# The most libeled people in history **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 6, 2014, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205 "2014-06-06T15:31:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![RivkahChaya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rivkahchaya/32/8919_2.png) [@RivkahChaya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RivkahChaya)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/41 "2014-06-08T13:48:51Z")
> [@Sefton](#): > > I was going to mention Elizabeth Báthory, as I’d heard that the horrible accusations against her were fabricated for political/religious reasons. > > But the Wikipedia [article](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_B%C3%A1thory) makes a strong case that the accusations were accurate. The Blood Countess. Jeepers. Mental illness and absolute power. Bad combo. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/42 "2014-06-08T14:06:47Z")
> [@rowrrbazzle](#): > > The next Republican nominee for President will get progressives comparing him unfavorably to Reagan. Not true. Progressives don’t have the unwarranted, ridiculous reverence for Reagan that conservatives do so no matter who a Republican nominee is and no matter how poorly he is perceived, progressives will not compare him in any way to Reagan, nor consider Reagan at all. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/43 "2014-06-08T14:25:12Z")
[Gary Webb](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Webb), the subject of a soon to be released movie [Kill The Messenger](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0gbQk38F0g). He was destroyed by his own peers and the people he worked with. All this despite the fact that he was proved correct soon afterwards. One of the guys who fucked him over recently [apologized.](http://www.laweekly.com/2013-05-30/news/gary-webb-jess-katz-crack/) ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/44 "2014-06-08T15:34:47Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > You know it’s threads like this that make me wonder how long before serious historians start saying that Hitler was not so bad. Hey, you’ve got to give the guy some credit, he killed Hitler. ---
**Author:** ![Katriona](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/katriona/32/113_2.png) [@Katriona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katriona)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/45 "2014-06-08T15:38:41Z")
> [@Kamino\_Neko](#): > > MacBeth got it worse from the Bard. At least his version of Richard was based on contemporary rumour, and casting actual events in an anti-Ricardian light. > > MacBeth was basically made up out of whole cloth. (For instance, Duncan died in battle with MacBeth’s forces, not killed in his bed by MacBeth’s hand - a battle that Duncan started.) Not to mention that Cawdor wasn’t built til about, what, 400 years after MacBeth… ---
**Author:** ![Octarine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/22d042/32.png) [@Octarine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Octarine)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/46 "2014-06-08T16:46:29Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I heard an interesting theory recently. It said that Machiavelli wrote _The Prince_ as an exposé. He obviously wasn’t inventing the ruthless politics he wrote about. He was just writing about ruthless tactics that politicians were already using. But by doing so, he was making them obvious. > > Now when a ruler tried to use the political tricks Machiavelli had told everyone about, his subjects would recognize what he was doing. And that would make it impossible for rulers to use the trick. > > So _The Prince_ was essentially an attack against the Medici. Not by ineffectively denouncing them but by revealing the political tricks they (and others like them) used to hold power and thereby making it impossible for them to use those tricks. There are multiple theories out there, and the exposé one is definitely valid. As a diplomat, Machiavelli traveled extensively to the leaders of other countries, and saw their tactics firsthand. Another weird aspect of _The Prince_ is how different it is stylistically from his other works - most of his stuff it rather dense, filled with long, technical sentences and citations. _The Prince_ is rather fast paced and witty (although I don’t speak Italian, I heard the original copy is filled with puns and such), which could mean he was aiming for something that would have a wide appeal. If so, it was a genius move - instead of just saying “hey, citizens, these are the immoral tactics your rulers use,” say, “hey, princes - here’s a how to guide on how to rule all those stupid peasants! Yeah, this definitely isn’t a book for civilians to read . . . but maybe I’ll just leave it lying on this table right here, 'cause it’s not the kind of thing all of _you_ normal people are interested in, right?” ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/47 "2014-06-08T18:04:40Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > You know it’s threads like this that make me wonder how long before serious historians start saying that Hitler was not so bad. Serious historians or idiots out of their field? Because serious historians look at evidence, and we’ve made sure that Hitler’s crimes are documented to an amazing degree. Only a historian who was incredibly biased, incredibly incompetent, or the victim of a massive campaign of lies would seriously try to redeem Hitler. The best anyone can reasonably say is “He wasn’t actively engaged in wholesale genocide twenty-four hours a day, even once the war began.” Everyone always seems to take for granted that the knowledge of our era a hundred years from now will be as scanty as our knowledge of eras thousands of years ago. Everyone also seems to imagine that historians are just as ill-informed as the average person. Anyway, Jesus actually existed, Edison wasn’t a monster, and Watson and Crick did manage to do some science instead of stealing everything from poor black women. That takes care of a lot of the second-option bias I see on a daily basis. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/48 "2014-06-08T18:06:57Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > Also possibly Benedict Arnold. In what way was Benedict Arnold libeled? A case could be made that insufficient attention has been paid to his military achievements on behalf of the Revolutionary Army. But his loathsomely traitorous activities have been accurately reported. ---
**Author:** ![Hermione](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/cdc98d/32.png) [@Hermione](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermione)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/49 "2014-06-08T18:21:20Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > Mudd. > > More so the doctor one than the tribble distributor. You mean Cyrano Jones. Mudd was more interested in illegal beauty enhancers, peddling wives to settlers, and lording it over androids. 😃 As for Samuel Mudd…isn’t there evidence that at the very least he was in on Booth’s conspiracy when they were still out to kidnap, not kill, Lincoln? From there it’s not so hard to surmise that at the very least he was perfectly aware that he was helping Booth all along. According to James Swanson, author of Manhunt, Mudd confessed on his deathbed that he DID know all along that Booth was his patient. Did he deserve his harsh sentence? Probaby not. But was he the innocent, unfairly railroaded dupe that the movie The Ordeal of Dr. Mudd portrayed him as? Probably not. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/50 "2014-06-08T19:52:41Z")
Dang it. Whats worse than a bad joke? A bad joke with a wrong fact. And worse than that? One with two wrong facts 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/51 "2014-06-08T20:07:40Z")
> [@Martian Bigfoot](#): > > My nominations: > > 1. Salieri. Despite what you might think after seeing that movie, no, Salieri didn’t kill Mozart. There might have been some rivalry there at one stage, but the two men were actually friends, and supported each other’s works. Salieri even tutored Mozart’s son. If you think that after seeing the movie, you’re not paying any attention to it. Yes, Salieri did say he killed Mozart, but the entire point of the film was that God killed Mozart so Salieri could not share in his genius. As for my own, it’s \*\*Fatty Arbuckle. \*\* There’s no evidence he did anything to cause Virginia Rappe’s death. Hearst saw a good way to sell papers, though, and sensationalized and misrepresented the case. ---
**Author:** ![orcenio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orcenio/32/1036_2.png) [@orcenio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orcenio)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/52 "2014-06-08T21:29:09Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > In what way was Benedict Arnold libeled? A case could be made that insufficient attention has been paid to his military achievements on behalf of the Revolutionary Army. > > But his loathsomely traitorous activities have been accurately reported. That’s true, but in the end he had change of heart and worked for the crown. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/53 "2014-06-08T21:46:10Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > But his loathsomely traitorous activities have been accurately reported. > [@orcenio](#): > > That’s true, but in the end he had change of heart and worked for the crown. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Fuzzy\_wuzzy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a8b319/32.png) [@Fuzzy\_wuzzy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuzzy_wuzzy)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/54 "2014-06-08T23:28:12Z")
Some posters seem to be confusing fictional Plays with attempted historical accuracy. ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2014, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/55 "2014-06-08T23:35:15Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > Dang it. > > Whats worse than a bad joke? > > A bad joke with a wrong fact. > > And worse than that? > > One with two wrong facts 🙂 Now your name is mudd. ---
**Author:** ![Quimby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/22d042/32.png) [@Quimby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quimby)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/56 "2014-06-09T00:10:35Z")
> [@Martian Bigfoot](#): > > My nominations: > 2. The Emperor Caligula. Again, despite of the movie, and all the rumors, he probably wasn’t quite the deranged monster that you might think he was. OK, he was a bad enough emperor to be murdered by his own guards, but the business about sleeping with his sisters was likely just hearsay (accusations of incest was par for the course for unpopular public figures in ancient Rome), and he might not actually have been crazy. He didn’t make his horse a consul (OK, he say he \*planned \*to do it, but it could have been meant as a joke). And that thing from _I, Claudius_? Yeah, you know what. Didn’t happen. Made-uppey for TV. Not even the ancient historians, who really hated his guts, claimed that he did _that_. I can’t find the links at the moment but I have read that it goes even further than that. Caligula was apparently a decent emperor. His sin was he wanted to take power away from the Senate and institute democratic reforms so the Senate had him killed and made up the stories we all heard to tarnish his name. My pick for a relatively modern one would be Richard Jewel whose life was ruined because he was accused of trying to murder the people he saved. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/57 "2014-06-09T01:38:23Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > In what way was Benedict Arnold libeled? A case could be made that insufficient attention has been paid to his military achievements on behalf of the Revolutionary Army. > > But his loathsomely traitorous activities have been accurately reported. He was a traitor, but he wasn’t a really strong example of one. There have been many who were worse. Arnold, in the U.S., is treated as the traitor of all traitors, the national Judas. And…he was just an ordinary garden-variety turncoat. ---
**Author:** ![lisiate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f05b48/32.png) [@lisiate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lisiate)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/58 "2014-06-09T02:08:35Z")
> [@KRC](#): > > V I Lenin. The man liked cats, so how bad could he be? If he’d been a member of the SDMB he probably would have shown us kitty pictures. I can totally see it. [QUOTE=Hypothetical SMDB Lenin] The progressive historical role of capitalism may be summed up in two brief propositions: increase in the productive forces of social labour, and the socialisation of that labour. But both these facts manifest themselves in extremely diverse processes in different branches of the national economy. Also check out my adorable Mischka chasing this ball of wool [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/59 "2014-06-09T02:17:00Z")
> [@Quimby](#): > > I can’t find the links at the moment but I have read that it goes even further than that. Caligula was apparently a decent emperor. His sin was he wanted to take power away from the Senate and institute democratic reforms so the Senate had him killed and made up the stories we all heard to tarnish his name. [This one](http://listverse.com/2013/04/29/9-reasons-caligula-and-nero-were-saner-than-you-think/), perhaps? ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2014, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205/60 "2014-06-09T02:20:36Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > He was a traitor, but he wasn’t a really strong example of one. There have been many who were worse. Arnold, in the U.S., is treated as the traitor of all traitors, the national Judas. And…he was just an ordinary garden-variety turncoat. The reason being is that the person he betrayed was Washington. Washington had a habit of thinking his fellow officers whom he was friendly with as near family. So that when Arnold (and a couple of other people during later on during his Presidency) betrayed him he took it very, very hard. This nation reveres Washington, so by extension we find him the most loathesome US traitor. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-most-libeled-people-in-history/690205.md?page=4)