" it’s moronic to judge historical figures using a modern frame of reference"
That +10000
When Wagner lived pretty much everyone was misogynist or racist or antisemit , or actually all 3 of them + some (un)healty serving of nationalism , judged by today's standard.
Earlier than that everyone married teenagers that possible also was their cousins .
Can we listen to male artist that lived before there where any proper acceptance for women's rights ?
I have to add that with idol worshiping comes unrealistic expectations ? they ar just as stupid as the next guy/gal or you and me
and of course at the mercy of their times wims and fads and misguided beliefs , like we are.
People ask celebrities of all kinds of opinions on topics that's clearly outside their professional scope and listen to them. So much that we use them in ads for any products or spokes person for diverse movements . Soccer players in car ads ? Actors peddling religions ?
What do we expect of some partying young men in the 70's that suddenly fills arenas and sell millions of records ? like AC/DC or Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath ? I would listen to the records and possibly maybe if they insisted hear what they have to say
today.
Like myself being and very subjektivist audiophile earlier in life, you can probably search forums and showe idiotic things i wrote in the past in my face and let me eat that forever.
Very few people can be judged by todays standard backwards in time and come out clean and i'ts basically just a coin flip who they are.
Heck I'm getting old a sad part of cancel culture will be the we would have to live trough the indignities of being judged by what we said and did decades ago
before we die . So it's being a sin to actually been alive before (pol pot and khmer rouge thought so restarting the count of time with year zero and basically tried to erase everything that not fitted their ideology)