Fans take their heroes and make them a part of their identity and so it becomes unbearable to ever really take in rumours of bad behaviour. We want them to remain perfect in order that we can telegraph or offload certain archetypes on to them: the truth teller, the champion, the maverick, the trickster. If we turn people into symbols and then create a fandom around them, we don’t have to take on those responsibilities ourselves. They become our spokesperson nominated to do this for us so we can carry on living our lives unperturbed.
