How can you talk about peace and love and have a family in bits and pieces - no communication, adultery, divorce? You can’t do it, not if you’re being true and honest with yourself.” In an interview, Julian did not confirm or deny abuse claims, but he called his father a “hypocrite,” stating, “ Dad could talk about peace and love out loud to the world but he could never show it to the people who supposedly meant the most to him: his wife and son.

John Lennon left his then-wife and son while Julian was very young, and he was never as close with his first son as he was with his second son Sean and second wife Yoko Ono. People have questioned whether the abuse extended to his son with Cynthia, Julian Lennon. I will have to be a lot older before I can face in public how I treated women as a youngster.” I am a violent man who has learned not to be violent and regrets his violence. I fought men and I hit women… But I sincerely believe in love and peace. I used to be cruel to my woman, and physically… any woman. All that ‘I used to be cruel to my woman, I beat her and kept her apart from the things that she loved’ was me.

In a Playboy interview in 1980, preceding the release of his last album, when discussing the song “Getting Better,” Lennon admitted to abusing his ex-wife Cynthia Lennon, seemingly without much thought. We love this man and we ignore his faults, but should we? Radio stations will start to blast “Happy Xmas (War is Over)” once the holiday season comes again, and many of us (myself included) always leave his music on, welcoming the familiar chords when they arrive on the radio or Spotify. On his birthday a month or so ago, Twitter and Facebook were full of people wishing him a posthumous happy birthday, asking their followers to not forget his words of hope.

This is the stance on Lennon that popular media takes, it seems. I knew only that I loved him, that he spoke to the young hippie inside of me with his preaching of peace and love. Back then, I had no idea of anything out of the ordinary about him. I have loved Lennon since before I can remember - the Beatles and his solo album, Imagine, were always being played around the house and on my tiny iPod when I was a kid. This has made me question my love of one such man: John Lennon. It feels as though every day, more abuse allegations are coming to light, accusing powerful men in Hollywood of doing horrible things to women.

John lennon and cynthia