Powers of X #6 *spoilers*

[Chainsaw Vigilante]

Seeing Apocalypse sitting alone in contemplation combined with Moira's journal thoughts on him, and Apocalypse knowing about the futures Moira has experienced has me thinking he could start seeing much of the mutant "race" as unfit if they lose in all the futures Moira has experienced; also that his whole modus operandi of making sure the fit survive and continue to evolve the human race (I say human as mutants are just humans with an activated x-gene) could be a way to combat against celestial threats such as the Phalanx. He and Sinister also have a history of genetic and technological alteration of existing mutants, mutates, and non-mutant humans so they know that that last future that Moira experienced where the humans supplant mutants through genetic engineering means their use of genetic engineering is something worthwhile if not perhaps necessary. I don't know if Hickman had these thoughts in mind with the scenes of him in silent isolated contemplation, but they fit. I think he and Sinister, if written well, could have some very interesting storylines.

[tuck frump]

Apocalypse doesnt know about Moiras past lives.

[Lapsus]

I once heard that human beings aren't born with prejudice, but are made for them, by someone who wants something.

And like you mentioned with human extinction, although doesn't justify atrocities and irrationality, still plays a role in people who don't want to go extinct.

And sure, the relationship between human mutates and human mutants has gotten very inconsistent in its worldbuilding, and why humans ending up hating the mutants more than the mutates seems to have been pretty poorly handled by most accounts, but with that said, I quite liked the explanation Marvels #2 (1994) gave, and reminds me that human/mutant relations, at least when written well, have more complexities than what's seen on the surface:

I have to be honest with you, for me it still makes little sense. They are not kicking the dirt in our graves, they are not a machine who would rebel against us, they are not Aliens who would take our planet, they are our descendants who eventually will have powers.

"My grandson will have powers, as a human, i am offended"

I am interested in that Cyclops quote, it is out of context ? or he mean it ?

[ZeroBG82]

"My grandson will have powers, as a human, i am offended"

Some people are born special. Others never can be. There is no qualification for merit, or need. There is no way to achieve, or standard to meet. You are either chosen or you are not.

I think people underestimate how utterly terrifying that concept can be for some people. I also think it's one of the reasons why people in the Marvel U can love the Avengers but hate and fear the X-men. Anybody can be an Avenger. Only the anointed may be X-Men.

[spirit2011]

Some people are born special. Others never can be. There is no qualification for merit, or need. There is no way to achieve, or standard to meet. You are either chosen or you are not.

I think people underestimate how utterly terrifying that concept can be for some people. I also think it's one of the reasons why people in the Marvel U can love the Avengers but hate and fear the X-men. Anybody can be an Avenger. Only the anointed may be X-Men.

It can be terrifying, specially when a person has too much power and can kill millions.

but it can also be very fascinating, no doubt there would be lots of fans like it was on wickeed and divine

[Lapsus]

Some people are born special. Others never can be. There is no qualification for merit, or need. There is no way to achieve, or standard to meet. You are either chosen or you are not.

I think people underestimate how utterly terrifying that concept can be for some people. I also think it's one of the reasons why people in the Marvel U can love the Avengers but hate and fear the X-men. Anybody can be an Avenger. Only the anointed may be X-Men.

I still dont find anything terryfing about humanity eventually born with powers, "Anyone can be" is still a big if, in our world we still classify people born with or without talent.

Even between the mutants that feel should exists, i mean, i dont envy Long Neck, i dont envy several abortions that the x-gene has created but i could envy Telepaths, Storm or Magneto but many mutants should also feel like this, like genetic dead ends in comparison with the mutant elite.

This is almost never brought into topic, like every mutant is proud of his crappy powers.

I understand what you mean with the avengers, but several of them have abilities beyond the average mutant, several of them have weird origins which require specific accidents to work.

Probably is more easy being born mutant that become mr fantastic with cosmic rays and not die in the process.You are not telling me too much if your aspiration is become hawkeye.

Mutants lack the alien feel to truly unify humanity, at worst, it would be countless of opinions about them going from consider them demons to say that they are the chosen of god.

[H-E-D]

consider them demons

That's precisely the Purifiers and the Church of Humanity.

Hatred isn't rational, and even if it was – this is just part of the premise. It's part of what you have to buy into to buy into the franchise. You just have to accept it and move on.

[Lapsus]

That's precisely the Purifiers and the Church of Humanity.

Hatred isn't rational, and even if it was – this is just part of the premise. It's part of what you have to buy into to buy into the franchise. You just have to accept it and move on.

Of course, dont get me wrong, i understand the core theme of the franchise, my point is that i wish that more aspects of the Human-Mutant relations could be explore beyond "Im going to be extinct by mutants"

Hell, even Mutant-Mutant relations could give us countless of topics. This is the reason why i regard the Morlocks an indispensable part of the X-Men mythos. Trying to define what means to be Mutant.

[BroHomo]

Of course, dont get me wrong, i understand the core theme of the franchise, my point is that i wish that more aspects of the Human-Mutant relations could be explore beyond "Im going to be extinct by mutants"

Hell, even Mutant-Mutant relations could give us countless of topics. This is the reason why i regard the Morlocks an indispensable part of the X-Men mythos. Trying to define what means to be Mutant.

Are "morlocks" still a thing now that the mutants have KraKoa

[Icefanatic]

I have to be honest with you, for me it still makes little sense. They are not kicking the dirt in our graves, they are not a machine who would rebel against us, they are not Aliens who would take our planet, they are our descendants who eventually will have powers.

"My grandson will have powers, as a human, i am offended"

One branch of the dinosaurs evolved into what ultimately became birds.

Even though we have birds aplenty, the dinosaurs are still extinct.

If dinosaurs were somehow gifted with enough awareness to understand it, do you think they would find any comfort in that though they are all long dead, birds now carry on in their stead?

Why should humans be content to fade away while Glob Herman and such take their place?

You are ignoring that most humans give birth to human, not mutant, offspring. If evolution is the model and ONLY Homo Superior will untimely survive, not Homo Sapiens, it's less "My grandson will have powers, as a human, i am offended" and more 'My human grandson, and the decedents of almost everyone, will all die off so that mutants can replace us'.

Why should humans just be okay with that, an evolutionary genocide?

[JKtheMac]

You are ignoring that most humans give birth to human, not mutant, offspring. If evolution is the model and ONLY Homo Superior will untimely survive, not Homo Sapiens, it's less "My grandson will have powers, as a human, i am offended" and more 'My human grandson, and the decedents of almost everyone, will all die off so that mutants can replace us'.

Why should humans just be okay with that, an evolutionary genocide?

It is a fine distinction, and I think you are right. I think the important part that we need to remember is that the mutants do not represent myriad mutations. The idea of the X-Gene developed over the years and the original idea wasn’t as well defined, but the concept of the hatred has never been about humanity vs. evolution itself.

The apparently random, myriad powers are all due to a specific mutation called the X-Gene. On one level we all get this and it makes sense. They are all akin to each other. But, that idea is also profound. Humans are not randomly and increasingly giving birth to mutated children which would be standard evolution, they are giving birth to children with a specific adaptation. An adaptation that allows them to develop a specific power that literally empowers them as they hit puberty.

In many ways language fails us because the distinction is that mutants are not random mutations, therefore they contain this ominous idea of manifest destiny. Their inheritance feels inevitable and that would be terrifying for humanity.

Imagine if it was more obvious, that the mutation was always the same. The Midwich Cuckoos idea. A number of children all other and all unified. Then the horror element hits us immediately. Imagine a random and increasing number of kids all had green scales and matured five times faster with superhuman strength. That would be an international incident.

The question is usually expressed as ‘what is so different to superheroes’ and that problem is fundamental because their genesis as a comic was just a way to create new superheroes that don’t need a backstory. That idea got immediately twisted back on itself. Now the powers manifested are almost always thematically linked to the experiences of the individual, so they do have a backstory.

The way to think of the distinction is pick a specific superhero and imagine people were all giving birth to a version of that. “Human spiders are going to replace us!”

[Killerbee911]

The question is usually expressed as ‘what is so different to superheroes’ and that problem is fundamental because their genesis as a comic was just a way to create new superheroes that don’t need a backstory. That idea hot immediately twisted back on itself. Now the powers manifested are almost always thematically linked to the experiences of the individual, so they do have a backstory.

One of the bigger problems isn't just superhumans not being irrational hated for the same reason as mutants. It is that people flat out ignore that the irrational fear bleeds over to other things. Sorry, but racist are too stupid or don't care about the difference between Muslims and Sikhs. But Marvel the people who are equivalent of our irrational hate groups and bigoted show nuance not to hate superhumans. The hate of the mutants makes sense we see that in real life "the irrational hate". What people try to justify is the irrational hating people wouldn't follow the same pattern of irrational hating people past one group and extend their hate to other groups. It is to me like saying the KKK only hates Black People no the KKK hates Black people, Latino people, Muslims, Jews, foreigners in general who speak a different language. Marvel has a bunch of events of are equivalent to 9/11 like War of the Realms or Secret Empire. People are saying that these irrational hating people won't do what irrational hating people did in real life after similar events. Mutants scare people we get that it is people not being scared after an alien invasion, robot invasion or God invasion and irrationally hating other groups as well. Then remember these people can't tell the difference between Muslims and Sikh, They can't tell the difference between Human torch and Match. People underestimate irrational hate in these convos imo

[JKtheMac]

One of the bigger problems isn't just superhumans not being irrational hated for the same reason as mutants. It is that people flat out ignore that the irrational fear bleeds over to other things. Sorry, but racist are too stupid or don't care about the difference between Muslims and Sikhs. But Marvel the people who are equivalent of our irrational hate groups and bigoted show nuance not to hate superhumans.

Absolutely, there is a VERY fine distinction, and prejudice is not know for its nuanced thinking. However it is known for its elastic thinking. “I cant be ...ist, some of my best friends are ...” is not an uncommon sentiment. It is also completely genuine, however misguided.

We have to bring our nuanced thinking to this because otherwise the whole thing doesn’t work. Personally, and perhaps controversially, I would prefer that the X-Books were their own separate universe, but that will never happen and we have to engage with the premise we have. To twist that premise into something it isn’t, and then complain about it is self-defeating. We have to acknowledge the differences.

And, importantly I wasn’t talking about a metaphor for prejudice I was talking about the horror aspect inherent in the premise. Metaphors are slippery and mutable and will remain so even when people try to define them and set them in stone.

There is some horror in Spider-Man. Less so in Thor or Captain Marvel.

[RachelGrey]

Absolutely, there is a VERY fine distinction, and prejudice is not know for its nuanced thinking. However it is known for its elastic thinking. “I cant be ...ist, some of my best friends are ...” is not an uncommon sentiment. It is also completely genuine, however misguided.

We have to bring our nuanced thinking to this because otherwise the whole thing doesn’t work. Personally, and perhaps controversially, I would prefer that the X-Books were their own separate universe, but that will never happen and we have to engage with the premise we have. To twist that premise into something it isn’t, and then complain about it is self-defeating. We have to acknowledge the differences.

And, importantly I wasn’t talking about a metaphor for prejudice I was talking about the horror aspect inherent in the premise. Metaphors are slippery and mutable and will remain so even when people try to define them and set them in stone.

There is some horror in Spider-Man. Less so in Thor or Captain Marvel.

Actually Captain Marvel is a good example. All it took to erase all of the good will for Carol was one reporter who knew she was half human and half Kree. Riply and Minerva working together with just enough articles of bad press were able to ruin Carol's reputation to the point that she was considering leaving Earth and going to Kree space because so much hate was directed at her everywhere she went. She would try to save people and they would throw rocks at her. Hate can take over so fast that it can stun most people. Carol's situation turned around because of press, that little girl standing up and defending a prone Carol as Star exposited on how she was going to kill Carol and then kill any human who got in her way. So Carol got very lucky because people were filming and the fight between Carol and Ripley was taking place in Times Square with lots of public to witness it. But then we find out it's not as over as Carol thinks it is and Ripley has the reality stone and next month we get Carol going dark and we haven't found out why yet. Probably Ripley warps reality to put herself in charge of Earth and to make everyone hate Carol again, and then we continue from there.

It doesn't take much to stir up hate, one reporter with the right articles can stir the pot for Captain Marvel, an entire news team (Fox News) can stir the pot of hate to make a large percentage of the United States think that a caravan of poor impoverished latin american people could even possibly pose a threat to the United States. They ramped up the fear so far that it was frightening how easily they played the American People. Those refugees were just going to sit at the border and hope to be processed as asylum seekers, they weren't even going to rush the border at all. Even the majority of people who do get into the US as illegal immigrants, they just work as farm workers, janitors, and fast food workers because no one actually wants those jobs except extremely poor people.

In Marvel, the X-Men show up to help in the War of Realms, they are a pretty big part of why a lot of people survived because they were rescuing people and taking them to the safety of the stadium and then holding the line against Malkeith's forces. But after it was over, the United States government was still trying to imprison every mutant, nothing changed, sentiment didn't change, hell the X-Men had trouble rescuing some people because some people hated the idea of being saved by mutants. Even in the face of standing up and helping everyone the bad press didn't stop.

[Lapsus]

One branch of the dinosaurs evolved into what ultimately became birds.

Even though we have birds aplenty, the dinosaurs are still extinct.

If dinosaurs were somehow gifted with enough awareness to understand it, do you think they would find any comfort in that though they are all long dead, birds now carry on in their stead?

Why should humans be content to fade away while Glob Herman and such take their place?

You are ignoring that most humans give birth to human, not mutant, offspring. If evolution is the model and ONLY Homo Superior will untimely survive, not Homo Sapiens, it's less "My grandson will have powers, as a human, i am offended" and more 'My human grandson, and the decedents of almost everyone, will all die off so that mutants can replace us'.

Why should humans just be okay with that, an evolutionary genocide?

With the dinosaur thing you lost me, I cannot predict how a sapience species will interact outside of the only example that we have, us, which makes me going to the starting point. I dont see the "Mankind Extinction" with the Mutant premise. Besides if i were a Dinosaur and could see the future i would be more worry about that asteroid rather than "THE BIRDS, THE BIRDS ARE KILLING US!!!"

The reason why i ignored the human offspring is because Mutants are supposed to feel alien when they are not, how do you avoid these mutants ?? all human parents are going to kill their sons and daugthers?? if Mutant is something unavoadible and they, pretty much, resemble humans, i dont see the issue beyond of the nature of their powers but once again, people should also be worry about the other mutates.

The only way that i could see this working and making sense it would be if all mutants were scary Morlocks, looking absolutly inhuman, that could invoke the alien feel of mutants even if they are born from humans.

JKtheMac has brought an interesting concept about the nature of the X-Gene, "If the mutation will always be the same" this could also make them feel more like an unify species if, for example, all of them were telepaths.

I want to be clear, once again, i dont negate the nature of Mutants being scary as a concept, they are and many of them could suffer persecution, what i am negating is the shortminded writing of making every human and goverment scary of them.

For every person who could find storm scary there would be 10 others who would pay her in some kind of national wearther service in order to predict or avoid summer storms. The "inhuman looking mutants" are the ones who could represent a problem for society but not the absurdly good-looking X-Men, in real life half of the world will want to bang them.

And once again i agree with JKtheMac, even if for some of us the situation doesnt make sense, i agree that we need to work our minds to make it work but i also would appreciate a better approach from the writers in the context of human-mutant relations.