I think about the fragility of heroic personas a lot. During the peak of the 2020 protests and riots, there was a spate of statue toppling that, on their face,

I think about the fragility of heroic personas a lot. During the peak of the 2020 protests and riots, there was a spate of statue toppling that, on their face, seemed excessive. Like various Confederate leaders, sure. But George Washington? Thomas Jefferson? But it turns out that George Washington owned a lot of slaves. Jefferson has a very complicated and questionable history with slavery in particular. I learned a bit about Robert E. Lee's history of slave ownership, and it's directly at odds with what I was taught in school. Its worth investigating if you've time. I eventually landed on this idea that there are specific acts that we should encourage our children to emulate, but there is no entire person that any children should aspire to emulate. Oskar Schindler, we should recall, was a member of the Nazi Party (and, I'm surprised to learn from wikipedia, was employed by the Nazi intelligence organization, and was convicted of spying on Czechoslovakia for the Nazis, prior to the German occupation). I am troubled by the idea that we should always forgive and forget, as it were, the things that get people canceled today. Yes, people change, and a questionable tweet by an 18 year old should not dog them in perpetuity until the end of their life. But on the other hand, I feel like we should not grant blanket pardon for people who have not sought to redress their own sins, and sincerely apologized. E.g. Donald Trump's past is littered with exceptionally bad behavior, and it seems he never expresses contrition, but always asks that the public set aside that bad behavior.