Why do we idealise people based on what they say, or their intentions, rather than their actions?

[dumblogic511]

I was in my Geography class today and my professor was lecturing the class on the missions in California. He brought up how while Spain sent the Padre's to California in order to "save souls" in actuality they killed off most of the population(mostly unintentional),took the women as sex slaves, and treated the natives like subhumans. His point was that while the padre's brought tradgedy on the natives, most of todays history textbooks for elementary students will only mention what they said they were going to do, not what they actually did.

After I heard this lecture, I realized that often times, as a population, we seem to idealize people not on their actions, but on their intentions, and things they said. For example, Bob Marley, Jimi Hendrix, and John Lennon, are idealized not just as musicians, but as men who wanted to make the world a more peaceful place, but while they preached about peace and love, their actions painted them as different people. Jimi Hendrix frequently beat several of his girlfriends. John Lennon beat his first wife, treated his first son terribly, and cheated multiple times. Bob Marley was accused of marital rape by his wife, and constantly cheated on her.

 

[BlumiereBleck]

These a trend with those musicians...they were all druggies and i don't like a single one of them.

 

[Seives-Sliver]

I think we idealise people because that is what we are taught, most of the time we only look at the surface, rather than what lies beneath. Mostly out of fear, but also because it would be a hassle to include moralality and ethics in schools without ruffling the feathers of over-protective parents.

 

[Dimitriov]

We don't do that with Hitler...

I would point out that anyone who actually studies history with any seriousness and integrity does indeed try to see all those deeper layers.

Edit: Also they probably don't feel like putting the subjects of rape and murder in elementary textbooks so much.

 

[Taerdin]

People tend to not look beyond appearances and what is placed in front of them.

There's always more of a truth laying in wait, but people can't be bothered to think about it or explore it, why bother when its easier and simpler not to.

 

[zehydra]

I love Jimi Hendrix (and numerous other musicians) as Musicians, not as people. Same goes with Kurt Cobain at times. The man is my idol, even though he made some really bad decisions in life.

 

[spartan231490]

I was in my Geography class today and my professor was lecturing the class on the missions in California. He brought up how while Spain sent the Padre's to California in order to "save souls" in actuality they killed off most of the population(mostly unintentional),took the women as sex slaves, and treated the natives like subhumans. His point was that while the padre's brought tradgedy on the natives, most of todays history textbooks for elementary students will only mention what they said they were going to do, not what they actually did.

After I heard this lecture, I realized that often times, as a population, we seem to idealize people not on their actions, but on their intentions, and things they said. For example, Bob Marley, Jimi Hendrix, and John Lennon, are idealized not just as musicians, but as men who wanted to make the world a more peaceful place, but while they preached about peace and love, their actions painted them as different people. Jimi Hendrix frequently beat several of his girlfriends. John Lennon beat his first wife, treated his first son terribly, and cheated multiple times. Bob Marley was accused of marital rape by his wife, and constantly cheated on her.

We idolize them for what they say the did, because that's all that we are taught. That's all that we are taught, because history is written by the victor. As for intentions, to a certain extent, it is better to judge a man by his intentions than by the results, because his intentions reveal more about his character and values. the results only reveal his luck and ability to follow through with his intentions.

 

[Death on Trapezoids]

Heh, kids in elementary school are taught the "intentions" of the explorers and such because whoever's pulling the strings has decided that children's minds are fragile things, and that they can't handle what actually happened.

The majority of human history is just a long string of people screwing other people over, larger and more advanced civilizations squelching out the littler ones. The entire colonization of america was a series of expansions by the technologically advanced europeans who more or less shot anyone that put up a fight because they needed land to feed their rapidly growing population.

The only question now is, having more or less mapped the entire world, what happens when we start to run out of land to feed our rapidly growing population?

 

[Dimitriov]

We idolize them for what they say the did, because that's all that we are taught. That's all that we are taught, because history is written by the victor. As for intentions, to a certain extent, it is better to judge a man by his intentions than by the results, because his intentions reveal more about his character and values. the results only reveal his luck and ability to follow through with his intentions.

There is an important distinction between actions and results.

 

[dumblogic511]

We don't do that with Hitler...

I would point out that anyone who actually studies history with any seriousness and integrity does indeed try to see all those deeper layers.

Edit: Also they probably don't feel like putting the subjects of rape and murder in elementary textbooks so much.

Did you read the 2nd paragraph?

 

[Dimitriov]

We don't do that with Hitler...

I would point out that anyone who actually studies history with any seriousness and integrity does indeed try to see all those deeper layers.

Edit: Also they probably don't feel like putting the subjects of rape and murder in elementary textbooks so much.

Did you read the 2nd paragraph?

I did indeed. Why do you ask?

 

[spartan231490]

We idolize them for what they say the did, because that's all that we are taught. That's all that we are taught, because history is written by the victor. As for intentions, to a certain extent, it is better to judge a man by his intentions than by the results, because his intentions reveal more about his character and values. the results only reveal his luck and ability to follow through with his intentions.

There is an important distinction between actions and results.

True, but not in this context. The actions you take, are an expression of your intentions. the only difference between them should be a result of a lack of knowledge or bad luck or something like that. If you die because you drank mercury thinking it would make you live longer(it's happened in history), you're not suicidal, you just didn't know that mercury was a poison. Your intentions were good, the results were bad. actions could fall into either category.

I guess what I'm getting at is: actions will be the same as intentions. You may say you intend one thing, and actually intend another, but that's already covered, or the results may be different than your intentions because you're unlucky, or lack the ability to realize your intentions.

 

[dumblogic511]

I was in my Geography class today and my professor was lecturing the class on the missions in California. He brought up how while Spain sent the Padre's to California in order to "save souls" in actuality they killed off most of the population(mostly unintentional),took the women as sex slaves, and treated the natives like subhumans. His point was that while the padre's brought tradgedy on the natives, most of todays history textbooks for elementary students will only mention what they said they were going to do, not what they actually did.

After I heard this lecture, I realized that often times, as a population, we seem to idealize people not on their actions, but on their intentions, and things they said. For example, Bob Marley, Jimi Hendrix, and John Lennon, are idealized not just as musicians, but as men who wanted to make the world a more peaceful place, but while they preached about peace and love, their actions painted them as different people. Jimi Hendrix frequently beat several of his girlfriends. John Lennon beat his first wife, treated his first son terribly, and cheated multiple times. Bob Marley was accused of marital rape by his wife, and constantly cheated on her.

We idolize them for what they say the did, because that's all that we are taught. That's all that we are taught, because history is written by the victor. As for intentions, to a certain extent, it is better to judge a man by his intentions than by the results, because his intentions reveal more about his character and values. the results only reveal his luck and ability to follow through with his intentions.

I agree with you actualy, intentions was probably the wrong word there,what they claimed their intentions were, compared to what their actually intending to do.

 

[dumblogic511]

We don't do that with Hitler...

I would point out that anyone who actually studies history with any seriousness and integrity does indeed try to see all those deeper layers.

Edit: Also they probably don't feel like putting the subjects of rape and murder in elementary textbooks so much.

Did you read the 2nd paragraph?

I did indeed. Why do you ask?

Well because I was mostly using my teachers example to lead into my argument in the 2nd paragraph, but most people seem to be responding to the first one only, just wanted to know.

 

[Dimitriov]

True, but not in this context. The actions you take, are an expression of your intentions. the only difference between them should be a result of a lack of knowledge or bad luck or something like that. If you die because you drank mercury thinking it would make you live longer(it's happened in history), you're not suicidal, you just didn't know that mercury was a poison. Your intentions were good, the results were bad. actions could fall into either category.

I guess what I'm getting at is: actions will be the same as intentions. You may say you intend one thing, and actually intend another, but that's already covered, or the results may be different than your intentions because you're unlucky, or lack the ability to realize your intentions.

True enough. I focused on entirely the wrong part. What I should have pointed out was the contrast between intentions and stated intentions.

 

[SilentCom]

History is taught that way to elementary schools because the teachers don't want to tell their students how horrible human history is. It's taught in very simple terms and is often underfunded and taught by teachers who do not have a major in history. Once you get to college level it's different. As far as how musicians are epitomized despite their problems, this is because people enjoy their music and want to glorify their role models rather than focus on their problems.

 

[KeyMaster45]

Because the road to hell is paved with good intentions, that's why.

You could easily teach kids that Hitler was only trying to reinvigorate the German people thanks to the Treaty of Versailles which decimated the Germany economy after WWI, and blame the US for WWII since they made many loans to Germany after WWI to help with it's ailing economy. Then when the depression hit in late 20's we decided to call due our loans to Germany; whose economy was just starting to stabilize after they'd set up a new monetary system based on the amount of grain in the country. (or something like that)

The economy in Germany tanked even worse than it had after WWI and made pretty much everyone in Germany destitute. Coupled with lack of oversight from the other allied nations of making sure Germany did not keep a working army allowed for them to send scouts into the outer farmlands of France and set up small posts(that bits kinda fuzzy for me so I may be wrong) and let Germany build it's army back up.

The people were broken and demoralized, then along came Hitler and the Nazi party with promises of returning Germany to glory on the world stage and fix the all but nonexistant economy. He did exactly what he promised too (with about 6 million casualties along the way) but we all know that ended once WWII came to an end and Berlin and most of Germany were left a smoldering crater in the wake of the Allied advance.

Don't get me wrong, Hitler was an evil bastard and one of the few people in history we can legitimately call a supervillain. Though told through the right historical lens you can say the same thing about him as you could about the Spaniards. The point is that history is remembered the way the predominant force wants it to be remembered, and guess who came in an colonized North America after the Spanish priests had done their business? Exactly.

It wasn't his fault his country voted him into power and he started WWII; it was the fault of the allies and the US for gutting Germany with an overkill treaty and destroying their economy after giving them aid to fix it. Yeah maybe they shouldn't have started WWI but crippling the country afterwords didn't help to make them cut their losses and move on. It just pissed them off.

Disclaimer: I'm well aware of how obscenely incorrect this view is. I'm not saying it's right, it's actually very wrong and very hard to accept as a viable truth. It is used simply to illustrate the point of how easily historical facts can be used to skew the view of historical events.

 

[thePyro_13]

Because when their actions fail(or turn out to be something else entirely), they(usually the publicity machine behind them) stop talking about it. And all that is left behind is the media records of what they said.

In short, people cover up the stuff that makes them looks bad and publicise that which might make them more popular. You see the same thing in religion all the time. People will always talk about the parts of their holy book they like(the peace and love stuff, and for some people the burn all homosexuals stuff) whilst ignoring the stuff that would make any sane person horrified(God has some very sick ideas).

You don't see EA trumping up what are massive failure their Spore release was. But they'll happily talk about all the positive responses the game got at shows before release.