Keanu Reeves, I used to really like the guy when the matrix trilogy came out but then he said and did all these super nice things like saying “I don’t want to be part of a world where kindness is perceived as weakness”.
Nah just fucking with you. The dude is solid!
Oof, got me panicky for a moment.
Bill fucking Cosby. That guy was a generational idol.
Back in the '00s, he used to give speeches down at college campuses around the country that supposedly promoted ethics and social values for young men. The most famous of these, the Pound Cake Speech, was given out during the 50th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision at an NAACP Legal Defense dinner, ffs.
He was this pinnacle of Respectibility Politics. This Model Minority. The quintessential American father figure. An intellectual. A charismatic icon. A pillar of the community.
Oops. Fuck. Oh well…
Oof that speech did not age well. Basically a ignore systemic racism and just pull your bootstraps extra hard coming from a wealthy person is about as hollow as you can get.
Not so much a hero but I admired
his workthe projects he is associated with: Elon regarding Tesla & Space X.I had heard that he was a bit of a nightmare to work with but I just chalked that up to the usual tech CEO being a bit of an arsehole but still delivering the vision. So admired the projects but wouldn’t personally work for him.
The first time I came across something that gave me the impression something was off with him was when he called one of the Thai cave divers a pedo after the diver rejected using an unproven single person extraction canister Elon proposed.
It was just so uncalled for. Then the more I read and saw stories about him my opinion of him wained further down to a spoilt nepo-baby cosplaying as a design engineer who’d do best to get out of the way of the actual engineers trying to do the work.
Now I think the world would be better off without him and I hope the talented engineers currently work for him leave to find fulfilling employment elsewhere in the space and electrification industries as soon as possible.
Same with Musk. I was teaching engineering courses at the time of the first falcon heavy launch. I actually stopped my class so we could watch the launch. When those boosters landed in a perfect synchronous ballet, I told my class it was “engineering as poetry.”
Why couldn’t Musk just stay the fuck out of politics?
$$$$
He felt big buying a president.
when he called one of the Thai cave divers a pedo
I think that was when he exposed himself widely to be a garbage human.
He actually won a court case saying he didn’t defame that guy by calling him a pedo, so I’ve been calling him pedo elon for awhile. But then it turns out he’s all over the Epstein files, so he was actually a real pedo all along. Guess I have to start calling him a double pedo or something.
Back when I started getting an interest in tech back in middle school I looked up to Bill Gates
In high school I used to think highly of Elon because of all the promises he was making with Tesla, space X, etc
I think it’s safe to say those opinions aged like milk
Bill Gates is probably the only one on the list I have a positive bias for cuz he’s spent sooooooo much money buying goodwill.
He owns Goodwill?! That probably explains why their prices have become exorbitant, no longer thrifty. And all the best donated items aren’t even available for in-store customers to buy. The best items get set aside to be posted to eBay for maximum profiteering.
You serious rn? I’m talking about the Melinda Gates foundation and I’m using the meaning of “good will” that Good Will based their name on fyi
Not really “heroes” but several pastors / youth leaders from when I was young got caught in sex scandals and embezzling. My childhood bully became a youth paster and got convicted of sex crimes against minors.
Hulk Hogan…
Yup! Mick Foley and John Tenta are my only childhood favorites that I can still look back on with adult eyes, and think they are/were genuinely decent human beings.
My grandma. She always seemed the sweetest, kindest lady - freely sharing, donating time and her resources to charity. Yet when Orange Shitler was running for reelection, and she shared campaign propaganda with me after I repeatedly asked her but to, and I then shared with her the already overwhelming evidence of his malfeasance, pedofilia and rape, she simply responded that those things didn’t matter to her because she thought “he’d be good for the economy.”
I haven’t spoken to her since.
Oh yes, the “I elected a garbage human being because I thought he would be better for the economy despite bankrupting more businesses than any known man alive”.
Sad to hear about you Grandmother, but she betrayed so many people by siding with the Nazi.
A big hero of mine is/was “Weird Al” Yankovic. I feel like out of all celebrities that exist, he’s the one that I probably don’t have to worry about turning out to be a horrible person.
You may have misread the instructions for the project.
Nope! I read correctly. I just wanted an excuse to talk up Weird Al, honestly. 😁
Just paniced by the name. Please tell me he hasn‘t done something bad.
He became Serious Alfred last month, but no nothing bad has come out about Al.
And here I thought Al was the reason my RAM is ten times the price it was 3 months ago.
Regular Albert
Serious Alfred unseen for weeks on a math binge.
Can I say Dr Oz, sort of? Seriously, many of the women in my Moms generation were huge Oprah fans, and really loved Dr Oz. While his expertise was always questionable, his advice seemed relatively harmless and wholesome. For conservative folk with no interest in following medical science, they watched listened, and learned, including some actual good advice.
Now I just can’t even answer with some of the shit those same relatives bring up
I think we have that with dr Mike on youtube now. He’s still in the pre-enshittification stage where he’s responsibly saying “I know things but I’m a YouTuber. Please ask your actual doctor.”
But pressures change people over time so I have no doubt he’ll be shilling supplements eventually.
Grant Harding, the pharmacist in 3 or 4 states, seems like a solid guy with a fun angle.
Yes, I’m a big fan of his so far
When I was a child in the 60s and 70s John Wayne was my hero and when I grew up I found out what a POS he was.
Neil fuckin Gaiman.
The monster went from my favorite author to a name that elicits rage and disgust.
A lot of his works are still good. I just won’t buy new ones, I won’t give him any profits.
Perhaps in a purely academic limbo of examining the writing techniques, but that’s not the world any of us actually live our lives. “Death of the Author” is a cop out, especially when the author still lives.
Fundamentally I won’t ever be able to pick up my teenage favorite Sandman again without seeing the parallels between Neil and Morpheus rape, entrapment and abuse of the women who they lord power over. My own personal emotional connection to any of his character, worlds or stories is irrevocably shattered. I can’t view that as a character flaw, but more of a self-insert to Neils personal fantasies.
It sucks but that is where we are at now. :/
My childhood heros were the cartoon heros of the 80’s. And they all turned out to be lieing to us the whole time. Saying things like “evil never wins”, “crime doesn’t pay”, and all that. They were really just trying to reduce the competition.
Oh man, this makes me think of Hulk Hogan. Talk about a guy who aged like milk.
Also, ‘Don’t Do Drugs’.
Don’t forget the voice for McGruff the crime dog got caught with 1000 pot plants lol
Getting there is not half the battle.
None of them, really. Mr. Rogers was genuinely as awesome as he seemed. As a young adult, John Von Neumann, Grace Hopper, and Claude Shannon became my heroes. None have anything particularly bad that I’ve seen.
There are some people whose work I admire whom I don’t like, e.g. Harlan Ellison was famously an asshat. But they’re not my heroes, and the work is not the creator.
Never had heroes because basically this. Almost all people in a spotlight let you down eventually. Something about being rich makes people into depraved cunts.
Maybe not Dolly Parton. She’s been consistently good. Mr Roger’s too. But still, not many people on the list.
Marilyn manson
Oof. Lot to unpack there.
Somewhat related but I had to stop listening to Lostprophets once I found how shitty the lead singer was.
