Board Thread:Clean up Concerns/@comment-2059440-20160822192203/@comment-2217541-20160824074707

What about characters from media that was made "in a different time" that would be seen as villains today but are portrayed as heroic in the narrative? I recently made an article on Benjamin Cameron, the main protagonist of The Birth of a Nation. Nowadays, he is seen as a racist character in a racist film, and commits acts of vigilantism, lynching, and voter intimidation that are seen as villainous today, but in the context of the film he is seen as a hero. He doesn't delight in what he does, he is motivated by doing "what is necessary" to defend what he sees as his people and culture. Would he count as a villain? For that matter, would the people who are portrayed as villains by the movie count even though today we would see them as champions of civil rights?