What Public Person Influenced You The Most?

[Guest FourAces]

I am sure many have been influenced by parents or school teachers ... what I am curious about what public person has had the most impact on your life and if you can share why that would be great!

[Guest hitoallusa]

I guess all the people around me collectively influenced me through out my life so it's hard to pin point only one person. Public figures.. hmm.. it's very hard to come up with someone since no one comes to my mind...

I am sure many have been influenced by parents or school teachers ... what I am curious about what public person has had the most impact on your life and if you can share why that would be great!

[Guest CharliePS]

Although there are many public persons whom I have admired, I can't think of any that have actually influenced my ideas or conduct in any noticeable way. The closest I could come would be certain writers who have influenced my style. Probably the most important was James Boswell: reading his 18th century journals of his young manhood in London and Holland prompted me to start keeping the same kind of narrative journals, which I have now done daily for almost forty years--I guess that counts as a significant influence.

[Guest EXPAT]

Only because I've been a fan since I was 5 years old and that has never waned I would have to say Cher. I've seen her in concert over 30 times. I have arranged vacation times around her tours. I've had Cher parties. So from a social fun perspective I'd have to say she has influenced my "cultural" life in terms of what I enjoy in my private time. But outside of the FUN influence, I go out of my way to not let others really influence me without getting a lot of different perspective. But I have a blind spot when it comes to my Cher. . .

[RA1]

Although there are many public persons whom I have admired, I can't think of any that have actually influenced my ideas or conduct in any noticeable way. The closest I could come would be certain writers who have influenced my style. Probably the most important was James Boswell: reading his 18th century journals of his young manhood in London and Holland prompted me to start keeping the same kind of narrative journals, which I have now done daily for almost forty years--I guess that counts as a significant influence.

I would have to agree this a significant influence. If not, what possibly could have influenced you more? Who among us has consistently done anything (other than have sex) for 40 years? As a minor issue and statement, I have been influenced by aviation and various members thereof for the approximate same length of time but that does not denigrate Charlie PSP's account.

Best regards,

RA1

[Guest FourAces]

I think as a young boy at the edge of my teen years that John Lennon had a huge impact on shaping my life. Maybe I would have discovered much of what he spoke about on my own but it was his words and his actions that led me to the counter culture revolution. He opened my mind to how acceptance and love and common sense could rule the world.

There were many others at the time that reinforced this though they were just if not more important. Martin Luther King Jr, President John F Kennedy, and a host of other voices from that era. However John Lennon brought it all together for me.

Give Peace A Chance

[JKane]

Maybe it's different for my generation. We didn't have a JFK, RFK, MLK, or Lennon. Some my age are big on Cobain, but I never got that. I can't think of anybody as inspiring *in* "my generation" as footage of people like Murrow or those already mentioned remains...

[Guest EXPAT]

Cobain? seriously? I'm not sure I'd want to be around anyone who idolized Kurt Cobain, it would be for all the wrong reasons.

[TampaYankee]

I cannot really pick anyone either with the possible exception of Thomas Jefferson. Not so much for the usual high profile things which were all good, but for his view of the common man and the political party he helped found on that philosophy. Honestly, now I cannot remember if I learned, as a young man of high school age, my views from him or whether he just confirmed what I already conjured up. Either way it had a strong impact on validating my feelings. Too bad the country and times have become too complex to retain that simple individualistic approach to politics and policy. Or maybe I have come to see that all is not so simple and straightforward.

[RA1]

Interesting that two posters have chosen public figures that lived before TV and "modern" media. The absence of modern media gave "their" public ample time to read and digest whatever they had to say. A real benefit. Today it seems we must read and digest "instant' ideas and respond accordingly. Not so simple or appropriate or so it seems to me.

Who among us would not have changed their opinion (or did do so) after a seemly period of time after acquiring whatever "facts" seemed to pertain?

I just read an editorial piece about voters needing to "increase" their IQs. I did not necessarily agree with the conclusion but we all need to know more about whatever our opinions might rely, don't you think?

Best regards,

RA1

[Guest CharliePS]

Interesting that two posters have chosen public figures that lived before TV and "modern" media. The absence of modern media gave "their" public ample time to read and digest whatever they had to say. A real benefit. Today it seems we must read and digest "instant' ideas and respond accordingly. Not so simple or appropriate or so it seems to me.

Who among us would not have changed their opinion (or did do so) after a seemly period of time after acquiring whatever "facts" seemed to pertain?

I just read an editorial piece about voters needing to "increase" their IQs. I did not necessarily agree with the conclusion but we all need to know more about whatever our opinions might rely, don't you think?

Best regards,

RA1

We know much more about figures in the public eye today than we did before today's 24/7 media coverage. In some ways that is a good thing, because it is hard for anyone to get away with a very simplified image, when we know so much more about them. I think it prevents us from easily dividing everyone into sinners or saints. On the other hand, it is also hard to ever settle into an opinion about someone when we may learn something tomorrow which puts them in a new light.

In the days when a figure like Jefferson had more control over his own image because it came largely from his own writings, it was easier to take time to ponder them and come to our own conclusions about the eloquent apostle of equality, without being distracted by the revelation that he had a slave mistress and mixed-raced children (yes, there were rumors at the time, but they were always just dismissed as slanders by political enemies). Nowadays, we are more likely to question self-portraits, and to ask whether a person's philosophy might be tainted by inconsistency or hypocrisy, because so much more evidence is available. Imagine what might have happened to JFK's political trajectory if he were a contemporary of John Edwards. Could J. Edgar Hoover have been lionized as a symbol of integrity in the age of the Internet? If Fox News were around in the 1960s, what would their sleuths have done with the discovery that MLK, Jr., had plagiarized much of his doctoral dissertation?

Although it is harder to find--and keep--our heroes today, I prefer having more information now, and more nuanced character portraits. After all, if I had lived in the Victorian period, I would never have known that James Boswell kept a daily journal in which he candidly described his frequent casual sex with prostitutes and "loose" women, and therefore he would never have had any influence on my life. (Boswell's journals didn't come to light until the 1950s; until then, he had been known only as Dr. Johnson's biographer).

[RA1]

Does any of that make past figures or more current figures more or less relevant? I think neither one. All of them have "feet of clay" so to speak and NOW we can try to make value judgements that more or less seek to "balance" their relative attributes vs. their negative aspects. What it seems to mean is that human beings are human and that we need to "adjust" our thinking to allow for same. Not necessarily so easy if hero worship is foremost in one's mind, is it?

However, it is interesting to contemplate how past fugures would have dealt with current media. No doubt they would have learned quickly and done "well".

Best regards,

RA1

[MsGuy]

Bertram Russell

Around age 15, I ran across a collection of his essays ("Why I Am Not A Christian and Other Related Essays"? not sure of title) that opened my eyes to the notion that the worldview I grew up in was subject to being questioned on a serious level by serious people.

[Guest CharliePS]

Bertram Russell

Around age 15, I ran across a collection of his essays ("Why I Am Not A Christian and Other Related Essays"? not sure of title) that opened my eyes to the notion that the worldview I grew up in was subject to being questioned on a serious level by serious people.

I am assuming that "Bertram" was a momentary slip (Freudian?)for "Bertrand."

[Guest hitoallusa]

That explains your view point on religion a bit. But don't you think there is a reason that religion has played so much through out history? If you are a free thinker then you should not limit your mind by excluding religious beliefs from your thoughts.

Bertram Russell

Around age 15, I ran across a collection of his essays ("Why I Am Not A Christian and Other Related Essays"? not sure of title) that opened my eyes to the notion that the worldview I grew up in was subject to being questioned on a serious level by serious people.

[MsGuy]

I am assuming that "Bertram" was a momentary slip (Freudian?)for "Bertrand."

Oops

[MsGuy]

That explains your view point on religion a bit.

It wasn't Russell's conclusions that affected me so much as the approach. The idea that the whole of the belief system I lived in (& very much accepted as self-evident) could be examined and be found intellectually lacking was quite a shock to my system. It was as though the lights had been switched on in a darkened room; the furniture was all arranged just as I remembered it but it sure looked different in the light.

But don't you think there is a reason that religion has played so much through out history?

I'll go further than you, Hito: I suspect the evolution of enduring, large scale human societies wouldn't have been possible without religion or something very much like it.

If you are a free thinker then you should not limit your mind by excluding religious beliefs from your thoughts.

Accepting a set of religious beliefs as useful is not the same thing as accepting them as true. I know of no reason to priviledge Christian beliefs over Moslem or Buddhist or Santerian (other than it's the dominant belief system we inherited in our particular society & it's tamer forms seem to be compatible with the kind of society we've grown to like). Saying something like "Well, I mean religious beliefs generally, without the creeds." may be worse than useless, as you put the socially beneficial bits at risk without gaining much that I can see.

[Guest hitoallusa]

Wow I love it. Thank you for your elaboration.

It was as though the lights had been switched on in a darkened room; the furniture was all arranged just as I remembered it but it sure looked different in the light.

[Guest FourAces]

Maybe it's different for my generation. We didn't have a JFK, RFK, MLK, or Lennon. Some my age are big on Cobain, but I never got that. I can't think of anybody as inspiring *in* "my generation" as footage of people like Murrow or those already mentioned remains...

Kurt really didn't stand for anything. He was not promoting a framework of society or preaching for a different cause. He was simply an extremely popular musician with a terrible drug problem and a sad ending to his life.

There really were no cultural leaders that I'm aware of in the 90s. No one who tried to make a huge difference. No one who stood out. One could go as far to say the biggest cultural impact of the 90s was technology .. the Internet. So I guess you could look to Bill Gates or Steve Jobs or a host of other Silicon Valley innovators.