Just some thoughts on one of the 20th Century's "good people." It's easy to come up with a list of really awful 20th Century "bad people," because there were so many of them. I don't want to name names. Why not focus on the positive things concerning John Lennon's life today? Let's celebrate that.
To begin with, John Lennon was well ahead of his time in his attitude towards women. Upon marrying Yoko Ono, he inserted Ono within his name as a gesture towards equality. He became John Ono Lennon. This is evidence of his signature creativity in addressing serious issues.
He really did give away all his clothes to charity as mentioned in the song, "The Ballad of John and Yoko." He went through his racks, and ended up donating all his threads to charity sometime in 1969. His whole hippie/mod/Edwardian wardrobe fetches thousands per item at auction in these days of rabid fan collecting by wealthy millionaires around the world. I stood across from his Sargent Pepper's silk jacket at the John Lennon Museum in Saitama, Japan, and it was a marvelous experience.
I like John Lennon best for this reason: He was one of the most gifted song writers in the short form pop song. I sometimes think that if there had never been the Beatles, John would have wound up writing advertising jingles that would have sold millions of products to consumers in England. He kept his message, short, simple, and dynamic in his song craft. Instead, he used his considerable skills to sell a product that is intangible, costs nothing, and makes life worth living. John Lennon successfully marketed peace, love, and understanding. These are our core progressive values, and he helped define and articulate them. All the fame, prestige, and wealth accorded to Lennon were a mere byproduct of his central message.
Now, you can slam him for his trending toward the messianic in some of his statements, but what are you going to do when you're that far ahead of the curve, and more deeply in touch with a creative font like that? I think he took a look around, and felt isolated in his genius, and looked to the religious and political lives of others to find that he shared a lot of the same qualities with the world's greats. He can be forgiven that I think. He was very much like you and me. He was very human.