As regular readers of the site know, I’m a huge Beatles fan. I’ve written semi-obsessive posts about their bootlegs, I defended them with my criticism of the ridiculously overrated Grey Album, and even praised their bizarre Christmas records. So it’s with a heavy heart that I’ve got to make this statement :

The martyrdom of John Lennon must stop.

Seriously guys, it’s just embarrassing to watch. Every year around this time we’re faced with the spectacle of people tearfully quoting Imagine and praising Lennon’s “humanity”. Don’t get me wrong, his death was extremely tragic, but he was a musician, not a messiah. Still, the lessons of Lennon’s work have sugar-coated the man to the point that any unpleasantness is somehow a taint on his legacy. Case in point :

Former Beatle John Lennon was the master of the peacenik anthem, exhorting listeners to live in harmony and give peace a chance. He also asked us to imagine a world without possessions.

Yet the bickering among family and fans over his legacy is as loud as ever, as record releases, autobiographies and commentaries jostle for attention ahead of the 25th anniversary of his murder on Thursday.

In recent months the musical “Lennon,” endorsed by his widow Yoko Ono, flopped on Broadway and an autobiography by his first wife Cynthia described how he once hit her out of jealousy and how his use of the LSD drug destroyed their marriage.

Ono made a barbed comment about Lennon’s former songwriting partner Paul McCartney at a British awards ceremony in October, suggesting that their infamous feud rumbles on, although she did later apologize.

“It’s a pity that the people who loved John can’t love each other,” said Richard Porter of the British Beatles Fan Club, adding that he believed Lennon would have been uncomfortable with the way his image had been manipulated since his death.

Thank you, professional Beatles fan. Lennon’s two wives and musical partner wouldn’t know what John Lennon would have really wanted. For that, you’d have to consult someone who has a first-state mono version of the Butcher Cover.

Now I know I’m not the first person to point this out, but John Lennon was a wife-beating, substance-abusing, deadbeat dad. He smacked around his first wife, he abandoned his first son, and he had a serious drug problem that took him from pill-popping to hallucinogens to heroin to booze. In the early 70’s when his marriage was getting rocky, he ran off with his wife’s assistant to L.A. to get loaded every night and start the occasional bar fight. I’m not saying this to denigrate the man, but to point out that he was just a flawed human being like the rest of us.

But to Lennon acolytes, his humanity is paradoxically used as an excuse to put him on a higher pedestal, to the eternal denigration of everyone around him who doesn’t support the Lennon-as-spiritual-guru myth. The rest of the Beatles and Ono in particular have faced the wrath of Lennon fans for even suggesting that Lennon was less than perfect. McCartney is seen as a cheesy asshole who’s jealous of John’s genius and Ono is the money-obsessed dragon lady who never really loved John. I suppose zealotry doesn’t leave much room in your brain for the idea that these are all complex people with complicated relationships.

Nope, John Lennon is a “man of peace”. End of story. Nevermind the fact that the whole point of one of his most-quoted songs, God, was that people should drop their bullshit idolatry and start beliving in themselves. If you’re gonna do that, though, the first step is figuring out a way to define yourself that isn’t based on the lyrics of a dead celebrity.

Then again, it’s been two thousand years and we’re still trying to get people to realize that Jesus cared about the poor. The fanaticism is the most important part. The rest will take care of itself, I suppose.