History is saturated with characters who have played a pivotal role in influencing the development of mankind.
But what about influential characters who also affected mankind, even though they never existed?
Indeed, how is it possible for fictional people to effect any changes in human thinking or behavior?
We set our Life Daily team the task of finding characters who have done exactly that.
This is our list of characters who have been influential– even though they never lived:
1. Santa Claus
It is truly ironic that the most popularly recognized symbols relating to Christianity – apart, of course, from the Cross – are the Christmas tree, and Santa Claus. The irony is that both have their origins in legend and folklore, which include elements of Norse and Germanic Legend, and Paganism.
Modern Santa is the easily identifiable portly, joyous, white-bearded figure in a red coat and hat, who lives at North Pole, brings gifts for “good” children, and says “ho ho ho” rather a lot! Whether the overall message conveyed by Santa, and the values ascribed to him, are a good thing is a moot point.
Perhaps the most disturbing statistic relates to the number of people who believe that Santa was present at the birth of Jesus (12 percent), and that Christmas trees are mentioned in the Bible (7 percent)!
2. Barbie
When Barbie was introduced to the market in 1959, she represented just a cute little doll who changed clothes rather frequently.
Since then, Barbie has progressed from a pretty young woman, and role model for innocence, to something close to the appearance of a hooker. Was this a case of Barbie influencing children, or children influencing Barbie?
Certainly, Barbie has depicted almost every possible female lifestyle choice, and she has been at the beginning of the paths that many women have taken in life.
3. Robin Hood
There is controversy as to whether Robin Hood was real, or simply a popular figure of British folklore. However, the legend has persisted over the centuries since Medieval times, and now with numerous depictions in movies.
Somehow, it’s difficult to think of Errol Flynn’s Robin as a thief and crook – but what else was he? The fact that his philosophy of, supposedly, stealing from the rich to give to the poor has found it’s way into modern Socialist politics is no justification.
But it is an alluring concept (assuming you’re not “rich”), and has been used to explain away theft in many of it’s forms. Think “Taxes.”
There is good reason to believe that the majority of people accept taxes because of their prior belief in the false morality of the Robin Hood story.
4. Marlboro Man
He is included in this list not because the image he portrayed of the All-American Macho Cowboy was indirectly responsible for millions of people suffering and dying from cancer and lung diseases, but because he made filter cigarettes acceptable.
Before the Marlboro Man campaign, “real men” didn’t smoke cigarettes with filters – they were for women. The aim of the Marlboro Man campaign was to get men to smoke filtered Marlboro cigarettes – its success is abundantly clear today.
By facilitating the comfort factor of sucking toxic smoke into the lungs, more people were condemned a long and painful death.
Truly influential!
5. Big Brother
When George Orwell created the character of the omnipresent character of “Big Brother” in his novel “1984″, did he ever think that his fantasy could become reality?
The words “Big Brother” are used each time a government passes a restrictive law which appears to remove aspects of our basic freedoms. Everyone knows what those two words stand for, and everyone is terrified that our lives are slowly being governed by our own version of the fictional character.
Think CCTV surveilance, intrusion into emails, social media, websites, and internet accounts.
6. Romeo and Juliet
These two names, when used together, are regarded as the epitome of romantic love – provided you don’t pay to much attention to how the story actually ends, (with both of them dead).
Rather than helping the course of true love, the relationship of Romeo and Juliet – for most of Shakespeare’s play – is probably responsible in our modern society for the high percentage of divorces.
Couples frequently get married on the basis of a relationship full of passion and romance. When that phase passes, as it inevitably does, they feel cheated and consider the marriage has failed. Other elements are required, like respect, love, and friendship. The Romeo and Juliet effect is simply the wrong sort of influence.
7. Uncle Tom
Uncle Tom is the title character of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s 1852 novel, “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” Although this was probably not the intention, the phrase “Uncle Tom” has become an epithet for a person who is slavish and excessively subservient to perceived authority.
It is applied, particularly to a black person acting in a subservient manner to white people. The negative interpretation does not come from the original novel, but is the result of later works derived from it.
8. The Good Samaritan
The parable of the Good Samaritan is told by Jesus in one of the gospels of the New Testament. In modern parlance, the colloquial phrase “Good Samaritan” means someone who voluntarily helps a stranger in difficulty or distress.
Considering the multitudinous examples of the negative effects of religion on the history of mankind, this example stands out because of its humanity. Its relative uniqueness is probably the reason it is quoted so often, and hence why it is in our list.
9. Walter Mitty
He is a fictional character featured in James Thurber’s short story “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty,” published in 1939.
Mitty is a meek and mild man but with a vivid fantasy life, such as wartime pilot, emergency-room surgeon, and devil-may-care killer. The name “Walter Mitty” has come to personify an ineffectual dreamer.
The sad fact is that, even in his heroic daydreams, Mitty does not triumph. Well-meaning but insensitive strangers inadvertently rob Mitty of his dignity.
So now you can understand that there are Influential characters who never existed, but who still managed to affect our lives.
Were you ever affected by any of them? Do you know of others we could have included?
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