stories of their lives and deeds spread to others. As time passed, these heroes achieved semi-divine and ultimately, in some instances, divine status.

It is our experiences with a person and ultimately our memories of them that give them life and, ultimately, immortality. It is how we react to them and to their works that create the hero, or villain that they ultimately become. In life we remember the ups and downs, but rarely the middle way - the day to day humdrum existence that is the majority of existence. When we watch a film, we don't want to know every little thing that a person does: despite the time it would take, it is boring. We know that our heroes get sick, eat food, stub their toe and so on but we don't need, or want, to know that as this will destroy the image of the hero that we build up and, in that destruction, we feel betrayed and lose something of ourselves.

The danger of putting anyone or anything on a pedestal is that they often cannot live up to our expectations. We all remember our first 'crush' whereby we ignore their failings

and problems until the bubble bursts and we see them as they truly are. We place these heroes that we create above us, making them semi-divine and hence making them beyond our reach. To find that they have human failings or foibles can create a backlash whereby love and adoration can turn to hate and derision. We see this often in relationship breakups where, when the love goes, the small things that have always been there but which have been glossed over or ignored because of the love, all of a sudden become grating and lead to a hatred. Nothing has changed except our view point.

When this hero is beyond the personal space and is hero to millions, the fall can be harder, just as the worship is higher. We find that fans will attack, sometimes brutally, any who don't follow their beliefs or ideas about the person they worship. They feel the need to defend them, no matter what they do, and will defend viciously. Then, if the self-same fan is disappointed, they will turn on the object of their idolatry with the same level - or increased level of hatred and disdain.

This is the price of immortality, this is the price of hero