Are Superheroes Fascist By Modern Standards?

[Kaitou D. Kid]

Left-Wing YouTuber ThoughtSlime has a good video on this topic. The video is called Is Batman a Fascist? , but he talks about the idea of superheroes being fascists in general and why that is wrong.

Superheroes can be played up as fascist, but they are not inherently fascist by any means. If anything they're the opposite. Superheroes fit the socialist principle of "From each according to their ability, to each according to his need."

It is disheartening that some people are quick to label something as problematic just because a few problematic people like it. Not only is that tribalistic, it also comes off as gatekeeping. And gatekeeping can be dangerous. I mean, do we really want to send people the message that Fascists are like their favorite superheroes? Think about the consequences of saying something like that. Going around calling superheroes fascists is a gift to actual fascists.

[A Small Talent For War]

Remember that for the vast majority of people on the planet, individual liberties don't really mean much in practice because they are too worried about where their next meal is coming from to worry all that much about whether they can **** talk the government on Twitter, and a regime that can deliver prosperity and stability is infinitely preferable to one that promises freedom and equality yet is too weak and incompetent to deliver on any of those things. Most dictators out there enjoy far more popular support than we could ever conceive for these exact reasons, especially when the alternative is invariably some foreign educated bourgeois diaspora class that is all too willing to sell out the country to Western business interests. Part of the reason the invasion of Iraq failed so miserably is because we couldn't find a single pro-American leader to install who enjoyed any kind of broad public support, just about anyone with any kind of influence was either a Saddam loyalist or backed by Iran.

This is very true. The indigent in America are so constantly exploited and unjustly treated that it really is impossible to think freedom is really very important in America. In courtrooms every day, judges routinely deny poor defendants their rights to a court-appointed attorney simply because the municipalities can't afford it. Even if you get a public defender, they likely have too many cases to really provide any sort of defense. Many poor people lose their property because the value of their house will rise when a development begins in their neighborhoods. So, you worked all your life and managed to pay off an inexpensive house. Then, after retirement, the tax bill one year is two to three times more than in the past twenty and you can't pay. That debt is converted by your local government into a lien and then sold on the private market. The buyer can then demand immediate payment from you for that lien and they can legally force you to sell your house at public auction to pay it off. This happens all the time back in the poor Kentucky county where I grew up, and it is a major problem in urban minority communities as well.

It's actually this sort of injustice that gave rise to Superman in the 30's, and it is the sort of thing that leads to a lot of social unrest. So, it's not like the urge for superheroes is dissimilar to the urge for Fascist or Socialist revolutionary movements. However, often fiction is a release valve, not a pressure cooker. Orson Welles once said that "the theater is a safe place for dangerous ideas." The original Greek drama was part of a festival to annually release social tension. These power fantasies are often the way people resolve emotional turmoil to function safely in the world and the myth of "freedom" is really part of the process we use to accept all the obvious and ubiquitous injustice we regularly see or encounter without "Hulking out."

[ed2962]

I'm not really sure how to make a post pointing at a different post on CBR, and further will hope this poster would not mind me pointing out something they said in a different thread, but I really just felt like it's so on topic:

https://community.cbr.com/showthread...02#post5194502



OMG! Superheroes are so fascist! Promoting gentleness, sacrifice and service! So evil and fascist!

It depends how it's done though...Denny O'Neil's Batman solves crimes and is concerned with protecting citizens, Frank Miller's Batman literally gets his kicks from beating people up.

[DrNewGod]

...If, for example, Seigel and Shuster just invented the concept today, then we might see a Superman who is something more like Batman going after and meting out vigilante justice the leaders of corrupt financial institutions, vicious drug cartels, warlords and arms dealers and so on that the international community either refuses or cannot contend with. Or we'd see superheroes who start their own businesses as heroes for hire basically acting as superhuman private eyes.

If you go back the first dozen-odd issues of Action Comics, S&S' Superman was very much like what you describe. He literally drug Hitler and Mussolini in front of a world court, trapped a mine-owner and his party guests in a cave-in, thrashed a domestic abuser, and forced an arms merchant to enlist in one of the armies fighting a war the arms merchant had stoked.

[A Small Talent For War]

If you go back the first dozen-odd issues of Action Comics, S&S' Superman was very much like what you describe. He literally drug Hitler and Mussolini in front of a world court, trapped a mine-owner and his party guests in a cave-in, thrashed a domestic abuser, and forced an arms merchant to enlist in one of the armies fighting a war the arms merchant had stoked.

It is pretty cool reading the early strips. I recall one where a cabal of anti-union industrialists were trying to run a mill-owner out of business because he treated his workers well and paid them a fair wage. The whole story was essentially Superman stopping assassination attempts as the mill-owner and his daughter were trying to get to the bank for the payroll for their workers. Then, the bank refused to give the owner his money for some red tape reason until Superman went into the bank, lifted a massive safe and said something like "nice bank you have here. Be a shame if something happened to it."

[Agent Z]

I picked out three groups firefighters, emts, and cops for a reason. You choose to talk about the one that has real world implications that can't be avoided which I mention in my post. In its purest form policemen would get the pass but they are unmistakable issues with police that clearly tie in with this topic. They are no songs going f*ck the EMT or Firefighters. Nobody, when they see firetruck on the scene, goes "oh no here is firemen".

What separates superheroes from being seen/treated like Firemen and Emts, Is that for entertaining stories you have put superheroes acting not totally controlled by the government and rules because superheroes have many tropes that would maybe less fun to read in some creators opinions. But that leaves superheroes these guys who enforce rules with little no oversight(which is one of the police issues) and sometimes slightly border on kinda tyrannical or fascist in their approach. And again nobody ever calls a Fireman or Emt kind of fascist for saving people.

Superman and others probably do property damage, Batman beats people half to death and torture as well, They are underage sidekicks and child soldiers, Heroes ignore the system to supposedly do the right thing and they enforcing the law while being above the law. The last two things are some stuff that makes superheroes feel a fascist. And that is because comic storytelling heavily based on tropes and they want don't stop telling stories with those tropes even when they are options to do better(See the initiative without the forcing people to be heroes part). If Superheroes operate within the " Superheroes get called to help, They show up and help, pass the villains off to authorize and bounce" they never feel like authoritarian force but just people trying to help like firemen and emts. And a world like My hero academia the heroes doesn't feel like say Avengers Infinity Wars were the heroes go screw the government our way is right. MHA has more common sense based rules and heroes operate within the confines of the world laws. Which never brings it into "The safest hands are our own" mentality.

That was my point a lot of superhero stories is based on bizarro comic trope logic and at worse the heroes themselves wouldn't be taking the heat for some issues/problems because it would be the system( and country) that is at fault kind like qualified immunity and laws criminalizing things that shouldn't be a criminal offense.

Japan seems to be less cynical towards the idea of government superheroes. In addition to MHA, which you mentioned, there is also One Punch Man and several Super Sentai teams.

[kjn]

I can recommend checking out any issue of DC's this week. I think they all include a two-page spread about the history of voting in the US, and a call for voting.

And seeing a mailman getting "thanks for your service" warms by old postal worker heart, even though I think that particular American habit is loathsome.

(I also quibble with Superman's statement that "voter suppression is un-American", given how long and how thorough voter suppression has been and still is.)

[Agent Z]

I can recommend checking out any issue of DC's this week. I think they all include a two-page spread about the history of voting in the US, and a call for voting.

And seeing a mailman getting "thanks for your service" warms by old postal worker heart, even though I think that particular American habit is loathsome.

(I also quibble with Superman's statement that "voter suppression is un-American", given how long and how thorough voter suppression has been and still is.)

Why do you find it loathsome.

[kjn]

Why do you find it loathsome.

Because it's centered around privileging the military. Because the thanks is empty, since there is no real interpersonal relation between the service and the thanks.

See also Washington Post: The sting of ‘Thank you for your service’.

[PwrdOn]

Because it's centered around privileging the military. Because the thanks is empty, since there is no real interpersonal relation between the service and the thanks.

See also Washington Post: The sting of ‘Thank you for your service’.

It’s more just a matter of the American public knowing where our bread is buttered. Like it or not, the kind of prosperity and influence America currently enjoys simply would not be possible without an aggressive foreign policy that sees American military power wielded as a sledgehammer against anyone who dares to challenge our interests. Yeah, it doesn’t sit well with most people that we killed a million Iraqis just so we could get their oil, but at the same time, we needed that oil for our economy to function. It’s nice to entertain the fantasy that we could somehow withdraw from these foreign entanglements and maintain our society basically intact, but how exactly would that work?

[Steel Inquisitor]

It’s more just a matter of the American public knowing where our bread is buttered. Like it or not, the kind of prosperity and influence America currently enjoys simply would not be possible without an aggressive foreign policy that sees American military power wielded as a sledgehammer against anyone who dares to challenge our interests. Yeah, it doesn’t sit well with most people that we killed a million Iraqis just so we could get their oil, but at the same time, we needed that oil for our economy to function. It’s nice to entertain the fantasy that we could somehow withdraw from these foreign entanglements and maintain our society basically intact, but how exactly would that work?

Except the politics that lead to and during the Iraq occupation are far more complex than that description. The main people who wanted that oil was Republicans, and people who lined their pockets with companies like Haliburton - it was a far more controversial than Afghanistan. The American public elect the politicians but those politicians don't all work for the American people, that's why they warp the education system and have large media companies like Fox news to keep their followers dumb, mindless sheep. Republicans don't speak for every American.

America has massive problems with corruption and vote disenfranchisement but there are freedoms in the west you won't find in places like China. We're allowed to openly disparage Trump and other politicians, you can't do this in China. Everything is monitored more than what the west does.

[DrNewGod]

It’s more just a matter of the American public knowing where our bread is buttered. Like it or not, the kind of prosperity and influence America currently enjoys simply would not be possible without an aggressive foreign policy that sees American military power wielded as a sledgehammer against anyone who dares to challenge our interests. Yeah, it doesn’t sit well with most people that we killed a million Iraqis just so we could get their oil, but at the same time, we needed that oil for our economy to function. It’s nice to entertain the fantasy that we could somehow withdraw from these foreign entanglements and maintain our society basically intact, but how exactly would that work?

As a veteran, I'd submit it's too often less an acknowledgement of any debt than it is a convenient means of pretending gratitude and respect. While I'm sure that some people are since in the comment, too many use it by rote as a point of self-expression or self-aggrandizement.

Thanking service members for their service would be better conveyed by insisting congress fund more healthcare (including mental health) and civilian-transition programs for veterans, as well as insisting congress resume oversight of when and where US force gets used, and being more judicious in supporting it.

[Agent Z]

[PCN24454]

Japan seems to be less cynical towards the idea of government superheroes. In addition to MHA, which you mentioned, there is also One Punch Man and several Super Sentai teams.

I think it it’s because they argue that just because a superhero works for someone else, it doesn’t mean that they can’t be altruistic.

Tiger & Bunny argued that while they care a lot about their appearances, they still wanted to be heroes even when no one was looking.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Superheroes can be played up as fascist, but they are not inherently fascist by any means. If anything they're the opposite. Superheroes fit the socialist principle of "From each according to their ability, to each according to his need."

Care to elaborate on this? This does sound interesting and at the very least, new. There have been leftists who have made cases for superheroes like the writer Alan Grant is an anarchist-leaning writer who saw Batman as representing an essentially anarchist perspective.

It is disheartening that some people are quick to label something as problematic just because a few problematic people like it. Not only is that tribalistic, it also comes off as gatekeeping. And gatekeeping can be dangerous. I mean, do we really want to send people the message that Fascists are like their favorite superheroes? Think about the consequences of saying something like that. Going around calling superheroes fascists is a gift to actual fascists.

I agree that there's consequences ceding ground to fascism in genre culture wars. If we keep insisting the superhero genre is fascist, the side effect is that fascists can appropriate superhero imagery and other concepts for their own ends...and it would give them powerful tools. So on that respect I agree.

At the same time, it can be argued that it's problematic that the superhero genre and its codes have become so dominant culturally and financially, that they have taken this level of importance over other forms of genre more suited. The superhero genre as a whole are wrapped in capitalism, with the IP held by big corporations, outliving its original form (comic books the least lucrative vertical for these characters) but expanding outwards into other mediums like TV, Movies, Internet, Social Media and so on...and kind of dominating that at the expense of alternatives. On the level of being a hypercapitalist entity, superheroes can be said to take on authoritarian and fascist leanings, especially given how important China is to the global Marvel output and how MCU tailors its products to avoid offending Chinese censorship. (Plus doing a Spider-Man comic where Parker Industries does business in China).