re: The Kennedys and MLK were horrible people

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No one is perfect. Some our greatest heroes were very flawed men and women. Instead of deifying them, we should look at them as mere human beings who, while flawed, rose up and did extraordinary things that ended up benefiting mankind in the long run.

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Science seems to be able to do this better than most other areas. Separate their contributions to society away from their faults, which are acknowledged. Many great mathematicians were Nazis who made incredible contributions - luckily we don't decide that their theorems are worthless because they were terrible people.

There's a difference between being "flawed" and outright criminals. Joe Kennedy, the patriarch of the Kennedy family, was the latter.