Heroes or Villains?

[Ron]

No need to apologize, you're exactly right. 

How naieve of me to look for good in such a dispicable human being. 

I forgot everything was so black and white when it comes to how we love our fathers, Brian most certainly sees his father as a Villian. 

[the captain]

It's equally absurd and reductive to say hero or villain. Child abuse is obviously horrible. But similarly, praising someone as a hero just for having shot a load into his wife and having had one of the swimmers take hold ..l. I think reasonable people can agree that making a baby isn't necessarily heroic in itself. Raising a child, more so ... but if that child-raising involves abuse, less so.

Get it? People usually aren't heroes or villains. They're both. It's not even a complicated idea.

[Ron]

Yes Sir, I get it.  Thank you for enlightening me.  I'm going to try and live my life and make my own decisions about people without you or Wirestone to guide me, is it alright if I get your phone number in case I need any more life lessons?

[Ron]

Ergh.  I can't stand it.  Let me tell both of you what I really think.


When you're born, you see your father as a Hero.  It takes a lot of sh*t to diminish that.  Your father can treat you like hell and you still see him as a hero.  It's not rational, it's not logical, but it's human.

Brian Wilson saw his father as a hero, and wanted his appreciation, STILL sees his father as a hero, and wants his appreciation, and will ALWAYS see his father as a hero, and want his appreciation.

So take all your lecturing about what's right and wrong and shove it up your ass. 



Class dismissed.

[the captain]

Sure. You're a hero for asking (and being a dad).

[the captain]

They're so cute when they're sassy.

[Wirestone]

Ergh.  I can't stand it.  Let me tell both of you what I really think.


When you're born, you see your father as a Hero.  It takes a lot of sh*t to diminish that.  Your father can treat you like hell and you still see him as a hero.  It's not rational, it's not logical, but it's human.

Brian Wilson saw his father as a hero, and wanted his appreciation, STILL sees his father as a hero, and wants his appreciation, and will ALWAYS see his father as a hero, and want his appreciation.

So take all your lecturing about what's right and wrong and shove it up your ass.  



Class dismissed.

But what does any of that have to do with anything? Does the fact that someone loves someone else make their behavior irrelevant? Does the fact that an abused wife loves her abusive husband make him less of a heel? Abused children often love their parents. It doesn't excuse the real and lasting damage that such parents do.

I also -- it must be said -- find it remarkable that I have to make an argument that child abuse is wrong.

Do you really want to have that debate, Ron? Because I would say that society has rendered a general verdict on that some time ago.

[grillo]

     How can anyone defend a man who physically hurt his children and damaged them emotionally and on purpose? Things ARE black and white...if you (any person) hit your child for any reason, just like if you hit your wife for any, you are doing irreparable harm to them (and in the case of a child you are attacking someone 1/5 your size) and are most likely continuing the cycle of violence that your own father abused you with. Imagine how beautiful the music would have been had violence and fear not been the way the Wilsons were raised...

[b00ts]

Ergh.  I can't stand it.  Let me tell both of you what I really think.


When you're born, you see your father as a Hero.  It takes a lot of sh*t to diminish that.  Your father can treat you like hell and you still see him as a hero.  It's not rational, it's not logical, but it's human.

Brian Wilson saw his father as a hero, and wanted his appreciation, STILL sees his father as a hero, and wants his appreciation, and will ALWAYS see his father as a hero, and want his appreciation.

So take all your lecturing about what's right and wrong and shove it up your ass.  



Class dismissed.

But what does any of that have to do with anything? Does the fact that someone loves someone else make their behavior irrelevant? Does the fact that an abused wife loves her abusive husband make him less of a heel? Abused children often love their parents. It doesn't excuse the real and lasting damage that such parents do.

I also -- it must be said -- find it remarkable that I have to make an argument that child abuse is wrong.

Do you really want to have that debate, Ron? Because I would say that society has rendered a general verdict on that some time ago.

Wirestone - of course child abuse is wrong, and of course Murry was a villain (if we are just choosing one option here). He mentally and physically abused his sons. What you are dealing with is a troll. Don't feed the trolls.

[Disney Boy (1985)]

Brian definitely wrote those words.

Well they suck.

[Disney Boy (1985)]

Wow, didn't mean for this thread to turn into a debate on child abuse. Calm down, people! How's about we forget about Murray and move onto Rieley?

I don't really know the history at all re Rieley's lying (I know Al called him 'a great manipulator'), but really... who cares? So what if he lied when the results were so good! Don't forget, he was directly responsible for/helped contribute enormously towards the following:

Surf's Up and Holland. A drastic improvement in record sales and critical standing. Aruguably the top three greatest Carl songs ever. Some tremendous live shows and set-lists. Those terrific A Day In The Life... vocals. Some fantastic album cover artwork. The Mt Vernon narration. Blondie and Ricky joining the group. Two under-rated Brian co-writes. Some great withering remarks about Mike. Bruce buggered off.

Just how unforgiveably appalling must these lies he supposedly told have been to offset all of the above?

[b00ts]

Wow, didn't mean for this thread to turn into a debate on child abuse. Calm down, people! How's about we forget about Murray and move onto Rieley?

I don't really know the history at all re Rieley's lying (I know Al called him 'a great manipulator'), but really... who cares? So what if he lied when the results were so good! Don't forget, he was directly responsible for/helped contribute enormously towards the following:

Surf's Up and Holland. A drastic improvement in record sales and critical standing. Aruguably the top three greatest Carl songs ever. Some tremendous live shows and set-lists. Those terrific A Day In The Life... vocals. Some fantastic album cover artwork. The Mt Vernon narration. Blondie and Ricky joining the group. Two under-rated Brian co-writes. Some great withering remarks about Mike. Bruce buggered off.

Just how unforgiveably appalling must these lies he supposedly told have been to offset all of the above?

Well, from my understanding (and this could be incorrect), Jack Riely allegedly lied to everybody in the Beach Boys camp about having cancer, and took their money for his alleged cancer treatments. That is a pretty big, bad lie... But I still think out of Murry, Landy, and Riely, Riely isn't even in the same league as the other two.

Both Murry and Landy are responsible for Brian being alive today; unfortunately, both are also responsible for an immense amount of damage to the man. Murry is almost doubly culpable, as is shitty parenting is the likely cause for Brian's desperate need for a father figure, which was a role that Landy was all too willing to fulfill.

Lest we forget, Landy also became involved creatively with Brian, even letting his girlfriend Alexandra Morgan write many lyrics, to horrible horrible effect.

[SMiLE Brian]

Murry was a manic child abuser, enough said!

[Andrew G. Doe]

Seriously, if I hear someone say "But Landy saved Brian's life" just once more, I may not be responsible for my actions. Yes, he did, but consider the context - there's this 300 pound, chain-smoking, food-guzzling, coke-snorting semi-alcoholic who you've worked with before, and you're given carte blanche (and a blank check) to stop him killing himself. It's not rocket science: Stevie Wonder could see the problem.

I'll give you some more villains: The Beach Boys for thinking Landy was the right man for the job 2nd time around. Lord knows, they'd made some calamitous career decisions before then but in terms of what happened to Brian and, indirectly, the band, that has to be totally the stupidest thing they ever decided was a good idea.

One by-product of the 2nd Landy era was that Brian met Melinda. That one spans the spectrum.

[Paulos]

Murry was a manic child abuser, enough said!

Murry himself was a victim of child abuse and he unfortunately never dealt with that and carried the cycle of abuse onto his sons.

[drbeachboy]

From here on out, I'm staying out of any threads that get into their personal business. No matter what is said on either side of things, you can never have a normal discourse on a subject without nastiness to everyone else's views. There is no right answer here on Murry. People who grow up with parents who discipline like he did, have real love/hate relationships with them. When I answered the question, I said hero. You know why? Because they would have been different people with completely different histories. It was a benign statement not meant for nothing else but being happy that we were blessed with three brothers who brought a lot of happiness into our lives through their music. Had Murry not been their father, most likely there would be no Beach Boys and we wouldn't be here doing any of this stuff.

[SMiLE Brian]

Murry was a manic child abuser, enough said!

Murry himself was a victim of child abuse and he unfortunately never dealt with that and carried the cycle of abuse onto his sons.

That's a sad fact of a lot of abusers and the reason Brian was scared to raise his daughters.

[Autotune]

Murry was a manic child abuser, enough said!

Murry himself was a victim of child abuse and he unfortunately never dealt with that and carried the cycle of abuse onto his sons.

That's a sad fact of a lot of abusers and the reason Brian was scared to raise his daughters.

Let us not pass the blame here. Brian is responsible for his actions or lack of thereof with his daughters. Bearing his own upringing and being mentally ill sure did not help, but he is just as responsible for his fatherhood as Murry was for his, or any of us for ours.

[anazgnos]

I don't know about Jack, Landy was obviously a Villian, drugging and defrauding a mentally ill man is pretty villianous behaviour.

Murry was a Hero.  He did a lot of bad things but in the end he was Brian's father.  Even the totality of Murry's abusive behavior wasn't enough to erase the goodwill/inspiration/love that simply being a father to Brian provided.... even if it was only by default.   

Ron? Do you have kids?

No hero would abuse his children. Period.

Wirestone?  Do you have a father?

No father would be a Villian to me.  Period.

Being "a father" gets nobody any points.  There is no role in life for a man that puts him closer to being an absolute unredeemabel f-up "just by default" than being a father.  You have to actually succeed in that role for it to mean anything.

Being a father means you have unlimited power to completely screw somebody's life up forever just by failing or being absent, but if you take it even farther and actually knock them around physically or undermine their development emotionally or both, I think you go way past forfeiting any goodwill for the job you're doing.

I cannot imagine the kind of blinders it takes to look at a destructive narcissist like Murry through rose colored glasses, especially if you're not even related to him.

[SMiLE Brian]

Murry was a manic child abuser, enough said!

Murry himself was a victim of child abuse and he unfortunately never dealt with that and carried the cycle of abuse onto his sons.

That's a sad fact of a lot of abusers and the reason Brian was scared to raise his daughters.

Let us not pass the blame here. Brian is responsible for his actions or lack of thereof with his daughters. Bearing his own upringing and being mentally ill sure did not help, but he is just as responsible for his fatherhood as Murry was for his, or any of us for ours.

I agree, I just remember an interview where marylin explained that Brian was scared to raise his kids because he knew only one way, the Murry Wilson way.

[Disney Boy (1985)]

Where did the 'Reiley lied about having cancer' story originate from? Sounds like The Royal Tenenbaums made real...

[Iron Horse-Apples]

Without Murry as their manager, there would probably be no Beach Boys.

[hypehat]

Ergh.  I can't stand it.  Let me tell both of you what I really think.

[Andrew G. Doe]

Where did the 'Reiley lied about having cancer' story originate from? Sounds like The Royal Tenenbaums made real...

1977 or thereabouts. He also lied about working for NBC in Puerto Rico and winning both a Peabody Award and a Pulitzer Prize. He also produced a personal letter from Bobby Kennedy welcoming Ricky to the USA when he was having some difficulties with the immigration people. Bobby Kennedy was killed in 1968.

[Disney Boy (1985)]

Well, getting Ricky into the US was kinda a good thing really, though some of the rest is admittedly suspect... Still, I still say the positives which I listed earlier far, far outweigh these negatives.