Fallen idols XXI - modern life freedom and culture contexts

ICON.  imageIconoclasm is the social belief in the importance of the destruction of icons and other images or monuments, most frequently for religious or political reasons.

It is clear that the last word has not been written on out past Leaders, Heroes, Icons, nor is it likely to be in the future. 

A multitude of writers  have produced,  studies on them ... and the best/worst is yet to come.  

Find a wide spectrum, from the variously hagiographical or informative, to the critical and contentious! 

TASK. Have a go at these cases. Then, 
 Prepare a speech on a Fallen Idol of your liking.

• (Mao Tse Tung, Columbus,  Nixon, ...)  

SECTION  1__    Asian Leader: Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

The truth about Mahatma Gandhi: he was a wily operator, not India’s smiling saint

• The Indian nationalist leader had an eccentric attitude to sleeping habits, food and sexuality. However, his more controversial ideas have been written out of history.   Article here
• news- BBC 

SECTION  2__       American Leader on race:  J. Marion Sims 

New York just removed a statue of a surgeon who experimented on enslaved women -Article here

• The statue of J. Marion Sims, known as the “father of gynecology,” was moved as the US grapples with its history.

SECTION  3__  POLITICS -  The rights of citizens
  
            MP and Minister (60-63) in  UK   1968-  50 years ago   Enoch Powell 


           "Rivers of blood" speech  controversy 

10,000-year-old skeleton - Cheddar MAN

•        SLOGAN:    

            Back Britain, not black Britain   

•  “Those whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad. We must be mad, literally mad, as a nation to be permitting the annual inflow of some 50,000 dependants, who are for the most part the material of the future growth of the immigrant-descended population. It is like watching a nation busily engaged in heaping up its own funeral pyre.”   - article here

• The Windrush generation (1948-2018) - here

Theresa May sorry for Caribbean citizens immigration mix-up

SECTION  4__    MEDIA     Bill Cosby

Bill Cosby: Fallen Idol -article

The dishes from our Sunday BBQ had been washed and put away. The smell of brisket and strawberries hung in the air. It was Phoenix in 1964. The summer heat made outside entertainment undesirable, so our neighbor from down the street gave my father a record to play on our homemade Hi Fi system. “You’re going to love this,” he said as he settled onto the couch next.....

Bill Cosby retrial: Comedian paid sexual assault accuser $3.4m in previously undisclosed settlement

SECTION  5__    SOCIETY - USA - Harvey Weinstein

Hollywood Figures Who Have Spoken Out Against Media Mogul

A crowd against the producer amid sexual misconduct allegations.

timeline so far (Feb 2018) : How the scandal unfolded... here

EPILOGUE:

heroes of popular culture we said farewell  ...here