The Fallacy of Tainted Origins

 I coined this phrase this morning.  The idea is that we shouldn't dismiss something because it is associated with something unsavory in the past.  

Since I like questioning myself, I thought that maybe it isn't a fallacy at all. We should read contextually, and see that some things are open to our judgment. When reading Utopia,  I should think that its author went on to burn people at the stake. I shouldn't not read it, but I should at least know that. 

I can't say, well, in those days, they didn't know it was wrong to burn people alive because of religious differences. 

Or let's say that Lutheranism is tainted because Luther was a rabid anti-semite. We could say that Lutheran should should cancel themselves. Without excusing Luther in the least, let's say that contemporary Lutherans don't need to cancel themselves, because most of them don't share this prejudice, I would hope. 

Since I don't tend to put people on the pedestal in the first place, it doesn't bother me to see flaws, even very severe ones, in people I admire for other things. The problem is that if you throw out all the flawed people, you won't have any left at all.