Imagine that a famous non-fiction author about a notorious, vile crime that happened long before you were born. The author purports that this crime was committed by a specific ancestor of yours who died before you were born. There’s enough information in the book to connect you to this ancestor. The book is a best-seller, and there’s talk about making it into a movie.
Do you care? Why or why not?
I’d care more about any kind of hereditary insanity, actually. If the notorious ancestor had syphilitic dementia, or he’d been disowned for being the proverbial black sheep, I don’t think there would be any concern to be had.
I’d kind of hint to my friends that they should sleep with one eye open, though.
~VOW
I don’t care at all.
They are strangers to me, who have nothing to do with my life, and at this point have nothing to do with anyone’s life. I never really understood the fascination of genealogy- I guess it’s cool to think about how humanity goes back down through the generations. But my particular family line (beyond the people I know or have heard first-person stories about) doesn’t really have much more of an emotional resonance to me than any random family line. The names and stories might be kind of cool, but I don’t think that the fact that they are vaguely related to me really adds value to my life.
Depends on the quality of the research. If it’s a hack job, I’ll be displeased. If it’s a pretty solid case, I’d be somewhat embarrassed, but perhaps willing to play said ancestor in the movie if the money is right.
There’s a family tradition that my mother’s father (whose middle name was Fawkes) was descended from one of the most notorious criminals of all time – one who is still burned in effigy every year in England, 400 years after his attempted crime was stopped by the authorities. I would have no trouble with a book about great-great-…-grandfather Guy (fiction or non-fiction) listing my real name as among his possible descendents: if fact, I feel a bit of pride in possibly having such a famous ancestor.
I can actually picture exactly which ancestor who’d most likely be the vile criminal in question, and I’d nod my head and say “I knew he was a piece of crap.”
But unless it was somebody that would fill me with schadenfreude, I don’t think I’d really care.
Old Billy was pretty much a nasty piece … and your point? 
I would love to see the blighter portrayed in a movie. I love costume pieces, especially if they are remotely accurate - there are some great portraits around to get the costuming details from. Costumes are one of the things I loved about 1776!
Thanks to the accidental loss of records and some deliberate obfuscation by my grandparents, we’ve been unable to trace our family heritage any more than two generations back. If someone can link me to someone who was born earlier than 1882, I’d love it.
Depemds on how far back and how infamous.
“Adolf Hitler was your second cousin” level? I would never speak or it or acknowledge it.
“Vlad Tepes is buried somewhere in your family tree” Bragging rights.
I have a relative who was a famous mafia boss and murderer (they even made a movie about him). I find the idea amusing.
Been there. Done this: Heinous ancestors make great cocktail party stories. The real hell is relatives recently dead or still alive who have committed mind-shattering acts of despicable cruelty for which there are still living witnesses or ex-victims.
It’s kind of an open but mostly-unspoken secret that my maternal great-grandfather was descended from one of Hitler’s maternal ancestors. I find it kind of morbidly interesting, but it has no bearing on my daily life, and I can’t really see that any stigma should be attached to being Adolph’s fourth cousin twice removed. Somewhere back in history, there’s a high probability that everyone has a notorious or criminal ancestor.
One of my 18thC forbears set up a sectarian murder squad in Northern Ireland.
Worse, though, another of my 18thC forbears married his brother’s daughter, which makes him a dirty pedo.
They’re nothing to do with me.
Wouldn’t bother me. Why would their crime have any effect on me?
The wiki article doesn’t mention him as all that horrible. I get the feeling I’m missing something, historically (or morally? 
).
The worst my family can offer is a great- great- who was a mining town madam. It’s no skin off my nose and I’d be among the first to buy a copy of the book. It’s not like I can do anything about it, or contributed in any way.
I get people who think because of my German ancestry, I have Nazis in my family tree. Umm no-- we cleared out a couple of centuries before that, thanks.
Been there, done that. Google the “Glencoe Massacre.”
I’d try to make money off of it. Incidentally I am descended from a line of Song dynasty Emperors in China.
Hey, I’m in Japan. I could be Goering’s nephew and no one would bat an eye.
It would give me something to talk about in bars, though.
When I was a young adult I learned that my grandpa beat a Chinese man to death because the man yelled at my grandpa for stealing an apple from his store. My grandpa recieved no punishment. He was 14 at the time.
I’ve always felt bad about it and did some online searching trying to find anything about it but it was in the early 1900’s and I’ve had no luck.
I’ve always figured that if you go back far enough most of my ancestors are by my standards monsters. Slavers, murderers, torturers, robbers, genocides, rapists; all things that used to be acceptable or even admired (as long as you picked the appropriate victims). Having a specific guy implicated in a crime wouldn’t impress me, he’s no doubt one of legions.