reputations.

I'll start with Roald Dahl, a man whose books I loved as a kid and turns out to be anti-semitic.
Roald_dahl#Anti-Semitic_remarks

Try to post some justification too. I'm hoping the thread will be educational, and not turn into a huge bun fight.

george best. i think people already know both sides of that one.

great talents don't make great people - but for some reason we need heroes.

(someone told me MLK was a plagiarist and womaniser... that's totally unchecked though)

No, let's not. If you insist, then at least quote some reputable sources rather than a free-for-all Wiki.

dave

Hansie Cronje..
Proberbly one of the true gentlemen of the game of cricket along with being an excellent captain... atleast till he owned up for the match fixing scandal.

Still he was the only one with the balls to admit that he had done something wrong.. every one lese pleaded innocence.

You mean the free-for-all Wiki that's more accurate than Brittanica?

No I mean the one that has been the medium of countless libellous comments.

dave

I read on Wiki that all homo sapiens are in fact vegetarian, not omnivorous. You mean that could be wrong?

oh, i haven't read that one. funny how easily established media and encyclopaedia salesmen feel threatened.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite

Who is MLK. If you can give some clues, I may be able to confirm if I have had him in the past given that he is a womaniser (allegedly)

he had a famous dream... i doubt you were beside him for it

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...51C1A966958260

On request.

I like my heros to be womanisers.

(Not sure where Optimus Prime fits into this concept)

Is this you finding out that your "hero" has a dark side and is not as great as you thought?

A lot of famous people from the old days have been branded as anti-semetic or racist, but you have to remember, 50+ years ago pretty much every one was racist, and also anti-semetism was also very common.

In todays modern western world, we have learned to become, on the whole, much much tolerant and accepting of other cultures and races. but this is due in large part, to major cultural shifts in opinions and the way we view the world.

50+ (?40+) years, it was normal to be racist, so I would brand someone from a time which was very different to ours, as being a bad person, just because they where racist or anti-semetic. Obvious, not providing any examples, but there where bad people who where anti-semetic or racist. But I wouldn't go as far as to say that someone from those times was bad because they where racist.

Or perhaps, would you say, that everyone that was racist in those days was bad, and there was more bad people in the world than there is today?

Which "hero" would that be then ?

dave

hmmm... i'm not so sure. i think there are differences in scale - being actively discriminatory or or violent or spreading hatred is different from the kind of passive ignorance/xenophobia that e.g. some grandparents are prone to. i think good people knew the difference even "in the olden days".

It was a dig, the Hero meant Wikipedia.

Ah, OK. I don't like Wikipedia very much, as although it contains a lot of useful background on a huge number of subjects, its veracity must be questioned.

On the subject of heroes, if my hero didn't have a dark side , then they were either very dull or lying. Having some vice, makes them human.

dave

TOSH!!! UTTER TOSH!!!

40 years ago my parents were in their 20's for godsake.

My Grandparents and my parents are/were not racist.

Ignorance existed then and exists now...

Heroes like me don't have heroes.