James Dean I understand was not a very nice guy- full of hate.
Sort of a…I don’t know…rebel? Without a cause, maybe?
Can I make an official request that all the “who’s going to hell” discussion be taken to its own thread?
To carry on the point from earlier, according to friends from the Pittsburgh area, Ben Roethlisburger is known as being an asshole. He’ll go into restaurants with a huge crew of people, insist that they are seated immediately (regardless of how busy the place is), then when the check comes, insist that the meal be free because of the publicity the place will get from him being there. They also still object to him being stupid and selfish enough to ride a motorcycle without a license or helmet, and then crash it and bust himself up.
The one that surprised me most, personally, was (as has been mentioned and discussed earlier) Thomas Edison. When I was younger I’d always had him on my list of “Cool historical figures”, and then when I found out how he stole other people’s work and in general tried his level best to sink anyone that was trying to compete with him, I lost all respect for him.
This is a shock to me. I’ve never heard nor read about any addiction on his part, nor has my wife (who is much better versed in jazz than I). But it would explain his aggressive behavior, I guess. On this same theme, Miles Davis and Chet Baker could be assholish and extremely manipulative, but their “track” record is well known.
Benny Goodman was also a real jerk.
Lindbergh’s record wasn’t as cut-and-dried as you make it here. While he wasn’t a Nazi or a foaming-at-the-mouth anti-semite, neither was he a model of tolerance. For example, here is an excerpt from his diary on the subject of Kristallnacht:
More from his diary:
I was disappointed to hear about Rosa Parks. The civil rights struggles are taught with such reverence you expect the leaders to be saints, but they are just people after all.
I don’t think what she did is any less virtuous even if she only did it because she was a cranky bitch.
Even if so, she was a cranky bitch that was right, and that’s what matters.
On the subject of Martin Luther and anti-semitism, I’d say his own words make a strong case against him.
This lets him off the hook far too easily. For balance, check out The American Axis, which looks at the racist and pro-German attitudes of Lindbergh and Henry Ford, and reveals some very ugly facts about both.
Lindbergh, for one, was a close associate of a controversial French scientist who believed in the inferiority of some races and the need to “eliminate” undesirables from society. Lindbergh went beyond isolationism as far as the Nazis were concerned and was a defeatist and anti-British at a time when the British were struggling alone early in the war to hold back the Nazis. His visits to Germany went further than being impressed by military development:
“The organized vitality of Germany was what most impressed me: the unceasing activity of the people, and the convinced dictatorial direction to create the new factories, airfields, and research laboratories…,” Lindbergh recalled in “Autobiography of Values.” His wife drew similar conclusions. “…I have never in my life been so conscious of such a directed force. It is thrilling when seen manifested in the energy, pride, and morale of the people–especially the young people,” she wrote in “The Flower and the Nettle.” By 1938, the Lindberghs were making plans to move to Berlin…
In his role as bigwig in the “America First” isolationist organization, Lindbergh made highly publicized speeches urging America to stay out of the war, and his beliefs made him increasingly unpopular. One particular address (on 9/11/41) was the icing on the cake:
With his hero status already greatly tarnished by his philosophical and political beliefs, Lindbergh delivered a speech in Des Moines that fully knocked him off his pedestal. Announcing that it was time to “name names,” Lindbergh decided to identify what he saw as the pressure groups pushing the U.S. into war against Germany. “The three most important groups who have been pressing this country toward war are the British, the Jewish and the Roosevelt Administration.” Of the Jews, he went on to say, “Instead of agitating for war, Jews in this country should be opposing it in every way, for they will be the first to feel its consequences. Their greatest danger to this country lies in their large ownership and influence in our motion pictures, our press, our radio and our government.”
You can view that as naivete, or loathsome bigotry. I vote for the latter.
He never seriously repudiated these views. He did discover patriotism (of a sort, anyway) after America entered the war.
Hey-her being a “cranky bitch” makes me admire her that much more! 
The winner!
Did you consider any legal action? Did you tell anyone afterwards? I have zero respect, absolutely zero, for any celebrity who treats the fans that way.
hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
Denis Leary?
Although he just had that song…
I suspect if I knew him personally, he’d kick my sorry ass 24-7 for giving in to this shit that’s going on with me…
And then he’d help take care of me.
I think he’s just that kinda guy, and sometimes it takes assholes to motivate ourselves to be better.
Q
I don’t think anyone denies Martin Luther was an anti-semite; but so were most of his peers. My only real qualm with Argent Towers was his glaring historical inaccuracies, and it’s something I’ve noticed a lot with some Jews–this “chosen people” stuff often manifests itself into thinking like “only the Jews were literate in the Middle Ages, which is why they were so much better than the dirty, stupid Christians.”
I was just joking. I’ve never met Harlan Ellison, and he certainly never attacked me. I mean, shoved my face into a urinal and whipped me with a belt? A five-foot-nothing, seventy-four year old man? I’m surprised you actually thought I was serious. No, I was just trying to riff off of the very commonly discussed perception of Ellison as being a jerk. (I doubt anyone would be “surprised” to find that Ellison was an asshole - the surprise would be that he turned out to actually be a really nice guy.)
SWOON <3 