Don Draper the Real-Anti-Hero

For those who watch the show Mad Men or know much about it, this will make sense - for those who don't, get on it because you're missing it.
Don Draper is tragic man. But he is certainly not the most tragic in the entire series thus far. Don transforms dramatically throughout the series. Good writing offers him a strike of reality and humanity. He is something is rare in media and even more so in television, a human being. Needless to say, all the characters on the show are well crafted and very vivd. But as Don is the center of the show, he receives a lot of flack. For a number of popular qualms - he is sexist (sorta), he promotes promiscuity, he is a liar, and he promotes the hyper-masculine male.
For the most part I entirely agree with all of those statements. Absolutely, he is a terrible husband and is overall a very bad person. He lies - constantly. He is certainly sexist in the way he treats women and is a handsome devil. Don Draper fits the era he lives in. He is real and develops as a real person. Don, the anti-hero, you accept. You accept these problems and faults of his. The show does nothing to hide or disguise it. The idea that the show promotes Don as the ideal male is skewed and not looking through the right lens.
The correct lens is that it, the entire series, is a story. A story has characters, good and bad - villains and heros. And because the show is well crafted, well written, these characters  Don - are very real. No one person is all hero. No one person is all villainous (well for the most part). These stereotypical troupes are not real and do not carry the same weight as the anti-hero and a deeply layered persona. Man, in the universal sense, is a paradox and to ignore this in art and storytelling is cheap and easy.
Don Draper is formed out of real people. He is the character written out of real lives and thus is very complex. Full of problems and faults - it is poor judgment to criticize a show or character because of what they do is bad or 'wrong' to one's accepted morals.