politics in comics

[gurkle]

Ann Nocenti can sometimes be heavy-handed, but in her 80s/90s prime I thought she was one of the better superhero writers at working political/social issues into her comics, because she didn't make every character parrot her own view, and treated other views with respect. One example of this is a "Classic X-Men" story where a young Hellfire Club employee criticizes the skimpy, objectifying outfits, and Emma Frost makes this huge pages-long speech about why wearing skimpy outfits is actually an empowering act. You can tell it's not a point of view the writer agrees with, but it doesn't straw-man Emma, it allows her to make the best possible defense.

Many writers, when they deal with controversial issues, have a habit of straw-manning, for a lot of reasons: maybe they can't empathize with those who hold abhorrent views, maybe they're afraid they'll get in trouble if they make bad views seem too sympathetic, etc. But the alternative is just having one view be completely right and another be obviously wrong, and that's boring.

[Huntsman Spider]

The way he keeps using police corruption to deflect from the choice to have Matt continue to run free after having killed someone and have the other superheroes defend Matt when.

Two particularly disgusting scenes are -

1) Spider-Man giving an entire speech to Cole North about how superheroes should be above the law because they have super powers and "there's no rule book". Never mind the lack of a rule book is Marvel's own choice. You could be forgiven for reading this scene and wandering if Otto Octavius is running around in Peter's body again.

2) The conversation Matt and Cole have in a diner after Matt has saved him. Cole talks about an incident in Chicago where he accidentally shot a kid thinking he was a drug dealer with a gun. Matt, a white guy, tells Cole, a black guy, that Cole would have never gone to jail because Cole is a cop, apparently ignoring the times black cops have indeed gone to jail.

Even beyond that, the way audiences have swallowed up this argument genuinely revolts and frightens me. We have people calling Cole naive for wanting to bring Matt to justice and actually agreeing with Peter that superheroes should be above the law because of their powers. Apparently, that argument is only terrifying when it's coming from super villains.

I can agree with most of what you're saying, and it would definitely be frightening in a real-world context where we cannot know for sure that superpowered beings would be genuinely benevolent or protective toward "mere mortals." In the real world, we might get something a lot closer to deconstructions like The Boys or The Authority, where so-called superheroes exercise their powers with no sense of responsibility to the populace they "protect" and may very well be out for themselves and their own gain.

That being said, the one sticking point in this is that the Kingpin is currently Mayor of New York and thus effectively owns the NYPD, controls New York's criminal justice system, and would most likely use any public trial of Matt Murdock as an exercise to completely humiliate and discredit him, assuming he didn't just have Matt killed before he ever made it to trial for fear of Matt exposing his own, even greater crimes. The superheroes like Spider-Man aren't closing ranks to protect Matt from accountability, but to protect him from being taken out by someone who's an even bigger and worse criminal on his best day than Matt on his worst, and has been known as a criminal for years, even if he's managed to game a transparently corrupt system and people's sheer cynicism and apathy about said system to his advantage. Everyone knows who Fisk is and what he's done, but as long as he has wealth and connections and "respectability" on his side, he can get away with just about all of it, and nobody in their right mind should trust that system with him at its head or center to be run justly or fairly. That's the argument, and while I can admit it would hold a lot less water, if any, with a good, honest mayor in charge of New York as opposed to the allegedly "former" Kingpin of Crime, that's the reality we're stuck in for now.

I'm not against politics in comics, as long it's a well written story and put reader into a position to thing. My main issue is that very few writers have a solid, political view and even more, a worldly view. Also, many times, we have seen characters losing their personality traits, in order to fit the political message of the writer(like Iron Man or Mr Fantastic in Civil War).

Definitely. At least the MCU's Civil War had a better reason for Iron Man siding with what was effectively superhero registration and explicitly stated that it only applied to those who chose to put on costumes and fight crime/terrorism with their powers, not to mention that Iron Man wasn't a participant in the worst actions taken against Captain America's side, even if he still was a major hypocrite for getting an underaged Peter Parker involved as an asset and concealing his identity despite aiming towards ensuring accountability for superheroes.

Ann Nocenti can sometimes be heavy-handed, but in her 80s/90s prime I thought she was one of the better superhero writers at working political/social issues into her comics, because she didn't make every character parrot her own view, and treated other views with respect. One example of this is a "Classic X-Men" story where a young Hellfire Club employee criticizes the skimpy, objectifying outfits, and Emma Frost makes this huge pages-long speech about why wearing skimpy outfits is actually an empowering act. You can tell it's not a point of view the writer agrees with, but it doesn't straw-man Emma, it allows her to make the best possible defense.

Many writers, when they deal with controversial issues, have a habit of straw-manning, for a lot of reasons: maybe they can't empathize with those who hold abhorrent views, maybe they're afraid they'll get in trouble if they make bad views seem too sympathetic, etc. But the alternative is just having one view be completely right and another be obviously wrong, and that's boring.

Actually a pretty solid point there. Strawmen just undercut your argument and message, whatever it is.

[Chris0013]

I would prefer they kept politics out of it...but if they are going to have it to present both sides in an even handed manner.

If you are going to do your gun control story...don't leave out the other side...all the people who use a gun in self defense every year.

If you are going to tell the story of illegal immigrants hope for a better life don't leave out the sex trafficking or the violent criminals who come as well.

[Ascended]

That's more a case of an issue or idea being politicized rather than the story being political.

That's (part of) my point. We're not going to avoid the politics because everything is political now.

Which is on the whole quite overblown and childish. Superman's New Deal flirtation with politics was interesting for its time but largely shallow and simplistic.

Of course it was, it was written by a couple 19 year old kids. The entire genre was shallow and simple (and largely still is, let's be honest) and its approach to politics and social issues were no different.

Heroin addiction is more of a social issue than a political one.

Not in a country that waged a failed War on Drugs. In America, it's both social and political. As most things are now.

Largely filtered through highly generational angst and feelings. Early Marvel in terms of politics was fairly centrist and wishy-washy.

Very true, but still full of socio-political commentary. I'm not saying it's always been done well because gods know it hasn't, but politics and social commentary have always been in the mix.

[Ascended]

Agreed. Peter David wrote that issue of 90s Supergirl you were referencing, right? With Linda Danvers/Matrix, who eventually became some kind of angel?

That's the one. Had Steel guest star. Fantastic issue.

Going back to Marvel, Spider-Man stories have tackled a wide swath of real-world issues such as adolescent social alienation, bullying, drug abuse, child and spousal abuse, corruption and/or bias in news media, homelessness, elder rights, mental illness, exploitation and abuse of women in entertainment media, corporate/political corruption, and more.

Adding to all that, what were two of the biggest issues of Spider-Man in the last twenty years? The 9/11 issue and the Obama issue. And maybe calling those out is cheating because those were moments that really went beyond the political and impacted America in very deep ways, but still.

[skyvolt2000]

I would prefer they kept politics out of it...but if they are going to have it to present both sides in an even handed manner.

If you are going to do your gun control story...don't leave out the other side...all the people who use a gun in self defense every year.

If you are going to tell the story of illegal immigrants hope for a better life don't leave out the sex trafficking or the violent criminals who come as well.

The issue is will your editor allow that?

And in most cases those topics are covered to a point.

I would fire back on illegals-tell the TRUTH about why you really can't get rid of them. What about all those laws that give them rights? Or how much money they put into public schools?
Nobody wants to talk about the law that says if a child comes to your school-you HAVE to take them-illegal or not. Once you do that that child is linked to your school district funding.
If half the kids in my school district were illegal and removed that is 10K per kid. We have 160,000 students. That would wipe out more than half of the 350 schools we have.
Also who are hiring these folks? They won't stay if no one hires them.

Also the issue is blaming ALL that sex trafficking & criminal acts on illegals. Acting like Americans don't do it.

Also you have to look at what does one lose discussing both sides? When was the last time you saw a black show/movie discuss black on black violence?
We can get a story of Trayvon Martin.
We can't get one on Derrion Albert.

[Electricmastro]

Ann Nocenti can sometimes be heavy-handed, but in her 80s/90s prime I thought she was one of the better superhero writers at working political/social issues into her comics, because she didn't make every character parrot her own view, and treated other views with respect. One example of this is a "Classic X-Men" story where a young Hellfire Club employee criticizes the skimpy, objectifying outfits, and Emma Frost makes this huge pages-long speech about why wearing skimpy outfits is actually an empowering act. You can tell it's not a point of view the writer agrees with, but it doesn't straw-man Emma, it allows her to make the best possible defense.

Many writers, when they deal with controversial issues, have a habit of straw-manning, for a lot of reasons: maybe they can't empathize with those who hold abhorrent views, maybe they're afraid they'll get in trouble if they make bad views seem too sympathetic, etc. But the alternative is just having one view be completely right and another be obviously wrong, and that's boring.

Yeah, if a writer is going to present two political/social views, then I suppose the least the writer could do is write the story with as much solid evidence, context, and critical analysis as possible so as to better understand how a government is presiding over a country and such and the complexities and solutions that can be involved, otherwise it's practically a call to arms against the view considered to be objectively abhorrent. I've been coming to realize how easy it is to vilify a side that so much as makes one the least bit uncomfortable, and strawman them out of reactionary emotion as opposed to constructively and critically analyzed evidence. Seeing as how complex situations involve politics and social issues can get, the process of finding a solution probably becomes better when the latter is used as opposed to strawmanning, which can throw a wrench into the complex system of gears and make the situation messier. I imagine comic writers tend to go for something like shock than something like nuance, seeing as comics are meant to entertain and be bought in the capitalistic society we live in, but I think there's definitely a good place for something that lends itself to more contemplative, thought-provoking material so as to better understand the world around us overall.

[Huntsman Spider]

That's the one. Had Steel guest star. Fantastic issue.



Adding to all that, what were two of the biggest issues of Spider-Man in the last twenty years? The 9/11 issue and the Obama issue. And maybe calling those out is cheating because those were moments that really went beyond the political and impacted America in very deep ways, but still.

Fair enough, and like Revolutionary_Jack commented, "Doomed Affairs," which followed the 9/11 issue in JMS's Spider-Man run, had Spider-Man forced to protect Doctor Doom from some revolutionary assassins . . . who didn't mind causing collateral damage and innocent casualties in the name of getting rid of Doom and freeing Latveria from his rule. Given their disregard for innocent people caught in the crossfire, would they or whoever they wanted in charge be any better for Latveria than Doom? Still, even as Spider-Man saves Doom's life, with Doom offering Spider-Man a favor in gratitude, Spidey makes it clear that just because he doesn't want Doom dead, doesn't mean he doesn't want him arrested, tried, convicted, and sentenced in the Hague for all the human rights violations he's doubtlessly racked up in securing his grip on Latveria. That was also a political story in JMS's Spider-Man, albeit through the lens of a reluctant superhero/supervillain team-up, a relatively conventional type of superhero story.

The issue is will your editor allow that?

And in most cases those topics are covered to a point.

I would fire back on illegals-tell the TRUTH about why you really can't get rid of them. What about all those laws that give them rights? Or how much money they put into public schools?
Nobody wants to talk about the law that says if a child comes to your school-you HAVE to take them-illegal or not. Once you do that that child is linked to your school district funding.
If half the kids in my school district were illegal and removed that is 10K per kid. We have 160,000 students. That would wipe out more than half of the 350 schools we have.
Also who are hiring these folks? They won't stay if no one hires them.

Also the issue is blaming ALL that sex trafficking & criminal acts on illegals. Acting like Americans don't do it.

Also you have to look at what does one lose discussing both sides? When was the last time you saw a black show/movie discuss black on black violence?
We can get a story of Trayvon Martin.
We can't get one on Derrion Albert.

Solid point, though I would say on the fronts of illegal/undocumented immigration, human trafficking, and other forms of criminality, there are indeed Americans somewhere in that chain of crime/illegality turning a buck off exploiting desperate people with no other recourse or resources, so that should be addressed as well, if the point is to represent the issue as fairly and comprehensively as possible.

Yeah, if a writer is going to present two political/social views, then I suppose the least the writer could do is write the story with as much solid evidence, context, and critical analysis as possible so as to better understand how a government is presiding over a country and such and the complexities and solutions that can be involved, otherwise it's practically a call to arms against the view considered to be objectively abhorrent. I've been coming to realize how easy it is to vilify a side that so much as makes one the least bit uncomfortable, and strawman them out of reactionary emotion as opposed to constructively and critically analyzing evidence. Seeing as how complex situations involve politics and social issues can get, the process of finding a solution probably becomes better when the latter is used as opposed to strawmanning, which can throw a wrench into the complex system of gears and make the situation messier. I imagine comic writers tend to go for something like shock than something like nuance, seeing as comics are meant to entertain and be bought in the capitalistic society we live in, but I think there's definitely a good place for something that lends itself to more contemplative, thought-provoking material so as to better understand the world around us overall.

I would definitely agree on that, especially the last part.

[Chris0013]

Solid point, though I would say on the fronts of illegal/undocumented immigration, human trafficking, and other forms of criminality, there are indeed Americans somewhere in that chain of crime/illegality turning a buck off exploiting desperate people with no other recourse or resources, so that should be addressed as well, if the point is to represent the issue as fairly and comprehensively as possible.

And back to my original point...explore all aspects of it.

[Huntsman Spider]

And back to my original point...explore all aspects of it.

Fair enough.

[jackolover]

The argument made by Watchmen is that superhero stories cannot be political and continue telling superhero stories or being about superheroes.

IF you were to do a truly political story about IRON MAN it would involve a lot of bits of him lobbying to ensure policies that harm or affect his company aren't passed, it would involve him making deals with China or Bangladesh or other countries to outsource manufacturing and so on. Likewise, if you deal with Tony automating his labor process and doing it home, you are going to have to deal with him laying off workers from manufacturing jobs.

Tony Stark is based these days on Silicon Valley types and those are the real-world issues that involve them.

Almost any hero if you apply real politics to them and their story would fall apart and no longer function.

I think superhero stories can work as entertainment and social commentary but in terms of actual political insight or critique, the genre just isn't built for it.

I’m less concerned with the impact of the real world dealing with superheroes, because in the MU in those early days of Lee/Kirby/Ditko, society embraced their tradition because the superheroes provided a service, so society turned a blind eye to how they operate outside the law, and practically any part of how they operate, because of it. That’s why I think in the MU superheroes can operate with impunity. Deep down, society knows they have to embrace the masks because society would be nakedly at risk without them. I tend not to think about applying the same rules to superheroes as we have to to the real world.

[Agent Z]

I can agree with most of what you're saying, and it would definitely be frightening in a real-world context where we cannot know for sure that superpowered beings would be genuinely benevolent or protective toward "mere mortals." In the real world, we might get something a lot closer to deconstructions like The Boys or The Authority, where so-called superheroes exercise their powers with no sense of responsibility to the populace they "protect" and may very well be out for themselves and their own gain.

That being said, the one sticking point in this is that the Kingpin is currently Mayor of New York and thus effectively owns the NYPD, controls New York's criminal justice system, and would most likely use any public trial of Matt Murdock as an exercise to completely humiliate and discredit him, assuming he didn't just have Matt killed before he ever made it to trial for fear of Matt exposing his own, even greater crimes. The superheroes like Spider-Man aren't closing ranks to protect Matt from accountability, but to protect him from being taken out by someone who's an even bigger and worse criminal on his best day than Matt on his worst, and has been known as a criminal for years, even if he's managed to game a transparently corrupt system and people's sheer cynicism and apathy about said system to his advantage. Everyone knows who Fisk is and what he's done, but as long as he has wealth and connections and "respectability" on his side, he can get away with just about all of it, and nobody in their right mind should trust that system with him at its head or center to be run justly or fairly. That's the argument, and while I can admit it would hold a lot less water, if any, with a good, honest mayor in charge of New York as opposed to the allegedly "former" Kingpin of Crime, that's the reality we're stuck in for now.

The question that I have at the back of my mind is this - if these mitigating factors weren't in play, if Fisk weren't the mayor, would Matt turn himself in? Would the other heroes still protect him? Because this is not the first instance of superheroes letting one of their own get away with a crime. And this story line pretty much means Peter and Matt can't get on Frank Castle's case without coming off like hypocrites.

[phonogram12]

I honestly do think Matt would turn himself in if Fisk weren't the mayor. Prior to this, Matt believed in the letter of the law. Now that he sees how it can be manipulated by a man like Fisk, he realizes that just because something is the law that doesn't make it just (especially if this current case he's working on leads all the way up to the governor).

As for Castle, well, I do think there's an ocean's wide difference between accidentally killing someone and doing everything you can never to do it again and willfully murdering people at the drop of the time.

[Huntsman Spider]

The question that I have at the back of my mind is this - if these mitigating factors weren't in play, if Fisk weren't the mayor, would Matt turn himself in? Would the other heroes still protect him? Because this is not the first instance of superheroes letting one of their own get away with a crime. And this story line pretty much means Peter and Matt can't get on Frank Castle's case without coming off like hypocrites.

I honestly do think Matt would turn himself in if Fisk weren't the mayor. Prior to this, Matt believed in the letter of the law. Now that he sees how it can be manipulated by a man like Fisk, he realizes that just because something is the law that doesn't make it just (especially if this current case he's working on leads all the way up to the governor).

As for Castle, well, I do think there's an ocean's wide difference between accidentally killing someone and doing everything you can never to do it again and willfully murdering people at the drop of the time.

I can definitely see both your points, and as for Agent Z's point about "superheroes" repeatedly letting their own get away with things that they would've come down hard on the actual "supervillains" for, that could definitely be aimed at the likes of the Avengers and the X-Men. The X-Men at least have the excuse, such as it is, that the justice system is irrevocably biased against them for being mutants feared and loathed by the vast majority of human society and thus would never grant them a fair hearing or trial (aside from when Magneto went on trial in Chris Claremont's Uncanny X-Men #200, but still). The Avengers, on the other hand, have a number of members --- founders included --- who, in a setting that at least pretended to abide by real-world criminal law, would have been put in jail or tied up in litigation for years on account of (some of) the things they've done in the past and yet they're still recognized, if not trusted and respected, as Earth's Mightiest Heroes.

[Electricmastro]

I can definitely see both your points, and as for Agent Z's point about "superheroes" repeatedly letting their own get away with things that they would've come down hard on the actual "supervillains" for, that could definitely be aimed at the likes of the Avengers and the X-Men. The X-Men at least have the excuse, such as it is, that the justice system is irrevocably biased against them for being mutants feared and loathed by the vast majority of human society and thus would never grant them a fair hearing or trial (aside from when Magneto went on trial in Chris Claremont's Uncanny X-Men #200, but still). The Avengers, on the other hand, have a number of members --- founders included --- who, in a setting that at least pretended to abide by real-world criminal law, would have been put in jail or tied up in litigation for years on account of (some of) the things they've done in the past and yet they're still recognized, if not trusted and respected, as Earth's Mightiest Heroes.

I guess the later writers fell short of writing trials fairly like Claremont did with Magneto, like you mentioned, and perhaps further made interesting with how a number of the Avengers have been mutants, which hasn’t always been met with hospitality as evidenced when the Beast or Firestar joined the Avengers.

Case in short, if the justice system seems irrevocable on Earth 616, then perhaps no one should be blamed for that but the other writers themselves, for how inconsistent things have gotten with how Earth 616 approaches the X-Men vs. the Avengers, among other things.