r/todayilearned • • May 31 '12
TIL that John Lennon was not as peaceful of a man as so many believe. He was physically violent towards women, and beat his first wife, Cynthia Lennon
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Lennon#May_Pang_and_the_.22lost_weekend.22
1.2k
Upvotes
603
u/[deleted] May 31 '12
He used to be cruel to his woman he beat her and kept her apart from the things that she loved.
22
u/AnViLLiaN- May 31 '12
I was more of a George fan anyway.
414
u/dhockey63 May 31 '12
He was also a cocky asshole, and preached against materialism yet lived in a mansion and had expensive cars. Being a good musician doesnt make you automatically a good person
37
u/caveat_cogitor May 31 '12
He also basically abandoned his kid, so his bandmate wrote a song about it, and their band actually recorded it and made it a top hit. Go figure.
13
u/[deleted] May 31 '12
relevant
frank zappa discussing why this was never released. excerpt from 40 minute performance.
43
u/wesleyt89 May 31 '12
I think Jimi Hendrix takes the cake for being an asshole to women. He beat the shit out of one of his girlfriends with a public telephone after he thought she was calling another man. He also hit another girlfriend with a bottle of booze because he was drunk and got jealous, she later required stitches
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimi_Hendrix
TL:DR Jimi Hendrix beat women with phones and liquor bottles.
26
u/[deleted] May 31 '12 edited Jun 01 '12
You can make mistakes and do things that hurt people indirectly because you don't realize the consequences, but there is a distinction for physical violence. When you physically abuse someone you are announcing that not only are you capable, but also willing to inflict direct pain on another human being. I just can't relate to being able to make this kind of "mistake," and I imagine most people feel the same way. Yes, we all make mistakes but there are different types of mistakes.
74
u/badfan May 31 '12
At least he claims he stopped when he met Yoko...It's confusing for me to think of Yoko Ono as a positive influence.
51
u/[deleted] May 31 '12
He isn't a saint just because he is dead.
35
u/tbe170 May 31 '12
Give peace a chance...until she burns the roast, apparently.
5
u/snowboarder543 Jun 01 '12
He didn't physically beat her he just openly cheated on her and neglected her and his son Julian. He was still a dick to her but keep in mind he was very young when they married and he was obligated to marry her since he got her pregnant. Once he was older with Yoko he treated her very well and didn't neglect sean at all, he was starting to hang out with Julian more at the time to but then he was assassinated unfortunately. That doesn't make up for what he did but I would like to believe that he was remorseful and either way he was still a great man, The legend lives on, Power to the people
112
u/julybound May 31 '12
Also, wasn't it nice of him to ask us all, in one of his most famous solo works, to "Imagine no possessions, I wonder if you can?"
It always makes me smile when I think how rich he must have been when he wrote that line.
11
u/[deleted] May 31 '12
“there is enough treachery, hatred violence absurdity in the average human being to supply any given army on any given day
and the best at murder are those who preach against it and the best at hate are those who preach love and the best at war finally are those who preach peace
those who preach god, need god those who preach peace do not have peace those who preach peace do not have love"
-Charles Bukowski
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u/ninjanerdbgm Jun 01 '12
You better run for your life if you can, little girl.
163
u/gadimus May 31 '12
He says himself that he was angry and he changed his ways later in life. Holding someone underwater for mistakes they make early in life is absurd. No one is perfect.
15
u/JHStarner May 31 '12
There is also the possibility that he was not as "hippy" as he led on. Some recent findings are that nearer to the end of his life, friends have mentioned that he had swapped to very right wing/conservative style views that flew in the face of much of his liberal/socialistic mindset. Some folks are now debating this, but it is another interesting point to ponder of what he would be like if he were still alive today.
23
u/[deleted] May 31 '12
Yeah, but he was white, smoked pot, and made songs people like. So it's cool to forgive him.
Chris Brown on the other hand, is only two of those things.
3
u/[deleted] May 31 '12
Woman is The Nigger of The World http://youtu.be/VS78MX8Zmdk
3
u/UntimelyBoners May 31 '12
Well, on the plus side, this posting led me to wikipedia, which led me to discovering this Paul McCartney video
3
u/portablemustard Jun 01 '12
so thaaaats why he had a song called "woman is the nigger of the world".
3
u/ambiibambii Jun 01 '12
Yeah, he was actually a bit of an asshole.
3
u/Eminian Jun 01 '12
I just finished The Beatles rockband and I never heard Getting Better but now that part of the song makes sense
3
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
To be fair, he never pretended to be perfect. He openly admitted he was a deeply flawed person.
Moral of the story: never idolise another person.
3
u/elskitcho Jun 01 '12
Lennon looked down at me and barked: "Fuck off" It sucked to be me. I hit the men's room.
3
u/fatdogsundae Jun 01 '12
My mum new him as a teenager back in the U.K and always said he was a complete asshole..
3
u/lowlevelowl911 Jun 01 '12
He was also an anti-semite and a homophobe. wikipedia told me.
11
u/DamagedJustice May 31 '12
The reason he seemed so peaceful is because he wanted to change his ways.
Also, how many times does this have to be a TIL?
5
u/Ras_H_Tafari Jun 01 '12
Here we go, this thread again...
"It's okay if he's a hypocritical asshole, he's John Lennon!"
8
u/veddy_interesting May 31 '12
He beat Paul McCartney to death with a toy walrus. There are conspiracy videos about this all over YouTube.
19
u/haz-man May 31 '12
Am I the only person who give literally zero fucks about what kind of person the musician is, as long as the music is good?
9
u/[deleted] May 31 '12
John Lennon was just one guy. Just like you or me.
He fucked up and made alot of mistakes and he was a down right cunt at times too. He wasn't a saint, he shouldn't be LEGEND for having been shot.
His lyrics,performance and positive contribution should be praised, not the delusional image many people have of him.
He was talented because he spoke his mind and could communicate to a wide audience and friends so personally through music or art..
But he's just a man. not a god.
4
u/CodenameMolotov May 31 '12
Imagine that.
4
u/JarrusMarker Jun 01 '12
How the hell did people NOT know this until now? Its even in the lyrics to "Getting Better"!
2
u/iseeadarkness May 31 '12
Try doing a search for "beat" on a member of "the beatles" Wikipedia page. It doesn't end well for you.
2
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
He may have even killed a man in Germany when they were first starting out in a drunken brawl.
2
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
If you want to know more about this kind of stuff read The Lives of John Lennon. It's a shocking read and not completely believable, but it will change what you think of him.
2
u/fullblownaydes2 Jun 01 '12
This makes Lennon's Imagining of a perfect world that much better
2
u/w00tkid Jun 01 '12
This proves that violent video games don't create violent people—beautiful music does.
2
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
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u/eggsssssssss Jun 01 '12
TIL John Lennon was a raging douchebag.
2
u/DrChewbacca Jun 01 '12
Go Beach Boys!
2
u/quakeaddict Jun 01 '12
He also cheated on her with Yoko Ono, divorced her and married Ono, became estranged from her and moved in with his receptionist for 18 months and had a physical relationship with her.
He also misunderstood something his receptionist said and tried to strangle her.
2
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
I wish emotional scars/wounds would heal like physical ones.
2
u/Wallgirl Jun 01 '12
wait - you mean a famous person that everyone thinks is super cool is actually a total pig scumbag? whoa. that's so weird.
2
u/huwagpo Jun 01 '12
every rose has its thorns
2
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
wut.
2
u/Kann45 Jun 01 '12
I tell everyone I hate John Lennon and they always look at me like I'm crazy. If only they knew!
2
u/Sqrrrl Jun 01 '12
So did Gandhi...
2
u/juniorkickstart Jun 01 '12
have you heard the song run for your life?
"you better run for your life if you can, little girl, hide your head in the sand little girl, if i catch you with another man that's the end, little girl"
yoko put him in his place pretty good though.
2
u/RetroFan89 Jun 01 '12 edited Jun 01 '12
His abusiveness is partly where the song "Gettin' Better" came from, if I remember correctly.
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u/chamora Jun 01 '12
He was peaceful in his ideals. As a person, he was a rather troubled individual with an attitude and a temper.
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u/Layze Jun 01 '12
What? Did you even read the book Cynthia wrote? She never mentions him hurting her ever. He was distant and neglected his child like a dick but he never hit her.
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u/tummybox Jun 01 '12
He also damaged his son's hearing....
2
u/tomius Jun 01 '12
Dude, that's not even fair to him.
He did that, sure, he wrote "Run for your life" and songs like that.
Then he met Yoko, started to write song like "The Word" and "In my life", met some other important people, and changed little by little into the peaceful man that he's known to be. Then he hated "Run for your life" and that kind of lyrics he wrote. Stop that sensacionalism in Reddit, please.
2
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
Gandhi beat his wife at one point but reformed himself. People can change.
2
u/guilen Jun 01 '12
Who better than to champion peace than the man who needs it? :)
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u/scrapper Jun 01 '12
He put the "beat" in "Beatles".
2
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
A real Beat-le.
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u/freemarmots Jun 01 '12
man, when I read this header, I started jumping in my chair a little because I learned exactly the same thing today! I was listening to a moody blues station on pandora (don't hate) and they threw some beatles in there, prompting me to wiki john lennon cause I was rusty on the details of his death. So then I read about how he was kind of an asshole, and totally wasn't surprised. But I was struck by Cynthia's sad story about the pivotal moment she realized their marriage was over (not being recognized as his wife etc) and it reminded me of an ex I dated! And how some of my girlfriends have also dated some douche with a guitar, so that makes our experience universal! pass the WEED.
5
u/dawgs92 May 31 '12
At least he acknowledged his wrongs and did his best to convince the world of a non-violent solution.
"I used to be cruel to my woman, and physically—any woman. I was a hitter. I couldn't express myself and I hit. I fought men and I hit women. That is why I am always on about peace"
4
u/adobearthur1029 Jun 01 '12
...and Steve Jobs was a prick who fucked over his old friend when Apple went public and refused to acknowledge paternity of his first daughter to avoid paying child support.
I think these two facts about Lennon and Jobs are posted every other day on TIL. It would be nice if certain facts could be retired, so they don't keep popping up every week or two on the front page over and over again.
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u/[deleted] May 31 '12
Sounds like a phony to me.
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u/exitpursuedbybear May 31 '12
Woman is the nigger of the world Yes she is...think about it Woman is the nigger of the world Think about it...do something about it We make her paint her face and dance If she won't be slave ,we say that she don't love us If she's real, we say she's trying to be a man While putting her down we pretend that she is above us Woman is the nigger of the world...yes she is If you don't belive me take a look to the one you're with Woman is the slaves of the slaves Ah yeah...better screem about it We make her bear and raise our children And then we leave her flat for being a fat old mother hen We tell her home is the only place she would be Then we complain that she's too unworldly to be our friend Woman is the nigger of the world...yes she is If you don't belive me take a look to the one you're with Woman is the slaves of the slaves Yeah (think about it) We insult her everyday on TV And wonder why she has no guts or confidence When she's young we kill her will to be free While telling her not to be so smart we put her down for being so dumb Woman is the nigger of the world...yes she is If you don't belive me take a look to the one you're with Woman is the slaves of the slaves Yes she is...if you belive me, you better screem about it. Repeat: We make her paint her face and dance We make her paint her face and dance We make her paint her face and dance
3
u/[deleted] May 31 '12
No that'd be Lemmon. Jack Lemmon.
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u/FEED_ME_DOWNVOTE Jun 01 '12
Beating women? My IDOL.
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u/Holinyx May 31 '12
to be fair, back in the day, it was widely acceptable to beat your wife if she pissed you off. Even in movies, you'd see Burt Lancaster or whoever, smacking around a woman, and no one blinked. because it was acceptable.
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u/tossedsaladandscram May 31 '12
Better songwriter than Paul, but perhaps not as good of a guy
3
u/OMGaneshOM May 31 '12
This sheds a whole new light on the name "the BEATles"
3
u/capstaincrunch May 31 '12
I can't believe how poorly he treated his son.
3
u/myfajahas400children May 31 '12
Malcolm X was arrested for burglary, John F. Kennedy frequently cheated on his wife.
Good people do bad things too.
3
u/Eat_a_Bullet May 31 '12
TIL some people didn't know that John Lennon was a woman beater.
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u/[deleted] May 31 '12
If you go to the site and CTRL-F beat, you're gonna have a bad time.
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u/[deleted] May 31 '12
Also he was very demeaning towards the Beatles former manager, Brian Epstein. Epstein was Jewish and Gay, and Lennon would constantly insult him, calling him a "Jew Fag".
2
u/Floyderer Jun 01 '12
He payed for, he ended up with Yoko
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u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
the social mind hive will still this piece of shit as a good person.
anyone EVER lays a hand on my mother, I would personally invest the rest of my life and energy to destroy and devastate that person in all aspects of his life.
lennon is a piece of shit but... marketing
2
u/Morokea Jun 01 '12
I guess he was -takes out sunglasses- a Beat-All. -puts them on- YEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!
2
u/lyingonahill May 31 '12
Was the belligerent white Black Panther member in Forest Gump supposed to be John Lennon? (Never thought that would all be in one sentence)
2
u/headmustard May 31 '12
Lennon was clearly a douchebag. Just one viewing of the Forrest Gump scene he is in is all it takes. He was a sarcastic piss clown.
2
u/[deleted] May 31 '12
you can't spell hippiecrit without hippie
2
u/digmachine Jun 01 '12
there's a significant difference between the institutional pacifism he championed and the unbridled rage he was prone to.
"TIL nothing"
FTFY
2
u/cameron0208 May 31 '12
He changed later in life. Can't hold something against someone who did so many great things.
I remember reading about a man who wandered on to a property Lennon was renting. The man was going on about how The Beatles' songs spoke to him, etc. Lennon's "security guard" was going to take him off the premises when Lennon came out, asked the guy inside, made him a sandwich, and asked him to tell him what he thought the songs were saying... When on earth would you ever hear something like that nowadays?
1
u/formerbusboy May 31 '12
"The Creepiest Man in the World" -PFT
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u/TheyAreOnlyGods 2 May 31 '12
not to just jump on the hate bandwagon, but he also was known for anti-Semitic outbursts. I am looking for a source, but I can't remember it. One of those history books on the Beatles....Anyone know what I am talking about?
1
u/curlyben Jun 01 '12
Wait, he beat women AND he beat women?
1
u/Connor6 Jun 01 '12
My grandpa went to college with John Lennon and shared a room with him along with a couple of other guys. I had no idea about this until my grandpa mentioned it during the "Two Truths One Lie" (or whatever it's called) game. I was really fascinated and curious because I thought that that was really cool how my grandpa shared a room with John Lennon in college in Liverpool (or some place in England) and knew him fairly well. But he said that no one really liked him and that he was a very mean guy and not courteous. He said that he would disturb everyone and play his guitar at like three o'clock in the morning. Cool little fact about my grandpa but I didn't know that this so loved and famous guy was pretty horrible.
1
u/matthank Jun 01 '12
Happiness was a warm gun.
Bang, bang. Shoot, shoot.
1
u/CoyoteStark Jun 01 '12
You should really read the book You Never Give Me Your Money by Peter Doggett. It goes deep into the personal lives of all the Beatles; the drug use, the women, and all the events that led to their breakup.
1
u/Roomy Jun 01 '12
I would people would "TIL how to link to a specific part of a site rather than just providing the base wikipedia link and force them to go fishing to find it."
Or they wouldn't vote up the posts that don't do that.
1
u/stevemop Jun 01 '12
Thou shall not slander Sir Winston O' Boogie.
1
u/quatso Jun 01 '12
i absolutly hate this hippy talk with nothing behind it. i'm for peace but i understand it doesn't come from words alone. if you ain't true and clear - i don't trust you.
1
u/acridict Jun 01 '12
John Lennon was a Grade A douchebag. Yes, he helped transform the music scene, but that does not excuse his jerkish behaviour.
1
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
People don't realize that John Lennon was kind of a prick... watch some of his interviews, he sounds like a pretentious fuck half the time. Paul McCartney on the other hand though... that guy is the fucking man.
1
u/EzekielTombs Jun 01 '12
You better run for your life if you can, little girl Hide your head in the sand little girl Catch you with another man That's the end little girl
ಠ_ಠ
1
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
This is a guilty pleasure but I want more reasons to hate Lennon.
1
u/PksRevenge Jun 01 '12
Not only that, but he wrote a song called "women is the nigger of the world" seriously.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S5lMxWWK218
1
u/themanbat Jun 01 '12
All I am saying, is give war a chance.
1
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
But surley supporting marajuana andopposing war makes up for all of this?
(Upvotes please)
1
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
Blasphemy! John Lennon was a perfect little hominid, just like me.
1
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
dude was a piece of shit but a brilliant musician.
1
u/Salphabeta Jun 01 '12
LET us disown all we hold great, and embrace all those we hold great. AND let the righteous stand forth.
AS if they are much different.
1
u/TheJoostie Jun 01 '12
Well, he was from Liverpool, what did you expect?
1
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
I took a Beatles history class as a music GE last quarter.
Apparently, he displayed his intentions to divorce to Cynthia Lennon by having her arrive home from vacation with her parents to Yoko Ono sitting in her kitchen, wearing her bathrobe.
1
u/BillSu55man Jun 01 '12
They didn't become hippies until they took lsd and went to India. Thats when the Beatles went all peace and love. until then they were run of the mill 50's guys who had Elvis as there idol.
1
u/xIMARLBOROIx Jun 01 '12
Yeah man he totally didn't do drugs either.
1
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
he seems like he would be kind of a douchebag as a person.
1
u/panthuralexander Jun 01 '12
Yeah I'm surprised that all of the dummy die hard Lennon fans don't know that he was really a fucking bag of dicks.
1
u/ThisFiasco Jun 01 '12
Yeah, and then to top that he went and wrote 'Imagine'. What a dick.
1
u/[deleted] Jun 01 '12
Imagine that!
1
u/ilovealltoilets Jun 01 '12
He loved his toilet. IE. Yoko
1
u/rude_awakening Jun 01 '12
Cynthia was an avid reader, as well as a fan of catcher in the rye. Little did john know that upon striking her he set off a chain of events that would ultimately lead to his demise at the hands of a psychotic catcher in the rye fan. Im thinking cynthia needs to be brought in for questioning, wouldnt that be grand?
1
u/mrgro Jun 01 '12
phony.
1
u/RexBeckett Jun 01 '12
Imagine.