History Quotes / HistoricalHeroUpgrade

... by all accounts, Film/{{Rudy}} is kind of a prick. Oh, and speaking of pricks, every one of the Film/ThreeHundred dudes was both boned by an older man as a child, and boned a child before leaving for battle...\\
I mean, for God's sake, Film/ThePatriot would have been about a guy burning churches, slaughtering unarmed Cherokee and raping his female slaves. That's what the real guy Creator/MelGibson was playing did. Over here in life, where [[CrapsackWorld everything is awful]].''

-->-- '''Creator/SamuelFuller''', whose film ''Film/IShotJesseJames'' [[Irony was an attempt at revisionism]].

Wed've found this stuff anyway.
-->-- ''WesternAnimation/Animaniacs2021'', UsefulNotes/ChristopherColumbus song

->''In fourteen-hundred and ninety-two,\\
Columbus sailed the ocean blue,\\
He had three ships, he sailed from Spain,\\
A first rate hat 'top a second rate brain,\\
He sailed by night, he sailed by day,\\

He's cruel, he rules through thuggery,\\
Yet he's praised for the New World's discovery,\\

->''"The truth is I was violent, and with my good mate Matt King,\\
Robbed travellers at gunpoint; money, watches, anything!\\
My horse it wasn't called Black Bess, although that's what you've read,\\
Was no romantic hero, shot not one, but two men dead!\\
The legend that surrounds me misses out the crucial part,\\
I was a ruthless killer with a ruthless killer's heart!"''
-->-- '''[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Turpin Dick Turpin]]''', ''Series/HorribleHistories''

->''Charles George Gordon functioned as example and as symbol. He seemed for many years and for a large section of the British public to have been the best of his race, embodying those traits most dearly admired by Victorian England: bravery, religious humility, honesty, resourcefulness, an innate sense of justice, and a real but manly feeling for the unfortunate. This was how the English nation liked to think of itself...The public needs a constantly fresh supply of heroic figures, and it is only when a national figure is catapulted beyond his time that he survives in the national Valhalla. We could point to people such as [[UsefulNotes/HoratioNelson Nelson]], or perhaps [[UsefulNotes/WinstonChurchill Churchill]], for contrast. Nelson lasts in the national mythology because he has been made to embody national qualities of courage and daring connected with the sea which are still admired in the English consciousness. Similarly with Churchill: he is thought to stand for a kind of bulldog determination never to give in, although fighting against overwhelming odds...Gordon shares many of the qualities necessary to the heroic figure, qualities which may be said to be universally admired. He might have succeeded had he not been tainted [[UsefulNotes/TheBritishEmpire by the smell of imperialism]], a doctrine which [[SocietyMarchesOn is in very bad odor in the twentieth century]]. It is hard to admire wholeheartedly the man who stood for [[WhiteMansBurden the imposition of white civilization]] on non-white peoples; he needs constant apologies and explanations.''

-->-- '''George Washington''', ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABhyKEK-CDg Founding Fathers]]''

->''The Founding Fathers weren't benevolent demigods, they were humans who made compromises and mistakes, and building a compromise with slavery into the structure of our government was one of them.''
-->-- '''Adam Conover''', ''Series/AdamRuinsEverything''

-->-- '''Creator/SamuelFuller''', whose film ''Film/IShotJesseJames'' was an attempt at revisionism.

->''"Shouldn't we applaud the Founders' restored popularity? Isn't patriotism a good thing, especially amid our current difficulties? Yes—but like anything else, it can be taken too far. And when it causes us to overvalue those who have preceded us, it does harm...I do point out that the Founders' work was very much unfinished at the time the torch was passed to the next generation, and that tidying up the loose ends took eighty years [[UsefulNotes/TheAmericanCivilWar and one of the most destructive wars in the history of the world before 1914]]...Americans aren't alone in looking to a golden age, but in our case this inhibits action on important public issues. We marvel that our predecessors, living at a time when the free population of the country didn't exceed the population of greater UsefulNotes/{{Chicago}} today, could have gained independence from Britain and fashioned a republic that has lasted more than two centuries; and we bewail our inability, in a population eighty times as large, to find anyone like them...The Founders got the country off to a good start, but they would have been the first to admit that it was no more than a start...They would have dismissed as ludicrous the notion that theirs was a blessed generation, to which others might never compare...In making giants of the Founders, we make pygmies of ourselves; in making saints of them, we make sinners of ourselves...The point of their revolution was to craft a government based on the will of the people; they would have judged themselves failures if they thought their mechanism required saints to run it."''
-->-- '''[[https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2003/09/founders-chic/302773/ H. W. Brands]]''', ''Founders' Chic''

->''"After the election this same Cardinal will be equally shocked that the [[UsefulNotes/ThePope Holy Father]] has [[BadHabits a mistress]], [[HidingBehindReligion and bastards]]. Ooooh. Because that would be shocking in 2001, but [[UsefulNotes/TheRenaissance in 1492]] this had been true of [[CorruptChurch every pope]] for [[FairForItsDay the past century]]. In fact, Cardinal Shocked-all-the-time, according to the writers you are supposed to be none other than [[UsefulNotes/PopeJuliusII Giuliano della Rovere]]. Giuliano “[[BadassPreacher Battle-Pope]]” della Rovere! You have [[GreyAndGrayMorality a mistress]]! And [[NotSoDifferent a daughter]]! And [[UpToEleven a brothel]]! And an [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking elephant]]! And [[BreadEggsBreadedEggs take your elephant to your brothel]]! And you’re [[NoodleIncident stalking]] [[Creator/MichelangeloBuonarroti Michelangelo]]! And foreign powers lent you 300,000 ducats to spend bribing other people to vote for you in ''this'' election! And we’re supposed to believe you are shocked by simony? That is not [[DeliberateValuesDissonance historicity]]. It is applying some historical names to some made-up dudes and having them lecture us on why'' [we]'' should be shocked."''

->'''Doctor''': I remember this man.\\

'''Doctor''': Some martyr! He led the Kyrian attack against ''Voyager''.\\
'''Quarren''': You're lying.\\

'''Doctor''': And so are you - from the truth. Isn't it a coincidence that the Kyrians are being portrayed in the best possible light? Martyrs, heroes, saviors. Obviously, events have been reinterpreted to make your people feel better about themselves. Revisionist history. It's such a comfort.

->''"After the election this same Cardinal will be equally shocked that the [[UsefulNotes/ThePope Holy Father]] has [[BadHabits a mistress]], [[HidingBehindReligion and bastards]]. Ooooh. Because that would be shocking in 2001, but [[UsefulNotes/TheRenaissance in 1492]] this had been true of [[CorruptChurch every pope]] for [[FairForItsDay the past century]]. In fact, Cardinal Shocked-all-the-time, according to the writers you are supposed to be none other than [[UsefulNotes/PopeJuliusII Giuliano della Rovere]]. Giuliano “[[BadassPreacher Battle-Pope]]” della Rovere! You have a mistress! And a daughter! And a brothel! And an [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking elephant]]! And [[BreadEggsBreadedEggs take your elephant to your brothel]]! And you’re [[NoodleIncident stalking]] Michelangelo! And foreign powers lent you 300,000 ducats to spend bribing other people to vote for you in ''this'' election! And we’re supposed to believe you are shocked by simony? That is not [[DeliberateValuesDissonance historicity]]. It is applying some historical names to some made-up dudes and having them lecture us on why'' [we]'' should be shocked."''

->''"After the election this same Cardinal will be equally shocked that the [[UsefulNotes/ThePope Holy Father]] has [[BadHabits a mistress]], [[HidingBehindReligion and bastards]]. Ooooh. Because that would be shocking in 2001, but [[UsefulNotes/TheRenaissance in 1492]] this had been true of [[CorruptChurch every pope]] for [[FairForItsDay the past century]]. In fact, Cardinal Shocked-all-the-time, according to the writers you are supposed to be none other than [[UsefulNotes/PopeJuliusII Giuliano della Rovere]]. Giuliano “[[BadassPreacher Battle-Pope]]” della Rovere! You have a mistress! And a daughter! And a brothel! And an [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking elephant]]! And [[BreadEggsBreadedEggs take your elephant to your brothel]]! And you’re [[NoodleIncident stalking]] Michelangelo! And foreign powers lent you 300,000 ducats to spend bribing other people to vote for you in ''this'' election! And we’re supposed to believe you are shocked by simony?"''

->''"After the election this same Cardinal will be equally shocked that the [[UsefulNotes/ThePope Holy Father]] has [[BadHabits a mistress]], [[HidingBehindReligion and bastards]]. Ooooh. Because that would be shocking in 2001, but [[UsefulNotes/TheRenaissance in 1492]] this had been true of [[CorruptChurch every pope]] for the past century. In fact, Cardinal Shocked-all-the-time, according to the writers you are supposed to be none other than [[UsefulNotes/PopeJuliusII Giuliano della Rovere]]. Giuliano “[[BadassPreacher Battle-Pope]]” della Rovere! You have a mistress! And a daughter! And a brothel! And an [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking elephant]]! And [[BreadEggsBreadedEggs take your elephant to your brothel]]! And you’re [[NoodleIncident stalking]] Michelangelo! And foreign powers lent you 300,000 ducats to spend bribing other people to vote for you in ''this'' election! And we’re supposed to believe you are shocked by simony?"''