The case I'm trying to make is one in favor of restorative justice -- this means identifying the harms caused by an act, and seeking accountability by addressing the harms, and encouraging perpetrators to experience growth and personal transformation through empathy and understanding. I am not trying to say that the offenses are small, and people are wrong to be outraged and seek accountability for misdeeds -- in this specific case over James Gunn's actually terrible and seriously tasteless jokes. I'm just trying to make the case that as a society, seeking a pound of flesh or knocking over a statue every time someone's mistake comes to light is not an efficient methodology.
While I believe the value we [0] ascribe to people, their acts, artifacts of their work was predicated on untold assumptions about their motivations, feelings, character etc. in the first place. New unexpected negative information simply ruins that value. It's not about the action itself.
It's just like many can't ever forgive betrayal even if it seems minor in terms of actions.
[0] or enough of us
I don't know enough about Gandhi to have an opinion. Growing up I just knew he was this great ego-less person who fought non-violently against racism and won. Having read some of the negative stuff I simply felt like I was duped into a false narrative. If everybody had this information in the first place perhaps he'd never come to attain this iconic status.