You might want to use people who actually exist as your examples 
That’s just a UL, right? 
Right?.. :eek:
This is not a binary proposition. We can call people whom we respect and look up to masters in their field AND work to realize our own potential. Not only does looking up to and even idolizing certain people not preclude bettering oneself, in many cases it inspires bettering oneself. When I look up to someone it gives me a partial model of a way in which I might choose to live my life. That is not a bad thing, it is a useful conceptual tool!
Right, but as I say, having them as an ideal should involve looking at them realistically, and ‘idolizing’ anyone is bullshit because no one deserves that much. Cecil Adams is incredibly smart, knowledgable, etc., and should be looked up upon as an ideal, but never ‘idolized’ or seen as ‘great’ b/c he has many flaws, and no one is worthy of being a HERO or IDOL or GREAT ONE.
Get the difference? “Martin Luther King was a great leader and has many incredible accomplishments. I hope to live up to his achievements one day.” vs. “MLK was a great man, my hero and my idol. I can never achieve what this monumental figure in history has, because he is a god among men and must be worshipped. He never had any flaws, he knew the mysteries of the universe, he never wanted money or power, and he never was afraid or petty. Hail MLK.”
Okay, I’m being glib and exaggerating like a motherfuck :D, but am I getting my point across? NO MAN OR WOMAN IS WORTHY OF IDOLIZATION OR HERO WORSHIP OR BEING CALLED GREAT MAN/WOMAN, because they all had so many flaws, even though so many of them had incredible achievements, and so they should be recognized and remembered and praised and lived up to, but I’m trying to say that people limit themselves by going too far in their praising.
As the site I linked to says:
"17. There are no great men.
18. If you have a hero, look again; you have** diminished yourself in some way."
**
By going so far as calling them ‘great’ men or by having them as a ‘hero’ or an ‘idol’, you are going too far (or so I am arguing) in your praising and looking up to them. It stops being a ‘useful conceptual tool’ as you put it and becomes a ‘useful self-limiting tool’. And that, friends, is fucking bullshit.
People have been known to vanish and never been seen again for much more inocuous comments.
You don’t want a couple guys in black suits knocking at your door, right?
Oh, come now, I’m perfectly safe and, oh, hold on… I’ll be right back, someone’s at my door.
I got dibs on Finn’s Nachos!
To have so much time to worry about such useless issues. Ahhhhhh, teenagehood