How do we learn to separate the action from the actor?

We enjoy entertainment from people who are complete scum, yet we don’t always know it. Art, writing, and music should stand on their own without being tainted with the personal lives of their creators. It’s hard to separate things when the dark side of the creator is known though.

It’s not a matter of “how” as much as it is “when”. A student voicing support of Palestinians or Israelis is not to be silenced; someone defending Hamas’ actions should be ashamed and silenced for supporting barbaric behavior.

The problem is that one cannot come up with a bright line solution to guide us on this. And even if we did by using today’s standards, that means we condemn behaviors from earlier periods, or we accept behaviors that were not acceptable in a prior time and place.

Last week I heard a podcaster state that “Pablo Picasso had problematic behavior”. But Picasso was as much a product of his time and place. Michael Jackson, on the other hand, was questioned for his behavior contemporaneously with its occurrence. And somewhere between Picasso and Jackson, there is Roman Polanski and Woody Allen.

Last week in discussing Christmas movies, I mentioned “Holiday Inn” with Bing Crosby. While not explicitly racist. that movie included behaviors of its time that are not acceptable today.

It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people.
Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman, Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

@Lightlyseared GA for quoting Terry Pratchett.

@Hawaii_Jake I was looking for the quote about humans being capable greater good than angels and greater evil than demons, often at the same time but google let me down

Can you separate them? I don’t think so. The actor is taking the action. Whether the actor is intelligent, sentient, moral, ethical, etc. – is secondary. The action is still his.

About the only exception I can see is someone who is out of his head – mentally ill.

Take the Michael Jackson example. He may have had health issues, but ultimately he did what he did.

Same with Picasso – yes, he was troubled and behaved badly. But he did things that were odious and should be held responsible.

To divorce actor from action is to allow, excuse, and even encourage, bad actions because the actor has a figurative get-out-of-jail free card.

I don’t know if we can or even necessarily should do so, certainly not in every case. It is going to come down to personal preference and what you are comfortable with. To separate the act from the actor (at least in the case of creative output) means you can appreciate the work of an artist who is problematic. Can you still listen to Michael Jackson’s music, admire Picasso’s paintings, or attend a Wagner opera? Different people will have different answers to those questions, depending on how much distance they feel from the artist and their actions. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with deciding that you can’t reconcile what Michael Jackson (allegedly) did with his artistic output and you no longer enjoy his music. We all have personal limits.

The protest example is a little different because we’re not talking about some artist you’ve never met—this could be more likened to being friends with someone who has totally different politics than you. At what point does it go from a difference of opinion you can tolerate to regarding their views as so abhorrent that you can’t be friends with them anymore?

Through forgiveness, I suppose.

Last week in discussing Christmas movies, I mentioned “Holiday Inn” with Bing Crosby. While not explicitly racist. that movie included behaviors of its time that are not acceptable today.

Apparently, since he was/is so well-loved, people can separate the man from his horrible abuse of his children.

https://www.upi.com/Archives/1983/03/14/Crosbys-children-claim-he-abused-them/5007660964411/

Context and perspective.
Bullies from your childhood need not be forgiven, the emotional damage such people can cause will likely never heal completely. With geographic and temporal separation, you will likely never have to deal with them again.

A few years ago, I found out that a writer I liked was very emotionally abusive to her children (one of whom was on a survivor’s site that I frequent). There was never an indication of this in her writing, but I felt the work was tainted for me. A few years later she died, the daughter benefited from the inheritance, and the taint of the work faded for me.

Your example of the student at the protest is a perfect example of perspective. The student may have loved ones or friends or family in Gaza and may view the extreme retaliatory response of the Israeli government as its own attempt at genocide, and be reacting based on that perspective. You simply can’t know.

I have reason to believe that my new next door neighbors do not share my political beliefs and may, in fact, vote for candidates that I abhor, but they are, and will probably remain my close neighbors for a long time. They are pleasant, helpful, and kind. Their teenage kids are not obnoxious, in fact are very nice. Context is everything. They will never be my friends, we will never socialize, but they are exemplary neighbors so I will happily continue this relationship exactly as is without discussing charged topics.

Context and perspective. Each situation should be examined and judged on its own merits.

@canidmajor Thank you. I appreciate the time you took to answer, and it’s a helpful perspective. I can grasp what you’re saying about everything, but I still struggle with what you say about the protester. However, I fully understand the fact that I cannot know.

I don’t feel as much of a dilemma over these sorts of things than it seems some people do, at least in terms of separating the appreciation of a work of art from the artist. I tend to relate to art and literature as their own things, to be engaged by us, and I don’t tend to be as interested in the artists/authors as much as some people seem to be.

Also, I don’t see that my appreciation or relationship to a piece of art is necessarily in moral conflict due to the acts or moral issues surrounding the artist. It can impact my feelings towards the artist as a person, and if they’re an actor and the art is their performance, that’s muddier, but other art forms, not as much.

I also have relationships to ancient art and history, and accept that people for millennia have had very different morality from my own, and certainly from our current society.

For example, I wish the Roman Empire hadn’t done so much damage to so many other European cultures, but that doesn’t have a big impact on my appreciation of Roman architecture or other cultural works outside of political theory, or what we’ve inherited from them. It’s not going to make me dislike the Pantheon, and I even appreciate ruins with grim histories.

And the cultural and religious and other atrocities committed by the Christian Church don’t spoil my ability to appreciate the art in a cathedral, or scultpure such as the Pieta` . . . well, a bit because of the subject matter and my disalignment to it, but not because of the art itself.

An author’s relationship to his children . . . is an unlikely subject for me to even consider. If I do know such a thing, I’ll take it into account somehow, and maybe look for traces in their writing, but I’ll still look at the writing as its own thing. Especially with literature.

People can and do create literature and art that doesn’t necessarily reflect who they are as people. And the more distant in time and culture an artist or author is from us, the less our moral qualms seem relevant to me, unless we ourselves can’t get over our own lenses and biases.

I also think it can be a positive interesting experience to study the creative work of people with very different, or even appalling, moral behavior, compared to our own.

Part of that, is that I think that often, violent behavior is an expression of something, and I think that’s often (even usually? always, for someone?) worth understanding and studying. I tend to think that impulses to avoid hearing or knowing what a violent person was thinking, is a mistake. Even, or perhaps especially, if they did it to bring attention to their own ideas.

As for bullies, I don’t have much sympathy for that behavior, but I do welcome their enlightenment and reform. Until that happens, they deserve to be beaten up and disrespected for it, IMO. I don’t feel any responsibility to hold detached views on bullies until/unless they do reform.

As for the current college protestors objecting to the recent violence in Palestine, I am not willing to try to develop the level of expertise on Middle Eastern politics that it would require for me to feel authoritative on the subject, but I don’t feel utterly inadequate in my perspective that:

Maybe, I’m wrong, but it seems likely to me that:

* Most people not involved in the conflict, who are protesting the recent Israeli military attacks on Palestine, are mainly protesting the severity of the damage, death, and suffering caused to non-combatants.
* They may also be protesting the situation having no satisfactory resolution, so that violence continues.
* If US college students are chanting Palestinian slogans, it’s almost entirely an attempt to draw attention and express their upset at the situation and their sympathy for Palestinians as humans who have suffered, and whose needs will eventually need to be met in order for there to ever be peace.
* So no, I don’t think such protests can really be intended as calls for genocide against Israel. I think there’s been a conflation in the media between contexts, and that even those students who may know that context, are really saying something like, “We’re so mad about the excessive impact on non-combatants, and the brokenness of the situation, that we’re even willing to express support for the cause of people who have murdered and called for the destruction of Israel – not that we want that – but that we think the situation cannot stand, and Palestinians have to be treated as humans, and a real solution found. We know that the inertia of the situation will likely return to a situation where there will be endless suffering, and there can be no peace without satisfactory justice.”

I don’t think we should.

I can separate them. I like Chinatown and The Pianist despite Polansky, Annie Hall and Manhattan despite Allen, Mission Impossible despite Cruise, and Braveheart despite Gibson. They are works of art and I appreciate the art.

No one size fits all. Larry Rivers took naked pictures of his daughters. When an exhibition was being mounted after his death, his daughters said he had abused them sexually and the exhibit was cancelled. (This is from my memory because I had asked a similar question her to yours about that incident years ago.) The daughters would have been hurt by the exhibition and his art and actions were directly connected. In someone like Picasso’s case, his misogyny and womanizing did not affect his art and also “that was in another country and besides the wench is dead.” T.S. Eliot was a common or garden English antisemite of his time but I still love his poetry. However, Pound was an out and out antisemite and Fascist and I probably wouldn’t read him. I still like Woody Allen’s older films but I would not pay money to attend his newer ones. Or Mel Gibson’s although I have no problem watching older ones on TV.

In the case of the current college protests, I am being very careful to try to see the gray and not tar protesters on either side with a label. And in situations where one’s own biases and triggers are being set off, I think it is important to look closely at personal reactions and emotions before responding.

Having said all that, there is no reason not to be angry at those who bullied you in the past but it doesn’t have to color who you are now or how you react.

I think for some things making an effort to understand the person’s experience, their perception, and their intentions, can help release our anger towards the person and the hurt we felt and that can lead to forgiveness and free us somewhat.

There are some things that are unforgivable. I don’t want it to sound like I give excuses to anyone who has done horrific things.

It’s all case by case.

As far as the ongoing situation with Israel and the Palestinians, I care and am very interested in the opinions of the people there and why they think as they do and what they think might solve the situation. I am not as interested in the opinions of college students in AMERICA who have never been to Israel or the Palestinian Territories, especially if they don’t know much about the history or geography. I don’t think my own opinion should carry much weight compared to the people there. I do care a lot if Arab and Jewish students feel very afraid and unsafe. I care about that for all ages not just college students. What if Jewish students started carrying signs with the Israeli flag and from the river to the sea?

Regarding actors, if they disgust me enough I usually won’t spend any money going to see their movies.

There is a president Biden quote regarding don’t assume a person’s intentions. I don’t know it by heart, but I completely agree we need to ask why someone thinks, wants, or does something. I’m not talking about gross abuse that is blatantly wrong, and easily criminal. But, regarding political differences, or maybe even bullying, as horrible as I think bullying is, why did the person bully? Were they afraid for themselves? Were they afraid for you? Was it not hate, but rather ignorance and fear? Especially children at very young ages they don’t understand consequences well. I am not excusing their behavior nor trying to diminish the pain and anguish it caused you, it makes me very sad you endured that. I also am not saying you should forgive, I’m only saying what has helped me not feel so anxious or angry is to understand why.

I am often stunned when I hear about some of the bullying that goes on, especially among boys, but it exists among girls too. Boys seem to participate in what I would call hazing much more than I ever realized when I was younger, and it is flat out awful in my eyes.

I think partly this reminds me of the saying; “Don’t meet your heroes.” The idea being that the people responsible for the things you covet most, are not and in some cases realistically can not be the type of person you look up to (for their actions.)

As we are inherently human, we are inherently flawed.

Another part of being human is understanding that, as the op said best (regarding some cases) ; ”...I fully understand that I cannot know.” – That’s exactly what is going on.

Another part of the human experience is our ability/inability to cope with reality.
People are no different than any other animals, in that we are products of our “design,” and environmental development.

Damaged people often damage other people.

While I sadly agree with @canidmajor , that child bullies shouldn’t be forgiven, I surmise that most of those kids had/have issues.
It took me a LONG time to understand that some people hate themselves so much, they want everyone else to hate themselves too. So. They tirelessly work to break down others. The actions may vary, but the intent is typically the same. A bully wants you to feel what they feel. Most bullies are weak/cowardly, and can only feel “better” by “appearing” strong.
People who were physically or psychologically abused, unfortunately repeat that behavior sometimes. Even if they aren’t aware of it.

We carry our scars. When a person is behaving in a rude way to me or someone else, it’s a sign that they are a damaged person. So. In a way, there is no need for revenge. Bad things have already happened to this person. The behavior we witness by others, in many ways reflects their life, more than their heart.

The op kind of mixed some very different variables for the motivation of the detailed examples.

Mental illness.
Whatever you want to call pedophiles. (It’s not a choice, to my understanding, they’re born that way.) MJ is a perfect example of people being people. I love his music. However. With every passing song of his, I can’t help but wonder if the flirty, sexual, and romantic lyrics/style should be considered repulsive… Given that the artist may have been talking about a child.

With MJ, it’s probably more complicated than just him being a pedophile. But that’s another discussion.
The most interesting/morbid things about him are how society reacted to him.
Long after rumors spread about his significantly odd relationship with children, parents still allowed their children to go stay with him. He was never imprisoned. I’m not up to date on his economic situation, but I don’t think his reputation hurt his record sales.

How do I separate MJ, from his art? Well. I don’t. When I’m listening to one of his songs, I think of the words as they would apply to my life and interests.
But. I would NEVER have let my kid near him…

With college students and the Isreal thing, it’s important to remember that most college age people are in the midst of their own emancipation from their guardians. Stories of rebellion, and oppression, hit home for younger people easier.
And of course, they’re young.
They can always change.

To me. Some actions are unforgivable. Regardless of circumstances, or my empathy for others. In those cases, I HAVE thrown the actors away.

I could delve into way more layers, but I guess I wanted to focus on society.
First off. We are all as much of an angel, as we’re allowed to be.
Most if us try to get away with as much as possible. Often times, it’s only the possibility of repercussions that hamstring us.
Most importantly, this is a problem with society right now. In my opinion.
Too often, people are given life sentences of being the scum of the Earth for some of their weakest most embarrassing moments. That’s not really fair, is it? To some people, all I am is an alcoholic. Although I haven’t drank in years, and likely won’t again. To an ER doctor, that’s all I am. 43yo male. Alcoholic. Liver transplant from liver disease brought on by survived suicide.

Separation of actors and actions, is indeed cade by case. But. Understanding that most of our flaws are because we are a all in this race, without asking to be.

There are just too many instances to give a black and white answer.

As I stumble through this gauntlet of life, I grow more understanding of others with each passing day…

If I cannot forgive others, why would I ever expect to be forgiven?..

Why would you want to separate them? That would be taking things out of context then.
Their actions are part of who they are and who they are can result in their actions.