"I fail to see why people get so passionately indignant whenever he is criticized."

It's probably because MacColl wasn't just a great singer - he was also an original thinker and a teacher. A lot of us in the UK were inspired by his singing and by his ideas. It's hard to explain without getting all hagiographic. These days musical 'stars' are rather remote figures who are 'worshipped' from afar. But MacColl and Seeger regularly toured the folk clubs and were usually very accessible. They also ran workshops for aspiring singers which were inspirational.

Those of us who seek to protect MacColl's reputation are not doing so because we are 'anti-criticism' (he taught to be critical and we know and accept that he wasn't infallible). Nevertheless, there is a highly vociferous group within the UK folk scene who hate and despise everything that MacColl stood for and even now, nearly 22 years after his death, are still trying to destroy his reputation. They do this by sniping and carping. They think that if they keep pulling out threads they will eventually destroy the magnificent tapestry which is MacColl's lifetime achievement.