Judgement Day (2022)

[Ulysian_Thracs]

Nope, I said what I said, and what I EXPLICITLY said when I talked about people I wouldn't help, is those that actually oppressed and assaulted me. Do not try and make me accountable for your perceiving a generalization that I specifically avoided when I made the point about who I wouldn't help.

Some of you keep creating or perceiving exclusions where no actual exclusions have been made. You're trying to make mutants out to be some kind of bad for going out of their way to exclude human kids who died of disease when that's quite literally not something that's ever been stated or claimed, and is NOT the same thing as mutants at the moment prioritizing the resurrection of mutant kids who died of diseases or oppressive violence or hate-crimes. For every assumption made about how there's some particular scenario in which mutants not resurrecting humans en masse makes them look bad, because it INCLUDES this particular specific scenario, there's an opposite assumption that could be made about some particular scenario in which mutants not resurrecting humans en masse is BECAUSE they're prioritizing a victim of human violence instead.

Meanwhile, if people are going to go ahead and talk in general terms about what mutants en masse owe humanity en masse, it absolutely has to be considered that humanity en masse ABSOLUTELY includes humans who have chosen to initiate violence against mutants, because well, we've literally seen those humans exist in the Marvel U in the present day.

So YOUR generalizations ABSOLUTELY already make the expectation that mutants owe it to humanity in general to resurrect humanity in general just because they can, even though we're all aware that included in THAT general population, is in fact, humans who have deliberately chosen to oppress or wage violence against innocent mutants.

I never said I would never go out of my way to help straight people. Point me to the sentence where I did just that. Thing is, *I* am perfectly aware that not every straight person agrees with or participates in the oppression of LGBTQ+ individuals. I'm perfectly capable of drawing a distinction between a straight ally and a straight oppressor or an innocent straight kid, all while talking about the society-wide fact that in general terms, straight members of society ARE the initiators and actualizers of the oppression of LGBTQ+ communities - all without that actually meaning that I assume every single straight person to be oppressive.

You could similarly draw a distinction between mutants 'owing' it to humanity to resurrect innocent humans, while understanding why they have reason not to want to resurrect humans who have harmed mutants. I did it, you can do it easily too. You and others in thread continually choose not to, creating the impression that you don't see or care all that much about such a distinction being made, and that has as much to do with my response as anything else.

Don't try and act like generalizations are fine when you use them but they're a smoking gun when anyone else does. And don't blame me for your own assumptions, and don't try and build a case out of them. That's a house of cards that I will happily take a wrecking ball to.

Calm down. That's a lot of words to say, 'Hey buddy, I missed the part where you expressly said: I don't think that is what you mean, BTW.' Or just be angry or something...

[BobbysWorld]

Calm down. That's a lot of words to say, 'Hey buddy, I missed the part where you expressly said: I don't think that is what you mean, BTW.' Or just be angry or something...

Ah yes, the defense of someone who has no leg to stand on in an argument and wants to pretend otherwise: act like the other person is triggered.

I didn't miss the part where you said you didn't think that's what I meant, I just ignored it because I was perfectly willing to clarify what I meant and didn't need you explaining what you thought I meant or acting like you were giving me the benefit of the doubt, while the rest of your response assumed the exact opposite.

As you can see from my response, clearly I still disagree with what you thought I was saying. So....why shouldn't I have said so just because you said 'I don't think that's what you meant, btw?'

*Shrugs* Sorry not sorry, I don't like it when people try and play things like 'I'm on your side buddy' when their real point is clearly aimed at undermining or discrediting the other person's point. I can speak for myself, and I did. Respond to my words and not your prejudicial assumption of my emotional state, or just don't reply. Either works for me.

[Jv565]

Not only is aggressive hate meet passive indifference NOT the same thing and the very essence of a false equivalency, its not actually even passive indifference?

A HISTORICALLY MARGINALIZED GROUP PRIORITIZING ITS OWN MEMBERS AND EMPHASIZING USING ITS RESOURCES INTERNALLY BEFORE SHARING THEM WITH OTHERS IS NOT REMOTELY COMPARABLE WITH HISTORICALLY NON-MARGINALIZED GROUPS WITHHOLDING RESOURCES IN ORDER TO OPPRESS OTHERS OR JUST BECAUSE THEY CAN.

Y'all keep insisting that the only explanation for mutants not sharing resurrection technology world-wide, the instant they even have it, is because of pettiness, or indifference, or all these things that distract from the fact that PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN OPPRESSED HAVE THE RIGHT TO PRIORITIZE THEMSELVES. And literally ALL that is about, is taking advantage of the opportunity to flourish, once they HAVE it, and has absolutely NOTHING to do with anyone BUT them.

Again, mutants aren't DOING anything to humanity. Humanity is continuing on the same as it always has been, with the same problems its always faced, and the most that mutants are ACTUALLY doing is just saying its not our responsibility to solve all your problems or make them a priority, and its weird if that gets you heated considering how few of you ever saw Genosha, the Legacy Virus or M-Day as a problem so long as you weren't affected.

Not prioritizing someone else in order to focus on yourself is categorically NOT the same as actively oppressing someone. Not volunteering to get up and help someone do something is NOT the same as standing in that other person's way. Mutants saying or thinking disparaging things about humans who have historically been violent towards them even based on the hypothetical of them being threats, is NOT the same thing as humans initiating violent acts on mutants because of the potential threat they might be.

None of these things are remotely interchangeable. They still matter, yes! Absolutely! But they are not INTERCHANGEABLE. They can not be swapped out and treated as a one on one comparison, as though the difference between them is negligible or outright irrelevant.

You are literally handwaving 'yes they were treated badly, yes they were hunted and killed' as your lead in to 'now humans will die out and mutants could stop that' and you could not BE more dismissive if you tried. Even while being disingenuous as hell, because humans have died as long as humans have existed, lmao, humans continuing to die as a natural part of life is NOT 'humans will die out' - humans aren't on the verge of extinction because MORTALITY EXISTS, like, do you not hear how utterly dishonest you're being with language choices like that?

THIS is the bullshit that pisses me off about this era. People who have previously never bothered to pay much attention to the tensions or power imbalances present in mutants being treated as an allegory for oppression, but the second mutants start flourishing in the comics and the power imbalance goes away, suddenly scads of readers who never saw it as much of a problem when mutants were persecuted - almost because they were like, well that's just the natural order of things, that's the way its SUPPOSED to be - suddenly many of those same readers who couldn't have given a fuck before are like, mutants are oppressing humans by not doing everything they can to make human lives better, even though the entire point is mutants aren't doing ANYTHING actionable about humanity. People keep trying to pretend that the power imbalances have flipped the other way completely, when to have an OPPRESSIVE power imbalance, one group has to be actively EXERTING POWER over the other....like humans used to exert power over mutants in very clear ways, such as by mutant registration acts, Sentinel programs, etc. Literally nothing mutants have done since the dawn of Krakoa has actually exerted power OVER humans as opposed to just being....displays of power, but guess what? These aren't actually the same thing? You can't BORROW oppressive acts and apply them towards a group who has not actually DONE those things, just because you feel their displays of power make it clear that they COULD do those things. The important part of that equation is still the part where the group with power has not chosen to exert that power over others just because they can.

Like, to be completely honest, these discussions piss me the fuck off, because its a little hard not to project on them. I mean, I was gaybashed in college eighteen years ago, and it left me with a disability that drastically affected my life with chronic pain and other issues until I was only FINALLY able to afford a surgery to get a prosthetic that returned me to prior quality of life levels, in this past YEAR. And that's not to mention the fact that y'know, having that surgery and regaining full use of my jaw didn't erase the trauma of having been targeted, singled out, assaulted in a variety of ways and basically left for dead.

So guess what? If I ever saw any of my attackers again, and they were in some kind of trouble or dying, after getting off scot-free with no consequences for the hell they put me through just because they could, because they hated what I was, because they wanted to?

Quite honestly, I'm not sure I would lift a single damn finger to ever help any of them.

But by your logic? That would make me just as bad as them. Go ahead. Tell me how not helping or prioritizing the needs of people who almost killed me for no other reason than they hated my EXISTENCE, where my withholding help or not wanting to prioritize them not because I hate their EXISTENCE but because I hate what they DID to me and how it affected me and how little they cared or that ever affected them....

By all means, PLEASE go right ahead and tell me how those two things are the same, and how that would make me no better than them. How my passive indifference to their fates is LITERALLY THE SAME as their aggressive hate and how their exertion of power and aggression over me affected the entire trajectory of my life for almost two decades, how even now, the memories and repercussions of what they did will never actually fully leave me. How just because something bad happens to them, that I maybe could have stopped, this is no different from the bad things that happened to me because they CHOSE to do those things.

Tell me I'm no different from my own literal oppressors, just because DUE TO THEIR PAST OPPRESSION OF ME, I do not give a shit if they live or die.

Like sure. Tell me those things are the same. I DARE you. Lmao.

Yeah. Not a fan of you insinuating that I'm dishonest, disingenuous, and a peddler of bullshit. I NEVER said they were interchangeable. I said they led to the same outcome, and they do. Mutants died because of the actions of humans (Not all humans, by the way. There were plenty that stood up with them, suffered, and died with them. I don't hear the bells ringing about bringing any of those people back), and now humans will die because of the inaction of mutants. Is that the same thing? No. Did I say it was the same thing? No. Did you say that I said it was the same thing? Kind of.

Mutants can do whatever they want. Of course, they can. But you can't let kids die and then take the moral high ground. That's not the way it works. Also, you're not the only one who was gaybashed within an inch of his life, dude. try growing up in the Deep South with a father who used slurs like they were greetings. I get the anger. I understand the want to wash your hands of people and the world. Trust me. I understand it as deeply as anybody. I'm not handwaving the suffering of a race. What I'm doing is mouring the loss of heroes who helped me get through childhood. The characters that I grew up with did the right thing REGARDLESS of whether or not the people who were asking for it deserved it. I liked those characters.I related to those characters. I wanted to grow up and be like those characters; a person who could live peacefully with people who (because of their own misguided ignorance) didn't like me. They were characters who helped humans grow and learn and who stood for a real moral higher ground. They didn't take their ball and go home.

And NO ONE SAID they were the same as their oppressors. If you don't want Iambatman putting words into your mouth, then don't put them into mine. I said they weren't acting like heroes, and I don't believe they are.

On that note, I have no problem with any people prioritizing themselves, but you can give pennecilen to the masses and still take care of yourself. I know those resources belong to the mutants, but something tells me that when the Avengers come with a dozen or so of the most powerful beings and most brilliant minds in the universe to help save them from an onslaught of Eternals, the mutants won't turn those resources away. Share and share alike. It's what heroes do.

[BobbysWorld]

Yeah. Not a fan of you insinuating that I'm dishonest, disingenuous, and a peddler of bullshit. I NEVER said they were interchangeable. I said they led to the same outcome, and they do. Mutants died because of the actions of humans (Not all humans, by the way. There were plenty that stood up with them, suffered, and died with them. I don't hear the bells ringing about bringing any of those people back), and now humans will die because of the inaction of mutants. Is that the same thing? No. Did I say it was the same thing? No. Did you say that I said it was the same thing? Kind of.

Mutants can do whatever they want. Of course, they can. But you can't let kids die and then take the moral high ground. That's not the way it works. Also, you're not the only one who was gaybashed within an inch of his life, dude. try growing up in the Deep South with a father who used slurs like they were greetings. I get the anger. I understand the want to wash your hands of people and the world. Trust me. I understand it as deeply as anybody. I'm not handwaving the suffering of a race. What I'm doing is mouring the loss of heroes who helped me get through childhood. The characters that I grew up with did the right thing REGARDLESS of whether or not the people who were asking for it deserved it. I liked those characters.I related to those characters. I wanted to grow up and be like those characters; a person who could live peacefully with people who (because of their own misguided ignorance) didn't like me. They were characters who helped humans grow and learn and who stood for a real moral higher ground. They didn't take their ball and go home.

And NO ONE SAID they were the same as their oppressors. If you don't want Iambatman putting words into your mouth, then don't put them into mine. I said they weren't acting like heroes, and I don't believe they are.

On that note, I have no problem with any people prioritizing themselves, but you can give pennecilen to the masses and still take care of yourself. I know those resources belong to the mutants, but something tells me that when the Avengers come with a dozen or so of the most powerful beings and most brilliant minds in the universe to help save them from an onslaught of Eternals, the mutants won't turn those resources away. Share and share alike. It's what heroes do.

Fair enough. I apologize for the heated response to you, it obviously wasn't just in response to your post but the ongoing conversation about this era in general, and your post happened to be the one that had me finally hitting reply on stuff I've been thinking in general for awhile. And there is definitely a distinction between intracommunity discussions about the responses to oppression vs responses to people who have the privilege of having never faced institutionalized oppression in their lives, but I'll definitely cop to being hypocritical in my assumptions here. Mea culpa. That said, I do still wanna point out that even being on the same page in certain respects here, (yay for Deep South gaybashing solidarity I guess, lol. It was Georgia for me), even in terms of intracommunity discussions I'd still likely object to the way you phrased yes mutants have been hunted and killed, like, it did truly come across as really dismissive even if I get that wasn't your aim. I'm just saying, might be something to consider because I do still think there's a huge gap between apathy and aggression being treated as having no difference - practically speaking - just because both still ultimately can lead to death, and like, acknowledging that intent absolutely does matter in discussions of responsibility, accountability, and power dynamics. The takeaway from a conversation can still be that a historically oppressed group is still being seen as equivalent to their oppressors, even without those actual words being used, and that tends to be a very recurring impression in a lot of these conversations. I think this is an argument where being clear about nuances is important, is all I'm saying.

As to your last point about sharing while still taking care of yourself, I do agree that's possible but that's why I think its key that the actual method and infrastructure of resurrection is being vastly under-acknowledged in this convo, because like, pennecilen can be mass-produced. Resurrection, as of right now, can not....and that sheds a very different light on the matter of is something self-prioritization or deliberate exclusion, y'know? I just think the fact that the Five will be working for thirty years to even resurrect thirty six million mutants should be a lot more central to the discussion of why mutants haven't already begun resurrecting eight billion humans, and it does seem deliberate the way people keep side-stepping that as irrelevant, when I don't see how anything could be MORE relevant to discussions of mutant resurrection technology than like...the actual process needed to achieve it.

[Jv565]

Fair enough. I apologize for the heated response to you, it obviously wasn't just in response to your post but the ongoing conversation about this era in general, and your post happened to be the one that had me finally hitting reply on stuff I've been thinking in general for awhile. And there is definitely a distinction between intracommunity discussions about the responses to oppression vs responses to people who have the privilege of having never faced institutionalized oppression in their lives, but I'll definitely cop to being hypocritical in my assumptions here. Mea culpa. That said, I do still wanna point out that even being on the same page in certain respects here, (yay for Deep South gaybashing solidarity I guess, lol. It was Georgia for me), even in terms of intracommunity discussions I'd still likely object to the way you phrased yes mutants have been hunted and killed, like, it did truly come across as really dismissive even if I get that wasn't your aim. I'm just saying, might be something to consider because I do still think there's a huge gap between apathy and aggression being treated as having no difference - practically speaking - just because both still ultimately can lead to death, and like, acknowledging that intent absolutely does matter in discussions of responsibility, accountability, and power dynamics. The takeaway from a conversation can still be that a historically oppressed group is still being seen as equivalent to their oppressors, even without those actual words being used, and that tends to be a very recurring impression in a lot of these conversations. I think this is an argument where being clear about nuances is important, is all I'm saying.

As to your last point about sharing while still taking care of yourself, I do agree that's possible but that's why I think its key that the actual method and infrastructure of resurrection is being vastly under-acknowledged in this convo, because like, pennecilen can be mass-produced. Resurrection, as of right now, can not....and that sheds a very different light on the matter of is something self-prioritization or deliberate exclusion, y'know? I just think the fact that the Five will be working for thirty years to even resurrect thirty six million mutants should be a lot more central to the discussion of why mutants haven't already begun resurrecting eight billion humans, and it does seem deliberate the way people keep side-stepping that as irrelevant, when I don't see how anything could be MORE relevant to discussions of mutant resurrection technology than like...the actual process needed to achieve it.

I apologize too. You raised good points, and the last thing I would ever want to do is come off as dismissive to the comics, the characters, or (MUCH MORE IMPORTANTLY) to you as a person and what you might have gone through. I'm sorry if that's the way it sounded. It's definitely a complicated issues, and I'm so glad that I've found a space where I can kind of geek out and go over all the intricacies of it with people who love it all just as much as I do.

On another note, I'm always a huge fan of your responses. Even if I don't always agree with them, they're well thought out and always leave me with something new to consider. So, thank you for that.

(And it was South Carolina for me. So, we're defintiely kindred spirits lol)

[BobbysWorld]

I apologize too. You raised good points, and the last thing I would ever want to do is come off as dismissive to the comics, the characters, or (MUCH MORE IMPORTANTLY) to you as a person and what you might have gone through. I'm sorry if that's the way it sounded. It's definitely a complicated issues, and I'm so glad that I've found a space where I can kind of geek out and go over all the intricacies of it with people who love it all just as much as I do.

On another note, I'm always a huge fan of your responses. Even if I don't always agree with them, they're well thought out and always leave me with something new to consider. So, thank you for that.

(And it was South Carolina for me. So, we're defintiely kindred spirits lol)

Thanks. I definitely didn't want to come off as dismissive to you or your lived experiences either. Ironically, that's a huge part of my aggressiveness here, lol, as I think a lot of the convos about this era are dismissive of the lived experiences many readers do have with oppression, so obviously I need to do a better job threading that needle and not like, falling into the trap of doing the same thing that ticks me off. And that's always a worthy reminder.

[Jv565]

Thanks. I definitely didn't want to come off as dismissive to you or your lived experiences either. Ironically, that's a huge part of my aggressiveness here, lol, as I think a lot of the convos about this era are dismissive of the lived experiences many readers do have with oppression, so obviously I need to do a better job threading that needle and not like, falling into the trap of doing the same thing that ticks me off. And that's always a worthy reminder.

That's always a good thing to keep in mind. But also, you caught me at the end of particularly rough day. So, don't be hard on yourself. That's the thing with the X-Men, though, isn't it? For people like us, people from marginalized communities or even people who feel like they were marginalized individually, we often relate to them so much that they become a bit more than characters to us. I know, for myself, they helped me get through some dark times, and I'm guessing that's true for a lot of people. because of that, maybe you're a little protective of them and maybe I'm a little idealistic when it comes to them. We're sort of like parents each trying to help our kids in different ways lol

[BobbysWorld]

That's always a good thing to keep in mind. But also, you caught me at the end of particularly rough day. So, don't be hard on yourself. That's the thing with the X-Men, though, isn't it? For people like us, people from marginalized communities or even people who feel like they were marginalized individually, we often relate to them so much that they become a bit more than characters to us. I know, for myself, they helped me get through some dark times, and I'm guessing that's true for a lot of people. because of that, maybe you're a little protective of them and maybe I'm a little idealistic when it comes to them. We're sort of like parents each trying to help our kids in different ways lol

Very true. I know for my part, these days I lean heavily on the whole 'mutants don't owe Marvel humans this or that' stuff, but to be clear, its not because I don't LIKE when the X-Men and related characters 'protect a world that hates and fears them' or who do the right thing regardless of whether the person they're doing it for is 'deserving' of it or whatever. I actually do like that quality of many of the X-characters, a lot! Its absolutely something to value and even aspire to. My issue tends to be more with how its turned into a kind of EXPECTATION for them, and how often it feels weaponized against mutant characters if they don't live up to that, because like.....it has to be a choice, not an obligation, I think - otherwise you rob it of its power.

If the takeaway is that if the X-Men are doing something wrong any time they DON'T live up to this ideal, even in cases where its very understandable why they might just flat out not WANT to - then I think it dilutes the power and poignancy of how often they DO live up to that ideal, even when they have every reason not to. It raises the bar past where I think it SHOULD be, and makes it that much harder for them to go over the bar, while meanwhile, other groups within the Marvel U are treated as being totally fine for just Limbo-ing under the bar all the time, without ever even trying to do better, because there's no expectation cast in their direction, like they should aspire to more.

That's the thing that bothers me - not the X-Men BEING idealistic, but that idealism translated by readers and other characters into hard-set expectations that are used against them, any time they don't live up to them. I think we as a society, in real life, have a very very bad track record of putting the burden of responsibility on oppressed peoples to overcompensate for their oppressors' refusal to just....stop oppressing them. We put the same burden of responsibility on victims to overcompensate for their victimizers' refusal to just....not choose to victimize them. We've so innately codified the idea that exerting power over others is equal to strength, and being unable to stop someone from exerting power over ourselves is equal to weakness, that we as a society tend to look towards those who have been oppressed or victimized and expect THEM to change - because we associate that idea that 'if they could be victimized in the first place, they're more likely to change or settle in order to reach a new status quo with their aggressors than we're likely to get from expecting their aggressors to change or apologize in order to reach a new normal.' And thus, most of the time society never even actually gets around to putting any kind of actual pressure on victimizers or oppressors to be held accountable or accept responsibility for their choices to do harm....because society's already pushed their victims to accept that there's just nothing to be done about their own victimization and its senseless to ever expect their victimizers to accept wrongdoing or change their behavior, let alone make reparations.

So that's where I'm coming from with my defense of mutants having the right not to prioritize humanity or do right by them regardless of whether or not 'they deserve it.' Its not because I DON'T want mutant characters to do that, particularly the X-Men.....I just want them treated as though they have the understandable option NOT to do that - while still being seen as decent people - so that whenever they DO prioritize things like protecting a world that hates and fears them, its treated as being to their CREDIT, not the bare minimum that they owe everyone.

[Zelena]

So that's where I'm coming from with my defense of mutants having the right not to prioritize humanity or do right by them regardless of whether or not 'they deserve it.' Its not because I DON'T want mutant characters to do that, particularly the X-Men.....I just want them treated as though they have the understandable option NOT to do that - while still being seen as decent people - so that whenever they DO prioritize things like protecting a world that hates and fears them, its treated as being to their CREDIT, not the bare minimum that they owe everyone.

For me, it was what they were: good people.

Is it a choice to be good if you are good? You can, grumbling, do things you know it’s the right thing to do but you do it anyway. As I saw them so often do it.

If they are less what they were, it’s not the X-men anymore, it’s something else.

[Galerion]

Id also expect that the Avengers are smart enough to figure out that the mutants did bring Wanda back after she had died

The funny thing that they would be actually be wrong about it because technically they didn't. Wanda did it herself and a sizeable part of the book is seeing her putting herself back together completely.

She is not reliant on others to be reborn so it actually depends if the others know about it. If they do then her showing up later wouldn't raise any flags and would keep mutant resurrection still a secret to them.

[king of hybrids]

The same humans would be arguing that mutant-made drugs are having some sinister effect on humans. A) making them mutants. B) making *their kids* mutants. C) making them sterile/less fertile so that they don't compete with mutants.

And, so far, those sorts of conspiracy theories aren't happening. And when they start, either A) they'll be right, thanks to some sketch-ass plan of Beasts, or B) they'll be insane racist cranks. (Possibly both!)

But as for the RP working on non-mutants, the scan from Cerebro *doesn't know before it happens* if someone is a mutant or not. It's only by scanning the brainwaves that it determines if someone is a mutant, which means it has scanned billions of humans, in the process of finding millions of mutants, and it would be no bigger of a retcon to say that it has saved all that human brainwave data, than it was to say that it has saved all that mutant brainwave data.

It would really be no big deal, at all, for readers who have blithely accepted the 'Cerebro stores all those mutant brainscans' retcon to similarly accept that Cerebro stores *all* of the brainwave data from it's scans, including the ones it determines are not mutants (which, many mutants are, for the first 12-15 years of their life, before their X-gene activates! Kitty Pryde didn't 'detect' as a mutant until puberty, for instance, so she would have thrown up a negative for fourteen years, before that fateful headache).

In fairness, if it’s a drug at least partially developed by Beast and being pushed by an organisation that considers the East India Trading company a goal to aspire to; I’d be sus too

As for human resurrection, in the time since HoXPoX came out both Orchis and Tony Stark have managed tech versions

[WallStreeter]

Yeah. Not a fan of you insinuating that I'm dishonest, disingenuous, and a peddler of bullshit. I NEVER said they were interchangeable. I said they led to the same outcome, and they do. Mutants died because of the actions of humans (Not all humans, by the way. There were plenty that stood up with them, suffered, and died with them. I don't hear the bells ringing about bringing any of those people back), and now humans will die because of the inaction of mutants. Is that the same thing? No. Did I say it was the same thing? No. Did you say that I said it was the same thing? Kind of.

Mutants can do whatever they want. Of course, they can. But you can't let kids die and then take the moral high ground. That's not the way it works. Also, you're not the only one who was gaybashed within an inch of his life, dude. try growing up in the Deep South with a father who used slurs like they were greetings. I get the anger. I understand the want to wash your hands of people and the world. Trust me. I understand it as deeply as anybody. I'm not handwaving the suffering of a race. What I'm doing is mouring the loss of heroes who helped me get through childhood. The characters that I grew up with did the right thing REGARDLESS of whether or not the people who were asking for it deserved it. I liked those characters.I related to those characters. I wanted to grow up and be like those characters; a person who could live peacefully with people who (because of their own misguided ignorance) didn't like me. They were characters who helped humans grow and learn and who stood for a real moral higher ground. They didn't take their ball and go home.

And NO ONE SAID they were the same as their oppressors. If you don't want Iambatman putting words into your mouth, then don't put them into mine. I said they weren't acting like heroes, and I don't believe they are.

On that note, I have no problem with any people prioritizing themselves, but you can give pennecilen to the masses and still take care of yourself. I know those resources belong to the mutants, but something tells me that when the Avengers come with a dozen or so of the most powerful beings and most brilliant minds in the universe to help save them from an onslaught of Eternals, the mutants won't turn those resources away. Share and share alike. It's what heroes do.

But the mutants are not strictly heroes. Krakoa is a nation, and Arrako is a planet. They don't have to share, and no, they are not asking for the moral high ground. They did share on medicine, and that's it.

The XMen have their own resources in terms of cosmic and mystical connections, some of which they share with the Avengers.

[WallStreeter]

And thus, most of the time society never even actually gets around to putting any kind of actual pressure on victimizers or oppressors to be held accountable or accept responsibility for their choices to do harm....because society's already pushed their victims to accept that there's just nothing to be done about their own victimization and its senseless to ever expect their victimizers to accept wrongdoing or change their behavior, let alone make reparations.

So that's where I'm coming from with my defense of mutants having the right not to prioritize humanity or do right by them regardless of whether or not 'they deserve it.' Its not because I DON'T want mutant characters to do that, particularly the X-Men.....I just want them treated as though they have the understandable option NOT to do that - while still being seen as decent people - so that whenever they DO prioritize things like protecting a world that hates and fears them, its treated as being to their CREDIT, not the bare minimum that they owe everyone.

Even if you are not a victim of oppression, no one exists just to help people. Helping people is fine, but there are limits and boundaries to that. The XMen are willing to save the world and share medicines with people. Try to resurrect every human that dies? That's not going to happen. I doubt Earth even has the space or the resources for that, and frankly, it's not viable.

[WallStreeter]

The current crop of writers are actually much better writers than say fans of the 80s are used to. Particularly when it comes to nuance. No one gets it right all the time, why should heroes? There are limits and boundaries to helping other people, and of course the person doing the help has the right to decide how much of their resources and time they can devote to helping. If they need time off, they have the right to do it. And just because you are not the overall leader doesn't make you a yes man, like Cyclops was portrayed in the 90s. I'm happy he decided to do the story with the Daily Bugle. He did that in part because he didn't want to have to live like Captain Krakoa forever, as ordered by the Quiet Council. He thought it better for himself and potentially for any other XMen resurrected to simply tell the truth, instead of having to lie forever.

[Fokken]

Very true. I know for my part, these days I lean heavily on the whole 'mutants don't owe Marvel humans this or that' stuff, but to be clear, its not because I don't LIKE when the X-Men and related characters 'protect a world that hates and fears them' or who do the right thing regardless of whether the person they're doing it for is 'deserving' of it or whatever. I actually do like that quality of many of the X-characters, a lot! Its absolutely something to value and even aspire to. My issue tends to be more with how its turned into a kind of EXPECTATION for them, and how often it feels weaponized against mutant characters if they don't live up to that, because like.....it has to be a choice, not an obligation, I think - otherwise you rob it of its power.

If the takeaway is that if the X-Men are doing something wrong any time they DON'T live up to this ideal, even in cases where its very understandable why they might just flat out not WANT to - then I think it dilutes the power and poignancy of how often they DO live up to that ideal, even when they have every reason not to. It raises the bar past where I think it SHOULD be, and makes it that much harder for them to go over the bar, while meanwhile, other groups within the Marvel U are treated as being totally fine for just Limbo-ing under the bar all the time, without ever even trying to do better, because there's no expectation cast in their direction, like they should aspire to more.

That's the thing that bothers me - not the X-Men BEING idealistic, but that idealism translated by readers and other characters into hard-set expectations that are used against them, any time they don't live up to them. I think we as a society, in real life, have a very very bad track record of putting the burden of responsibility on oppressed peoples to overcompensate for their oppressors' refusal to just....stop oppressing them. We put the same burden of responsibility on victims to overcompensate for their victimizers' refusal to just....not choose to victimize them. We've so innately codified the idea that exerting power over others is equal to strength, and being unable to stop someone from exerting power over ourselves is equal to weakness, that we as a society tend to look towards those who have been oppressed or victimized and expect THEM to change - because we associate that idea that 'if they could be victimized in the first place, they're more likely to change or settle in order to reach a new status quo with their aggressors than we're likely to get from expecting their aggressors to change or apologize in order to reach a new normal.' And thus, most of the time society never even actually gets around to putting any kind of actual pressure on victimizers or oppressors to be held accountable or accept responsibility for their choices to do harm....because society's already pushed their victims to accept that there's just nothing to be done about their own victimization and its senseless to ever expect their victimizers to accept wrongdoing or change their behavior, let alone make reparations.

So that's where I'm coming from with my defense of mutants having the right not to prioritize humanity or do right by them regardless of whether or not 'they deserve it.' Its not because I DON'T want mutant characters to do that, particularly the X-Men.....I just want them treated as though they have the understandable option NOT to do that - while still being seen as decent people - so that whenever they DO prioritize things like protecting a world that hates and fears them, its treated as being to their CREDIT, not the bare minimum that they owe everyone.

It is written. It is known.
Same, BobbysWorld. Well said.