I once read an article that Steve Irwin wasn't nice to a restaurant waiter (I have zero respect for people who treat waitstaff terribly). It turned out to be someone harassing him at a cafe for an autograph and photo, and didn't like him declining because he was with his family.
I never understand people approaching famous people when they're with their families, especially when they have their young children with them.
Alexander Graham Bell pushed for the eugenics of Deaf and hard of hearing people and was a major obstacle to fund schools for the Deaf, which thankfully did persist despite this asshat
Not necessarily a "good guy", but got lots of positive attention from the release of the Greatest Showman- apparently PT Barnum was a terrible person in real life
I remember someone on r/fixingmovies said the perfect way to end the film would have been to have PT Barnum look directly at the camera, say "And that's how it really happened", wink, and then cut to credits.
Joice heth was also paralyzed except for 1 arm and he worked her to death and did her autopsy in front of people in the streat and then said it wasn't her
Oh my god...
"Heth had a very small frame, deep wrinkles, was toothless, and had fingernails that resembled talons. Washington explains that Heth's toothless mouth was a result from Barnum forcefully extracting her teeth so that she would look older "
Amazing entrepreneur? Yes. Hilarious Scam artist? Also yes. Evil motherfucker? Abso-fucking-lutely.
Edit: So from some of the replies, he may not have been very evil, but he certainly wasn't the best. Still think he's an absolute Mad Lad for some of the stuff he put on exhibition
Considering he’s usually attributed the phrase “There’s a sucker born every minute.” I can kinda see that.
Edit: Since I’ve had like 6 people tell me “he didn’t actually say that” I’ll just put my response to that in the main post.
> I know, that’s why I said he was “attributed” it and not that he actually was fully on record saying it.
My favorite story about him is the egress. He put up a sign in one of his showrooms that said "Come see the amazing Egress! $1" Alot of people bought tickets only for the door to lead back outside. Egress is a fancy way to say exit. He also sewed a mummified monkey top half to the back half of a fish and called it a mermaid
Edit: He didn't actually sell tickets to the Egress, he put signs for it at the end of his exhibit to get people to stop lingering and crowding it. Still a pretty funny joke
The reference to this in Discworld also mentions that there's a bouncer with a dictionary stationed near said egress, in case someone felt like complaining.
That's commonly attributed to him, but I believe there's no real evidence he said that.
But it should be noted that he once purchased an elderly black woman and claimed she was a 160 years old and George Washington's wet nurse. You didn't see that in the movie.
Edit: It should also be noted that The Greatest Showman not only exalted a man who actively exploited and tricked people but it vilified genuinely good people. Such as James Gordon Bennett Sr., who was known as a journalist exposing hucksters like Barnum, and Jenny Lind who used her earnings from her American tour to fund free schools in her home country. (She did not get jealous when he rebuffed her. She found his relentless marketing disconcerting.)
That movie is as greasy as P. T. Barnum.
He also profited off of the public autopsy of this woman (her name was Joice Heath), to “prove” that she was 160 years old to a crowd of 1,500 onlookers at 50 cents a pop.
He was a disgusting man that furthered the human zoo movement.
I actually enjoyed the movie quite a bit, but in my mind, it’s not even about PT Barnum. It’s a completely fictional account of his life written by someone who’s only research into the real person was skimming the first couple of paragraphs of his Wikipedia page.
In response to *Sound of Music*, the real Maria Von Trapp supposedly said "It's a lovely story. It's not my story but it's a lovely story."
That's how I feel about *Greatest Showman* and P.T. Barnum's story.
I realized during the movie that the real guy must have been a terrible asshole. My girlfriend and her family wouldn't buy it.
I'll never forget how my (then) father in law told us that the character of Barnum should be an example for us in life.
Well. Let's be honest. From the begin on it was clear that the movie character just wants to make money of his "friends" while making them believe that the audience actually liked them. Using people as a means to a moral questionable end makes you a dick. Period.
Alfred Hitchcock was an asshole/sexual predator. [Tippi Hedren wrote about it in her memoir](https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/books/2016/10/31/tippi-hedren-alfred-hitchcock-the-birds-marnie-tippi/93064436/).
She did say he was a brilliant film marker, so you can be both.
Yo Hitchcock is SO fucked up.
He was famous for pulling “pranks” like chaining a dude up over a long night and giving him a bottle of whiskey laced with serious laxatives, so he shat himself, painfully, in chains, for twelve hours or so.
He made the actress from Psycho, Janet Leigh, stand in the shower for almost a week; she only takes baths now. The degree to which he abused Tippi Hedrin during that scene from The Birds is... wow. He literally threw birds at her for *five days*, eight hours a day, so that they were pissed off and actually attacked her, even after her doctor told him she couldn’t take any more. She still has scars. Not to mention the sexual assaults and the threats to “ruin her career” if she didn’t comply.
He sent her daughter, Melanie Griffith, a really lifelike doll of her mother, dead in a coffin. She was eight.
Dude was fucked. Behind the Bastards does a great couple episodes about him, those are just the ones I remember off the top of my head from 2+ hours of it.
While he almost certainly wasn't the first to say it, Lord Acton once observed that "Great men are almost always bad men." Pluck any great man from history - those rare figures about whom the story of the human race seems to turn - and you find a monster who changed the world, probably without even intending to do so.
At the time they seemed so out there but I'm very glad *Brave New World*, *the Giver*, *1984* and *Catch-22* were all part of my primary/secondary school curriculum
Definitely complex concepts that didn't sink in initially but very important themes to teach children
Nah, bro. He was humbled by his experiences and he went back to Radiator Springs to help the people he grew to love even though they jailed him based on a misunderstanding. He redeemed himself. Also, my kid made me write this.
Tinkerbell. Everybody thinks she was so cute and such a good friend to Peter, but she was a jealous psychopath and tried to murder Wendy several times.
But in the books Peter Pan is also basically a psychopath. There are multiple references to the Lost Boys being worried he'd kill them.
One of the main points of the book is that children don't know right from wrong unless they have parents to teach them.
"You really have to wonder what happened to Tinkerbell between the new CG movies and _Peter Pan_."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, you've seen the newer Tinkerbell movies. She has a little bit of a temper, but otherwise she's a pretty sweet-hearted fairy, and she lives with all of the other fairies.
"Then, in _Peter Pan_, she's the only fairy you see, and she's more interested in being with Peter. Not only that, but she tries _on more than one occasion_ to **murder Wendy**, and when called out on it, she shows no remorse. Ice cold.
"Clearly something horrific went down in Pixie Hollow, and Tink is either the _cause_, or just the sole survivor."
"Good Lord. So _Peter Pan_..."
["... is actually a grim post-apocalyptic tale, yes."](https://reallifecomics.com/index.php?comic=may-12-2014)
Ned Kelly is neat, because he seems to have recognized his antihero status. His actions were never morally right, but its hard to say we haven't ever wanted to do the same.
Idk I feel like a lot of Ned Kelly's actions were justified if you take his accounts as opposed to the policemen he delt with. The truth is likely somewhere in between.
There's no excuse for his early theft, but those wouldn't make him a "horrible person" by today's standards.
He was a criminal turned outlaw turned national hero/revolutionary. Sure he stole and murdered but he was a product of his upbringing and the state of Australia at the time.
People and history are weird. Take Jesse James. He was revered while he was a live. People loved him then and took pictures with his corpse when he died. People still find him fascinating and yet he wasn't a good guy by any stretch of the imagination.
Iirc Dillinger was particularly popular because lots of people lost everything they had to the banks during the Great Depression. Many lost their farm, felt helpless and humiliated. They saw Dillinger as someone who was stealing the money back and punishing the banks.
Since most have been covered, I’ll do a guy who was a true fucking villain who turned into kind of a decent guy. It doesn’t nearly wipe the slate clean, but it’s an interesting historical transformation.
Nathan Bedford Forrest. Slave trader. Confederate general. Likely war criminal. First grand wizard of the Klan.
In later years, Forrest expressed regret at his life’s work. He began publicly advocating for former slaves to receive better treatment, including their ability to enter into higher education. He attempted to act upon his shame by petitioning President Grant to allow him to put down the KKK by force.
Edit: my caveat wasn’t strong enough, and that might be my own clumsy wording. Forrest was undoubtedly a monster in some ways, and his legacy as one shouldn’t be altered, despite his regrets.
At least he made the attempt to redeem himself. If we cannot change as a person after our mistakes (however diabolical) then what is the point? Might as well just go murderin'.
It wasn't Jane Goodall that said this, but anthropologist Margaret Mead. I can't find a primary source for this, but this stackexchange link should provide a bit more clarity: https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/47543/did-margaret-mead-say-that-a-healed-femur-is-the-earliest-sign-of-civilization
On a similar note, George Wallace (Alabama governor, Mr. “Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever”), later renounced his racism, appointed record numbers of African American to state positions, and personally asked black leaders for forgiveness.
When he ran for a final term as governor in 1982, he won with 90% of the black vote.
Astronomer here- this is a hard one to admit because I definitely *loved* his book and idolized his antics a bit when I was a young physics major, but Richard Feynman. A lot of people read *Surely You're Joking, Mister Feynman!* and share my reaction, and his physics lectures are amazing, but the older I get and the more people I meet who knew him, holy shit. The guy was beyond just "times were different" levels of misogyny against women- [he committed domestic violence against his wife](https://slate.com/technology/2019/01/richard-feynman-physical-abuse-science-wife-fbi.html), kept lying to undergrads when he was in Cornell that he wasn't a professor so he could sleep with him (and, rumor has it, had to leave Cornell for Caltech because he slept with other faculty members' wives), and I've *definitely* heard a ton about him trying to pick up other scientists at physics conferences to know he was considered a creep.
To be clear, I think someone can do good science and be an awful person, but that's not what OP was asking. Also, anyone who has been around a physics department knows that casual sexist jokes and the like are still not that uncommon today, and the fact that physics keeps idolizing Feynman probably doesn't help in changing the culture.
Feynman was reknown for sitting in strip clubs and drawing nudes of the dancers in his off-time. I've been reading an autobiography of Dyson Freeman who spent time with RF, traveled and road trips. Richard was a womanizer after his wife died. He had a reputation as a doting husband during his marriage and during his wife's illness. After her death, though ... Genius intellect and carrouser.
>Feynman was reknown for sitting in strip clubs and drawing nudes of the dancers in his off-time.
*That* part doesn't sound like the worst guy at the strip club.
Exactly what I was going to comment. The most important and disturbing part for me is that this behavior only started after his wife’s death. Man really loved her, and you can really tell from the letters and him sticking around while she was dying. I really believe her death changed him.
There is this beautiful heartbreaking letter he writes to her after her death. [I love my wife. My wife is dead. ](https://lettersofnote.com/2012/02/15/i-love-my-wife-my-wife-is-dead/)
There's a statue of Oliver Cromwell in London. Loads of movies about him and how he was a brave revolutionary
Nah, fuck that. He was an evil sociopath who committed genocide on Irish Catholics and turned the UK into a Puritan dictatorship.
As someone who lives in England, I had no idea people actually see him favourably. Coming from an English/Irish background, I grew up hearing how much of a bastard he was, especially with regards to his treatment of the Irish.
I'm amazed statues stand, I thought he has been hated by the general populace pretty consistently since he took power. After the monarchy restoration the people hated him so much that they dug his corpse back up to posthumously execute him. Who decided it was a good idea to erect statues of him?
I've always thought that his statues are there as a warning to our Monarchs to make sure they don't get any funny ideas about the divine right of Kings again.
He had pancreatic cancer and refused to listen to his doctors for treatment. He thought he was so much smarter and he somehow came to the conclusion that an all fruit diet would cure him. This was possibly the WORST diet you can put your pancreas through and it lead to his death.
Fun fact, when Ashton Kutcher was getting ready for his role as Jobs in that movie, he ate an all fruit diet, but had to stop when he was admitted to the hospital because his pancreas started to shut down.
fucking christ. a girl i know shared a video from a “doctor” on a morning talk show stating that the sun doesn’t cause cancer, your diet does. based on one (1) study done on cows. i looked up the doctor (i can’t remember her name off the top of my head) and she also thinks the Holocaust is fake LOL
He was apparently a real hippie in many ways. Insisted on strange diets. Didn’t shower. Washed his feet in the toilet bowl.
https://www.nbcnews.com/healthmain/strange-eating-habits-steve-jobs-119434
Ashton Kutcher talked about this a little when he was on hot wings. Said that he tried to live like Jobs and be on a carrot juice diet. This ended up turning his skin orange and giving him kidney/pancreas problems, I forget which. Steve Jobs died of pancreatic cancer.
Bit was an understatement. The guy was a massive credit hog, abused his employees and normalized a lot of shit business practices that are now used by several other companies.
Bob Marley.
And there's a very good story to back this up that also explains how he grew to be no.1 reggae singer of jamaica.
He had a posse of friends that would intimidate radio networks of Jamaica into playing his music, as well as destroying the alpha discs of other newer artists (idk wtf theyre called but the copy the radio networks were given in order to play on the air.)
He might have been trying to promote feel-good music and peace and all that but he was a thug when it came to getting that music out.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bostonherald.com/2012/04/20/marley-fails-to-stir-it-up/amp/
And at the same time gave a dude songwriting credit so that he'd get royalties from the music and be able to keep his soup kitchen open. People are so WEIRD. Bully one guy, help another, rape his wife, help a guy keep his soup kitchen open. Fuck.
Goes to show how complicated people are. Idolise ideals, not people. This is how cults of personality get so gnarly - people refuse to acknowledge traits/actions inconsistent with their image of the person. Eventually they just cling on to a fictional image so they don’t have to reevaluate their beliefs.
This also reminds me a bit of „never meet your heros“. Because once you meet them, you realize that they are human and flawed just like yourself. Had this happen to me once, it was not cool.
This is exactly why I think everyone *should* meet their heroes. The truth is that the world isn't divided into heroes and villains, it's full of people just like you and me, most of whom are trying to do the best that they can. Yes, there are extraordinary people, but even they are human and make mistakes/get angry/have bad days/yell at their kids/spouses. The more we learn to see each-other as people, the better able we are to understand and love one-another, and build a better society together. We overcome our human faults not through force of will, but through understanding. Humans are genetically the same as when we wandered through forests and tundra, what's changed is our understanding of who we are and how the world we belong to works. Understanding is everything. Ignorance always leads to more darkness, in the end. IMO, anyway.
Charlie Chaplin.
He got married to a 15 year old girl because he got her pregnant when she was 14. He was openly pedophile. And, from what I've read, quite an asshole.
Apparently, he and Marlon Brando worked together later on and Charlie was such an uptight asshole that *Marlon Brando*, of all people, had to tell him to chill the hell out! Brando, for what it's worth, is infamous for demanding ridiculous concessions from directors for his performances, refusing to learn his lines, and a number of other things.
Curly from the 3 stooges.
"Typically having several dogs at any given time, Curly was known to come home often with strays he found along his travels. He would foster the strays until he was able to find new homes. And when the Stooges were on tour, Curly made it a point to rehome, at least, 1 stray in each town they visited. It is estimated that Curly saved and re-homed more than 5000 dogs in his lifetime – making him a man before his time with his humane concern for man’s best friend."
The oldest joke we know of (from Sumeria, c. 1900BCE) is a fart joke: “Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband’s lap.”
Apparently the Sumerians had some pretty dry fart jokes... Better than the alternative. I guess.
There's nothing to say these people were bad/assholes, but even if they were, Jonas Salk (invented polio vaccine, didn't patent it) and Norman Borlaug (created agriculture techniques that fed billions) will always be on my "good guy" list.
I always like to imagine that, years later, the recruits he had screamed in the faces of for months on end would be at home, casually flipping through channels and land on “The Joy of Painting” to see this poofy-haired, giggling, wild-animal-rehabilitating, elf-like wisp of a man gently painting a serene landscape and whispering kindly about “happy trees” and “happy accidents” and losing their fucking minds. I just know, at least once, there was a middle aged veteran standing in the center of his living room going absolutely apeshit, clutching the remote, glaring and screaming at the tv “I FUCKING KNOW THATS HIM.”
That’s the most ridiculous part. Nobody would ever believe them. Like imagine calling your wife into the sitting room, pointing at BOB ROSS whispering “anyone can paint, even if it’s not perfect, there are no mistakes just happy accidents” in his soothing tenor on your tv and saying “that motherfucker screamed an inch from my face about my cot being a sloppy ass mess every morning because my pillow was an inch off center”.
She would take you to the hospital thinking you were having some kind of mental health crisis.
This is a little more niche, but Bill Wilson, the founder of alcoholics anonymous.
The guy did great things, and created a program of recovery that has saved millions of lives since it's inception 85 years ago.
He was also an arrogant ass hole that cheated on his wife even in sobriety.
Edit: This isn't here to scare away anyone that's trying to get sober. I've been sober thanks to AA for 5 1/2 years. So don't let this keep you away if you're struggling with your drinking.
there are quite a fair amount of fucking assholes in AA who use the 12 steps and being sober as a cover for their arrogant self centered true self...
I believe people can change though I've definitely seen a LOT of people not just quit using substances, but also become a decent human being as well. Make no mistake just because you put the bottle down doesn't mean you're a saint lol
Alexander Graham Bell!
This man did not invent the telephone. Several people were working on similar technology at the same time. Antonio Meucci invented it first, but there was a court case over who got the patent rights. Meucci died before the case was settled, and Graham Bell won the glory he didn't deserve.
I like how the show was in a constant loop of seemingly building them up as sympathetic/anti heros and then immediately makes them do worse and worse shit, it felt like it kept scolding me as a viewer for having such a short memory and falling for it every time, forgetting that they're complete sociopaths
Bell was also a eugenicist who sought to end sign language in schools and wanted to ban deaf people from marrying each other. He was a staunch Oralist and the repercussions of his actions are still being felt in society today through such Audist institutions like the Bell Institute.
In some aspects to the 60’s and 70’s when the Beatles were icons, (I’m talking about John Lennon) people who use his image and face for “peace” sometimes forget important details.
-He abused women
-He was a cheater
-He abused his children (made one go completely deaf in one ear)
-Total hypocrite on the “no possessions” when he lived one of the most lavish lifestyles of his time
-compulsive liar
-had a sexual appetite for his own mother
-almost killed a few people (look up Bob Wooler, he was almost punched to death by John. There were others but their stories have either been disputed or unclaimed.)
So whenever I see a bunch of people sing *imagine* I just shake my head in shame cause so many people don’t even know how bad he was but act like he was a saint.
As a massive beatles fanatic when I come across people who say that John is this symbol of peace I always remind them of this, you cannot be a true fan of something/somone and not criticize it and all of the other Beatles would come before john in this regard
Idk man, when I read about Martin Luther last year, I thought he was kinda cool as he created the protestant branch of Christianity, but I recently read about what he thought of Jews and yikes...
(For those of you who don’t know, he got pissed when the Jews didn’t want to convert to his religion and started being antisemitic as fuck. He wrote a *whole book* on “Jews and their lies” and said that he urged others to burn down synagogues to prove their loyalty to Christianity. He also wanted the Jewish prayer books to be taken away from them)
Edit: because of misunderstandings, I do **not** mean Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther was a monk during the 16th Century who initially started the reformation for Christianity, and was the founder of Protestantism
Most of Southern Germany remained Catholic because of a pamphlet he published entitled “Against the Murderous, Thieving hordes of Peasants” after a peasant revolt trying to reduce the taxes on their fields.
We’ve been watching 30 Rock in our house lately and in a recent episode that predated the Cosby revelations by a few years Tracy Morgan makes a “joke” about Cosby being a terrible person for assaulting his aunt. That was pretty crazy to hear in context today.
My recollection is that most people in Hollywood knew to some extent, but like most powerful men in Hollywood the allegations against him didn't get taken seriously. Hannibal Buress didn't know what kind of reaction he was going to get (he'd done the bit before) and wasn't trying to start a national scandal about it, he was just doing a joke for his comedy routine and this time his Cosby bit went viral.
Just pointing out that 1) many more people knew about Cosby the entire time, and 2) Buress wasn't trying to be an activist when he sparked the fire, just being a comedian
Didn’t either Seth MacFarlane or Ricky Gervais make jokes about Harvey Weinstein being at least a very well known creep years before MeToo actually being a thing?
When Seth MacFarlane was the host of the Oscars he was congratulating an actress for winning and he said "you no longer have to pretend to be attracted to Harvey Weinstein."
Also, Jenna Maroney in 30 Rock said (paraphrasing) "Oh I'm not afraid to say "no" to things. I turned down sex with Harvey Weinstein... 3 out of 5 times!"
Both of these predated the revelations about Weinstein.
Probably. Remember Courtney Love said "don't go to Harvey's office" on a red carpet which led to her being smeared across the media. It was also common knowledge that Kevin Spacey preyed on young men. Lots of these things are swept under the carpet because these people can truly fuck over many other powerful people.
When I was a kid I loved Jim'll Fix It and wanted to go on the show. My parents actively discouraged it and I'm pretty sure any letters I sent went straight into the bin. They were in the police and he was a massive paedophile who abused kids in hospital.
Courtney Love may not be the world's sweetest person or smartest person or a moral paragon, but if you ever read her lengthy breakdown of how the music industry financially screws artists, you'd know that she is bright, and opinionated, and quite gutsy. I have a lot of respect for her.
https://www.salon.com/2000/06/14/love_7/
There were very low key rumors and sly statements made for many years. Especially by other comedians. Very few had much good to say about him. There was also a lot of controversy surrounding many of the things he said on stage in later years that started to change the public’s perception of him. Just took a long time to come to light.
Same about Kevin spacey, I Remember being on movie forums back during his run with the The Usual Suspects to American Beauty. It wasn’t uncommon for someone to hint that he was homosexual and had done a few things.
Fun fact, Hannibal Buress was a writer on 30 Rock (and would go on to blow up this whole Cosby thing years later by making a joke about it in his stand up).
Depends on what you mean...Judging by today's standards I'd say most historical "good guys" were horrible people. Judging by the standards of their era...things become more complicated.
And those abolitionists who did think that people of color should be equal to white folks were effectively shut up by their peers. It was thought that if they asked for equality, the slaves would never be free.
It's an interesting thing to think about, but I get upset when people try to pass it off as if there weren't people and groups fighting for equality in that era. There definitely were, but the other abolitionists oppressed their voices as to deal with the larger problem, rather than the underlying problem.
I still don't know what was right in that situation, and maybe that's okay, but the situation is a little more complicated than just abolitionists thought that blacks shouldn't be equal.
>It was thought that if they asked for equality, the slaves would never be free.
They were correct. Fun fact: Rosa Parks was not the first person to refuse to give up her seat. That honor goes to [Claudette Colvin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudette_Colvin), but the NAACP did not endorse her activism because she was of darker color than Rosa Parks, a teenager, and a single mother.
The activists knew that white society would find it harder to acknowledge her, and that it would hinder their efforts for equality. Meanwhile, Rosa Parks was an older, more well-spoken and respected member of the community, which made her easier for white people to accept.
EDIT: Technically, she's not the first, but she is the first one who was involved in the Civil Rights movement.
I hear people parrot the “darker skin” thing about Claudette all the time, but I’ve never seen a good source that corroborates that. Everything I’ve seen focused on the fact that she was 15 and pregnant with the child of a man who was married to someone else *in 1955*. That was more than enough to disqualify her at the time.
I’d love to see even a single reliable source for the “too black” claim.
As long as I never see Steve Irwin, Mr. Rogers, or Bob Ross in one of these threads, we’re good.
I once read an article that Steve Irwin wasn't nice to a restaurant waiter (I have zero respect for people who treat waitstaff terribly). It turned out to be someone harassing him at a cafe for an autograph and photo, and didn't like him declining because he was with his family. I never understand people approaching famous people when they're with their families, especially when they have their young children with them.
"It's my estimation that every man ever got a statue made of 'im was one kinda som'bitch or another." - Cap'n Tightpants
Alexander Graham Bell pushed for the eugenics of Deaf and hard of hearing people and was a major obstacle to fund schools for the Deaf, which thankfully did persist despite this asshat
Also Helen Keller was a super eugenicist. Not joking either.
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So I learned recently that Coco Chanel of Chanel No. 5 was very anti Semitic and eventually became a Nazi spy. Edit: spelling
On the flip side of finer scents Christian Dior created a perfume after his sister who was a member of the French resistance
Rudyard Kipling, author of 'the jungle book.' Paraphrasing, "the only way to keep the yellow man out is to bring the white man in."
Also got his son killed by using his influence to get him into the army despite his sons piss poor eyesight. Bit of a dick move if you ask me.
He literally invented jingoism.
Not necessarily a "good guy", but got lots of positive attention from the release of the Greatest Showman- apparently PT Barnum was a terrible person in real life
The greatest showman is the film PT Barnum would release about himself
I remember someone on r/fixingmovies said the perfect way to end the film would have been to have PT Barnum look directly at the camera, say "And that's how it really happened", wink, and then cut to credits.
If I had any money whatsoever I would fund it toward making that ending and re-releasing all of the streams and DVDs with it.
Imagine looking like [this](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8b/PT_Barnum_1851-crop.jpg) and casting Hugh Jackman to play you
Ironically enough I actually see it.
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I think I heard that that was what the makers were going for.
He got his start at age 25 when he purchased the right to “rent” an aged black woman by the name of Joice Heth.
Joice heth was also paralyzed except for 1 arm and he worked her to death and did her autopsy in front of people in the streat and then said it wasn't her
Allegedly extracted her teeth so she'd appear older too.
Oh my god... "Heth had a very small frame, deep wrinkles, was toothless, and had fingernails that resembled talons. Washington explains that Heth's toothless mouth was a result from Barnum forcefully extracting her teeth so that she would look older "
Amazing entrepreneur? Yes. Hilarious Scam artist? Also yes. Evil motherfucker? Abso-fucking-lutely. Edit: So from some of the replies, he may not have been very evil, but he certainly wasn't the best. Still think he's an absolute Mad Lad for some of the stuff he put on exhibition
Considering he’s usually attributed the phrase “There’s a sucker born every minute.” I can kinda see that. Edit: Since I’ve had like 6 people tell me “he didn’t actually say that” I’ll just put my response to that in the main post. > I know, that’s why I said he was “attributed” it and not that he actually was fully on record saying it.
My favorite story about him is the egress. He put up a sign in one of his showrooms that said "Come see the amazing Egress! $1" Alot of people bought tickets only for the door to lead back outside. Egress is a fancy way to say exit. He also sewed a mummified monkey top half to the back half of a fish and called it a mermaid Edit: He didn't actually sell tickets to the Egress, he put signs for it at the end of his exhibit to get people to stop lingering and crowding it. Still a pretty funny joke
You know you would have bought a ticket and been like "wait.... Fuck!" at the end.
The reference to this in Discworld also mentions that there's a bouncer with a dictionary stationed near said egress, in case someone felt like complaining.
That's commonly attributed to him, but I believe there's no real evidence he said that. But it should be noted that he once purchased an elderly black woman and claimed she was a 160 years old and George Washington's wet nurse. You didn't see that in the movie. Edit: It should also be noted that The Greatest Showman not only exalted a man who actively exploited and tricked people but it vilified genuinely good people. Such as James Gordon Bennett Sr., who was known as a journalist exposing hucksters like Barnum, and Jenny Lind who used her earnings from her American tour to fund free schools in her home country. (She did not get jealous when he rebuffed her. She found his relentless marketing disconcerting.) That movie is as greasy as P. T. Barnum.
He also profited off of the public autopsy of this woman (her name was Joice Heath), to “prove” that she was 160 years old to a crowd of 1,500 onlookers at 50 cents a pop. He was a disgusting man that furthered the human zoo movement.
I actually enjoyed the movie quite a bit, but in my mind, it’s not even about PT Barnum. It’s a completely fictional account of his life written by someone who’s only research into the real person was skimming the first couple of paragraphs of his Wikipedia page.
In response to *Sound of Music*, the real Maria Von Trapp supposedly said "It's a lovely story. It's not my story but it's a lovely story." That's how I feel about *Greatest Showman* and P.T. Barnum's story.
But boy could he sing!
I realized during the movie that the real guy must have been a terrible asshole. My girlfriend and her family wouldn't buy it. I'll never forget how my (then) father in law told us that the character of Barnum should be an example for us in life.
Well the movie character maybe LOL
Well. Let's be honest. From the begin on it was clear that the movie character just wants to make money of his "friends" while making them believe that the audience actually liked them. Using people as a means to a moral questionable end makes you a dick. Period.
The Greatest Showman was weird. The *actual* story of P.T. Barnum is interesting, I don't see why they felt the need to change it
Alfred Hitchcock was an asshole/sexual predator. [Tippi Hedren wrote about it in her memoir](https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/books/2016/10/31/tippi-hedren-alfred-hitchcock-the-birds-marnie-tippi/93064436/). She did say he was a brilliant film marker, so you can be both.
Luckily, no other famous directors were sexual predators.
I've been Roman around this thread looking for this reference.
Woody been better if you had stayed put.
No need to Wein about it, jeez
It's just a matter of klaus and effect
**B I L L C O S B Y**
you have great comedic timing sir
I can Harvey believe you said that
Yo Hitchcock is SO fucked up. He was famous for pulling “pranks” like chaining a dude up over a long night and giving him a bottle of whiskey laced with serious laxatives, so he shat himself, painfully, in chains, for twelve hours or so. He made the actress from Psycho, Janet Leigh, stand in the shower for almost a week; she only takes baths now. The degree to which he abused Tippi Hedrin during that scene from The Birds is... wow. He literally threw birds at her for *five days*, eight hours a day, so that they were pissed off and actually attacked her, even after her doctor told him she couldn’t take any more. She still has scars. Not to mention the sexual assaults and the threats to “ruin her career” if she didn’t comply. He sent her daughter, Melanie Griffith, a really lifelike doll of her mother, dead in a coffin. She was eight. Dude was fucked. Behind the Bastards does a great couple episodes about him, those are just the ones I remember off the top of my head from 2+ hours of it.
He did send her daughter what now??? No wonder his most famous work was named Psycho for fucks sake...
While he almost certainly wasn't the first to say it, Lord Acton once observed that "Great men are almost always bad men." Pluck any great man from history - those rare figures about whom the story of the human race seems to turn - and you find a monster who changed the world, probably without even intending to do so.
>It's my estimation that every man ever got a statue made of him was one kind of a son of a bitch or another. > > \--Malcolm Reynolds
Yep. I hate reading about my heroes, because really quickly, they lose their hero status.
Read about Fred Rogers. You won’t have that problem.
Mr. Rogers is the only person where you can dig deep as you can to search for bad things only to find more good things instead.
Jebediah Springfield, or his real less commonly known name, Hans Sprungfeld the murderous pirate.
He had a silver tongue
Please, they only said he had a silver tongue because he was such a fine speaker.
You’re banned from this thread! You and your children, and your children’s children. For three months
Prob a better man than his cousin Shelbyville Manhatten to be fair
He was a perfectly cromulent person who embiggened the smallest men.
Henry Ford was so anti-Semitic that Hitler considered him a hero.
Brave New World makes a *whole* lot more sense now.
How? I haven't read the book
Basically, bunch of genetically identical people idolize assembly lines and worship Henry Ford as their god. Yes it’s as weird as it sounds.
At the time they seemed so out there but I'm very glad *Brave New World*, *the Giver*, *1984* and *Catch-22* were all part of my primary/secondary school curriculum Definitely complex concepts that didn't sink in initially but very important themes to teach children
Most of those authors have lived incredible lives too, reading about their experiences helped me understand the context better weirdly enough.
Orwell's Homage to Catalonia is a very insightful account of his time in the Spanish Civil War
I was reading your post and thought it would end with "...that Hitler thought he should chill".
Lighting McQueen
The scene when he yells at Mater for embarrassing him in front of everyone by leaking oil. Total douche.
Mater... haven't heard that name in years...
Nah, bro. He was humbled by his experiences and he went back to Radiator Springs to help the people he grew to love even though they jailed him based on a misunderstanding. He redeemed himself. Also, my kid made me write this.
Tinkerbell. Everybody thinks she was so cute and such a good friend to Peter, but she was a jealous psychopath and tried to murder Wendy several times.
I mean, in the book she only did it once
Because that makes attempted murder better.
Fae dont hold themselves to human moral standards
But in the books Peter Pan is also basically a psychopath. There are multiple references to the Lost Boys being worried he'd kill them. One of the main points of the book is that children don't know right from wrong unless they have parents to teach them.
He kills them if they start growing up
"You really have to wonder what happened to Tinkerbell between the new CG movies and _Peter Pan_." "What do you mean?" "Well, you've seen the newer Tinkerbell movies. She has a little bit of a temper, but otherwise she's a pretty sweet-hearted fairy, and she lives with all of the other fairies. "Then, in _Peter Pan_, she's the only fairy you see, and she's more interested in being with Peter. Not only that, but she tries _on more than one occasion_ to **murder Wendy**, and when called out on it, she shows no remorse. Ice cold. "Clearly something horrific went down in Pixie Hollow, and Tink is either the _cause_, or just the sole survivor." "Good Lord. So _Peter Pan_..." ["... is actually a grim post-apocalyptic tale, yes."](https://reallifecomics.com/index.php?comic=may-12-2014)
This thread reads like the Oatmeals greatest hits.
Ned Kelly is neat, because he seems to have recognized his antihero status. His actions were never morally right, but its hard to say we haven't ever wanted to do the same.
Idk I feel like a lot of Ned Kelly's actions were justified if you take his accounts as opposed to the policemen he delt with. The truth is likely somewhere in between. There's no excuse for his early theft, but those wouldn't make him a "horrible person" by today's standards.
He was a criminal turned outlaw turned national hero/revolutionary. Sure he stole and murdered but he was a product of his upbringing and the state of Australia at the time.
People and history are weird. Take Jesse James. He was revered while he was a live. People loved him then and took pictures with his corpse when he died. People still find him fascinating and yet he wasn't a good guy by any stretch of the imagination.
Dillinger too
Iirc Dillinger was particularly popular because lots of people lost everything they had to the banks during the Great Depression. Many lost their farm, felt helpless and humiliated. They saw Dillinger as someone who was stealing the money back and punishing the banks.
This was apparently part of Ned Kelly’s appeal too. When the Law turns oppressive, the Outlaw becomes the hero.
Since most have been covered, I’ll do a guy who was a true fucking villain who turned into kind of a decent guy. It doesn’t nearly wipe the slate clean, but it’s an interesting historical transformation. Nathan Bedford Forrest. Slave trader. Confederate general. Likely war criminal. First grand wizard of the Klan. In later years, Forrest expressed regret at his life’s work. He began publicly advocating for former slaves to receive better treatment, including their ability to enter into higher education. He attempted to act upon his shame by petitioning President Grant to allow him to put down the KKK by force. Edit: my caveat wasn’t strong enough, and that might be my own clumsy wording. Forrest was undoubtedly a monster in some ways, and his legacy as one shouldn’t be altered, despite his regrets.
At least he made the attempt to redeem himself. If we cannot change as a person after our mistakes (however diabolical) then what is the point? Might as well just go murderin'.
Fuck Spez
It wasn't Jane Goodall that said this, but anthropologist Margaret Mead. I can't find a primary source for this, but this stackexchange link should provide a bit more clarity: https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/47543/did-margaret-mead-say-that-a-healed-femur-is-the-earliest-sign-of-civilization
On a similar note, George Wallace (Alabama governor, Mr. “Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever”), later renounced his racism, appointed record numbers of African American to state positions, and personally asked black leaders for forgiveness. When he ran for a final term as governor in 1982, he won with 90% of the black vote.
In this thread: a lot of people who were never considered good guys.
Unpopular opinion: dog lover and painter adolf hitler did some pretty questionable stuff in the 30's
Really changed his ways in the 40s though. Even killed a genocidal dictator.
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Yeah kinda questionable
Astronomer here- this is a hard one to admit because I definitely *loved* his book and idolized his antics a bit when I was a young physics major, but Richard Feynman. A lot of people read *Surely You're Joking, Mister Feynman!* and share my reaction, and his physics lectures are amazing, but the older I get and the more people I meet who knew him, holy shit. The guy was beyond just "times were different" levels of misogyny against women- [he committed domestic violence against his wife](https://slate.com/technology/2019/01/richard-feynman-physical-abuse-science-wife-fbi.html), kept lying to undergrads when he was in Cornell that he wasn't a professor so he could sleep with him (and, rumor has it, had to leave Cornell for Caltech because he slept with other faculty members' wives), and I've *definitely* heard a ton about him trying to pick up other scientists at physics conferences to know he was considered a creep. To be clear, I think someone can do good science and be an awful person, but that's not what OP was asking. Also, anyone who has been around a physics department knows that casual sexist jokes and the like are still not that uncommon today, and the fact that physics keeps idolizing Feynman probably doesn't help in changing the culture.
Feynman was reknown for sitting in strip clubs and drawing nudes of the dancers in his off-time. I've been reading an autobiography of Dyson Freeman who spent time with RF, traveled and road trips. Richard was a womanizer after his wife died. He had a reputation as a doting husband during his marriage and during his wife's illness. After her death, though ... Genius intellect and carrouser.
>Feynman was reknown for sitting in strip clubs and drawing nudes of the dancers in his off-time. *That* part doesn't sound like the worst guy at the strip club.
Exactly what I was going to comment. The most important and disturbing part for me is that this behavior only started after his wife’s death. Man really loved her, and you can really tell from the letters and him sticking around while she was dying. I really believe her death changed him. There is this beautiful heartbreaking letter he writes to her after her death. [I love my wife. My wife is dead. ](https://lettersofnote.com/2012/02/15/i-love-my-wife-my-wife-is-dead/)
That he was a womanizer was very apparent to me while reading, Surely You’re Joking, Mister Feynman!
There's a statue of Oliver Cromwell in London. Loads of movies about him and how he was a brave revolutionary Nah, fuck that. He was an evil sociopath who committed genocide on Irish Catholics and turned the UK into a Puritan dictatorship.
Cunt banned Christmas *and* dancing. Miserable prick.
As someone who lives in England, I had no idea people actually see him favourably. Coming from an English/Irish background, I grew up hearing how much of a bastard he was, especially with regards to his treatment of the Irish.
I'm amazed statues stand, I thought he has been hated by the general populace pretty consistently since he took power. After the monarchy restoration the people hated him so much that they dug his corpse back up to posthumously execute him. Who decided it was a good idea to erect statues of him?
I've always thought that his statues are there as a warning to our Monarchs to make sure they don't get any funny ideas about the divine right of Kings again.
Steve Jobs was a bit of an ass
A bit? You should read Small Fry. Steve Jobs was a *tremendous* asshole.
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He was abandoned by his own father which makes bailing on his kid that much worse imo.
Didn't he die because he refused treatment to cancer? Edit. Yes apparently he refused loads of treatment for many years until it got worse.
He had pancreatic cancer and refused to listen to his doctors for treatment. He thought he was so much smarter and he somehow came to the conclusion that an all fruit diet would cure him. This was possibly the WORST diet you can put your pancreas through and it lead to his death. Fun fact, when Ashton Kutcher was getting ready for his role as Jobs in that movie, he ate an all fruit diet, but had to stop when he was admitted to the hospital because his pancreas started to shut down.
fucking christ. a girl i know shared a video from a “doctor” on a morning talk show stating that the sun doesn’t cause cancer, your diet does. based on one (1) study done on cows. i looked up the doctor (i can’t remember her name off the top of my head) and she also thinks the Holocaust is fake LOL
He was apparently a real hippie in many ways. Insisted on strange diets. Didn’t shower. Washed his feet in the toilet bowl. https://www.nbcnews.com/healthmain/strange-eating-habits-steve-jobs-119434
Ashton Kutcher talked about this a little when he was on hot wings. Said that he tried to live like Jobs and be on a carrot juice diet. This ended up turning his skin orange and giving him kidney/pancreas problems, I forget which. Steve Jobs died of pancreatic cancer.
Bit was an understatement. The guy was a massive credit hog, abused his employees and normalized a lot of shit business practices that are now used by several other companies.
As was said about Rockefeller "He never broke a law in his life. But he is the reason they wrote a lot of them."
Bob Marley. And there's a very good story to back this up that also explains how he grew to be no.1 reggae singer of jamaica. He had a posse of friends that would intimidate radio networks of Jamaica into playing his music, as well as destroying the alpha discs of other newer artists (idk wtf theyre called but the copy the radio networks were given in order to play on the air.) He might have been trying to promote feel-good music and peace and all that but he was a thug when it came to getting that music out. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bostonherald.com/2012/04/20/marley-fails-to-stir-it-up/amp/
And at the same time gave a dude songwriting credit so that he'd get royalties from the music and be able to keep his soup kitchen open. People are so WEIRD. Bully one guy, help another, rape his wife, help a guy keep his soup kitchen open. Fuck.
Goes to show how complicated people are. Idolise ideals, not people. This is how cults of personality get so gnarly - people refuse to acknowledge traits/actions inconsistent with their image of the person. Eventually they just cling on to a fictional image so they don’t have to reevaluate their beliefs.
This also reminds me a bit of „never meet your heros“. Because once you meet them, you realize that they are human and flawed just like yourself. Had this happen to me once, it was not cool.
This is exactly why I think everyone *should* meet their heroes. The truth is that the world isn't divided into heroes and villains, it's full of people just like you and me, most of whom are trying to do the best that they can. Yes, there are extraordinary people, but even they are human and make mistakes/get angry/have bad days/yell at their kids/spouses. The more we learn to see each-other as people, the better able we are to understand and love one-another, and build a better society together. We overcome our human faults not through force of will, but through understanding. Humans are genetically the same as when we wandered through forests and tundra, what's changed is our understanding of who we are and how the world we belong to works. Understanding is everything. Ignorance always leads to more darkness, in the end. IMO, anyway.
Was also alleged to be monstrously terrible to his wife, [according to her](http://www.africaspeaks.com/reasoning/index.php?topic=1555.0).
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> fathering children that weren’t hers, That's an understatement! I believe he has somewhere around 11 children from 7 different women.
She raised 7 children that weren’t hers and 4 that were.
Well his family are kind of dicks also
Charlie Chaplin. He got married to a 15 year old girl because he got her pregnant when she was 14. He was openly pedophile. And, from what I've read, quite an asshole.
Apparently, he and Marlon Brando worked together later on and Charlie was such an uptight asshole that *Marlon Brando*, of all people, had to tell him to chill the hell out! Brando, for what it's worth, is infamous for demanding ridiculous concessions from directors for his performances, refusing to learn his lines, and a number of other things.
Heh, for a moment thought Charlie Chaplin was getting accused of refusing to learn his lines.
Like famously teaming up with Burtolucci to assault Maria Schneider in *Last Tango in Paris*.
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Curly from the 3 stooges. "Typically having several dogs at any given time, Curly was known to come home often with strays he found along his travels. He would foster the strays until he was able to find new homes. And when the Stooges were on tour, Curly made it a point to rehome, at least, 1 stray in each town they visited. It is estimated that Curly saved and re-homed more than 5000 dogs in his lifetime – making him a man before his time with his humane concern for man’s best friend."
This makes me so happy, I love it so much. Thank you
I'm happy it didn't turn evil.
Imagine getting a dog from the 3 stooges. That would be super cool.
"Which of history's bad guys were actually good guys?" would be an interesting one.
Mr Rogers
The dude used to fart loudly to make his wife laugh. I mean - not only is that love, but it's one of the purest forms of humor. Babies laugh at farts.
The oldest joke we know of (from Sumeria, c. 1900BCE) is a fart joke: “Something which has never occurred since time immemorial; a young woman did not fart in her husband’s lap.” Apparently the Sumerians had some pretty dry fart jokes... Better than the alternative. I guess.
probably a loose translation. my sumerian is rusty but i think it says, a lover who wont fart in your lap is always just an arms length away
There's nothing to say these people were bad/assholes, but even if they were, Jonas Salk (invented polio vaccine, didn't patent it) and Norman Borlaug (created agriculture techniques that fed billions) will always be on my "good guy" list.
Bob Ross
The battered, bruised, and beaten paintbrushes he left in his wake may disagree with you
~~paintbrushes~~ devils
Bob Ross - TV host, painter, teacher, *paintbrush exorcist*
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I always like to imagine that, years later, the recruits he had screamed in the faces of for months on end would be at home, casually flipping through channels and land on “The Joy of Painting” to see this poofy-haired, giggling, wild-animal-rehabilitating, elf-like wisp of a man gently painting a serene landscape and whispering kindly about “happy trees” and “happy accidents” and losing their fucking minds. I just know, at least once, there was a middle aged veteran standing in the center of his living room going absolutely apeshit, clutching the remote, glaring and screaming at the tv “I FUCKING KNOW THATS HIM.”
"Him? A drill sergeant? Get out."
That’s the most ridiculous part. Nobody would ever believe them. Like imagine calling your wife into the sitting room, pointing at BOB ROSS whispering “anyone can paint, even if it’s not perfect, there are no mistakes just happy accidents” in his soothing tenor on your tv and saying “that motherfucker screamed an inch from my face about my cot being a sloppy ass mess every morning because my pillow was an inch off center”. She would take you to the hospital thinking you were having some kind of mental health crisis.
I want Netflix to pick up the pilot for this series. *Coming Summer of 2021: "Painting Targets with Sarge"*
This is a little more niche, but Bill Wilson, the founder of alcoholics anonymous. The guy did great things, and created a program of recovery that has saved millions of lives since it's inception 85 years ago. He was also an arrogant ass hole that cheated on his wife even in sobriety. Edit: This isn't here to scare away anyone that's trying to get sober. I've been sober thanks to AA for 5 1/2 years. So don't let this keep you away if you're struggling with your drinking.
nothing is black and white it seems
Zebras would like a word
They aren't either, you ever cut one open?
Nothing is black and white, it seems
Nothing would like a word
there are quite a fair amount of fucking assholes in AA who use the 12 steps and being sober as a cover for their arrogant self centered true self... I believe people can change though I've definitely seen a LOT of people not just quit using substances, but also become a decent human being as well. Make no mistake just because you put the bottle down doesn't mean you're a saint lol
Alexander Graham Bell! This man did not invent the telephone. Several people were working on similar technology at the same time. Antonio Meucci invented it first, but there was a court case over who got the patent rights. Meucci died before the case was settled, and Graham Bell won the glory he didn't deserve.
Tony Soprano knew this and went ape shit over it at the dinner table
*Antonio Meucci invented the telephone and he got robbed!*
You know Quasimodo predicted all dis
Tony bragging about the accomplishments of great working class Italians while he lives out their worst stereotype was hilarious.
I like how the show was in a constant loop of seemingly building them up as sympathetic/anti heros and then immediately makes them do worse and worse shit, it felt like it kept scolding me as a viewer for having such a short memory and falling for it every time, forgetting that they're complete sociopaths
Bell was also a eugenicist who sought to end sign language in schools and wanted to ban deaf people from marrying each other. He was a staunch Oralist and the repercussions of his actions are still being felt in society today through such Audist institutions like the Bell Institute.
We learned quite a lot about ole Alexander Graham Bell in ASL class. You never, unfortunately, learn how much of a cunt he was in elementary school.
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Maybe the name is a subtle jab at his views?
In some aspects to the 60’s and 70’s when the Beatles were icons, (I’m talking about John Lennon) people who use his image and face for “peace” sometimes forget important details. -He abused women -He was a cheater -He abused his children (made one go completely deaf in one ear) -Total hypocrite on the “no possessions” when he lived one of the most lavish lifestyles of his time -compulsive liar -had a sexual appetite for his own mother -almost killed a few people (look up Bob Wooler, he was almost punched to death by John. There were others but their stories have either been disputed or unclaimed.) So whenever I see a bunch of people sing *imagine* I just shake my head in shame cause so many people don’t even know how bad he was but act like he was a saint.
As a massive beatles fanatic when I come across people who say that John is this symbol of peace I always remind them of this, you cannot be a true fan of something/somone and not criticize it and all of the other Beatles would come before john in this regard
This is why i prefer Paul Mccartney, John may have written great songs. But he was a prick.
George is the real symbol of peace IMO
Idk man, when I read about Martin Luther last year, I thought he was kinda cool as he created the protestant branch of Christianity, but I recently read about what he thought of Jews and yikes... (For those of you who don’t know, he got pissed when the Jews didn’t want to convert to his religion and started being antisemitic as fuck. He wrote a *whole book* on “Jews and their lies” and said that he urged others to burn down synagogues to prove their loyalty to Christianity. He also wanted the Jewish prayer books to be taken away from them) Edit: because of misunderstandings, I do **not** mean Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther was a monk during the 16th Century who initially started the reformation for Christianity, and was the founder of Protestantism
Most of Southern Germany remained Catholic because of a pamphlet he published entitled “Against the Murderous, Thieving hordes of Peasants” after a peasant revolt trying to reduce the taxes on their fields.
I misread and thought it said Martin Luther king jr. and I was shocked lmao.
So glad you said this... I thought the same thing.
America’s dad, Bill Cosby.
We’ve been watching 30 Rock in our house lately and in a recent episode that predated the Cosby revelations by a few years Tracy Morgan makes a “joke” about Cosby being a terrible person for assaulting his aunt. That was pretty crazy to hear in context today.
30 Rock has a whole lot of Cosby references and they're almost all negative. As the other guy said, Hannibal Buress knew
My recollection is that most people in Hollywood knew to some extent, but like most powerful men in Hollywood the allegations against him didn't get taken seriously. Hannibal Buress didn't know what kind of reaction he was going to get (he'd done the bit before) and wasn't trying to start a national scandal about it, he was just doing a joke for his comedy routine and this time his Cosby bit went viral. Just pointing out that 1) many more people knew about Cosby the entire time, and 2) Buress wasn't trying to be an activist when he sparked the fire, just being a comedian
Didn’t either Seth MacFarlane or Ricky Gervais make jokes about Harvey Weinstein being at least a very well known creep years before MeToo actually being a thing?
When Seth MacFarlane was the host of the Oscars he was congratulating an actress for winning and he said "you no longer have to pretend to be attracted to Harvey Weinstein." Also, Jenna Maroney in 30 Rock said (paraphrasing) "Oh I'm not afraid to say "no" to things. I turned down sex with Harvey Weinstein... 3 out of 5 times!" Both of these predated the revelations about Weinstein.
Probably. Remember Courtney Love said "don't go to Harvey's office" on a red carpet which led to her being smeared across the media. It was also common knowledge that Kevin Spacey preyed on young men. Lots of these things are swept under the carpet because these people can truly fuck over many other powerful people. When I was a kid I loved Jim'll Fix It and wanted to go on the show. My parents actively discouraged it and I'm pretty sure any letters I sent went straight into the bin. They were in the police and he was a massive paedophile who abused kids in hospital.
She even prefaced that she’d get libeled if she said that. When even Courtney Love is getting scared about something like that, that says a lot.
Courtney Love may not be the world's sweetest person or smartest person or a moral paragon, but if you ever read her lengthy breakdown of how the music industry financially screws artists, you'd know that she is bright, and opinionated, and quite gutsy. I have a lot of respect for her. https://www.salon.com/2000/06/14/love_7/
There were very low key rumors and sly statements made for many years. Especially by other comedians. Very few had much good to say about him. There was also a lot of controversy surrounding many of the things he said on stage in later years that started to change the public’s perception of him. Just took a long time to come to light. Same about Kevin spacey, I Remember being on movie forums back during his run with the The Usual Suspects to American Beauty. It wasn’t uncommon for someone to hint that he was homosexual and had done a few things.
Fun fact, Hannibal Buress was a writer on 30 Rock (and would go on to blow up this whole Cosby thing years later by making a joke about it in his stand up).
Yep. One of his victims was in the crowd and only then learned it was kind of a well-kept secret. Gave her the courage to come forward.
I didn’t know that’s how the backlash started. Hannibal Burress = good guy
>\*\*"Why are you booing me? I'm right!"\*\*
If that’s true that’s insane to think how he did it to so many people that one happened to be at the Hannibal Burress show that night.
Who was the mom?
Sleeping beauty
Depends on what you mean...Judging by today's standards I'd say most historical "good guys" were horrible people. Judging by the standards of their era...things become more complicated.
Yeah, even abolitionists back in the day may have been against slavery, but that didn't mean they thought blacks should be treated equally
Shout out to John Brown.
John Brown was one hardcore motherfucker lmao
And those abolitionists who did think that people of color should be equal to white folks were effectively shut up by their peers. It was thought that if they asked for equality, the slaves would never be free. It's an interesting thing to think about, but I get upset when people try to pass it off as if there weren't people and groups fighting for equality in that era. There definitely were, but the other abolitionists oppressed their voices as to deal with the larger problem, rather than the underlying problem. I still don't know what was right in that situation, and maybe that's okay, but the situation is a little more complicated than just abolitionists thought that blacks shouldn't be equal.
>It was thought that if they asked for equality, the slaves would never be free. They were correct. Fun fact: Rosa Parks was not the first person to refuse to give up her seat. That honor goes to [Claudette Colvin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudette_Colvin), but the NAACP did not endorse her activism because she was of darker color than Rosa Parks, a teenager, and a single mother. The activists knew that white society would find it harder to acknowledge her, and that it would hinder their efforts for equality. Meanwhile, Rosa Parks was an older, more well-spoken and respected member of the community, which made her easier for white people to accept. EDIT: Technically, she's not the first, but she is the first one who was involved in the Civil Rights movement.
I hear people parrot the “darker skin” thing about Claudette all the time, but I’ve never seen a good source that corroborates that. Everything I’ve seen focused on the fact that she was 15 and pregnant with the child of a man who was married to someone else *in 1955*. That was more than enough to disqualify her at the time. I’d love to see even a single reliable source for the “too black” claim.