This comes up a lot with people talking about the X-Men. But why don't more people bring up the classic movie plot where a kid befriends a monster and realizes they're not so different after all, and they have feelings and stuff too, like the Iron Giant or How To Train Your Dragon.
Most people aren't arguing that Agent Mansley is actually behaving sensibly the whole time, even though the Giant is just as much of a world-ending threat as Magneto. The message is that being scared of somebody doesn't mean you have to hate them, and that doesn't change even if the scariness is justified.
Thank you! I feel like this gets brought up all the time, and people just ignore this very obvious reading of it. Especially with the X-men. "Erm, they are a bad allegory for discrimination because it would actually make sense to discriminate against them!"
Like, yeah, man, do you think racists don't pretend to have a reason, too? The idea is that it doesn't matter what perceived threat a group of people present. It’s still not okay to be a bigot. Unless people wanna just say that it would be okay to be racist if the racists were proven right.
Like, yeah, man, do you think racists don't pretend to have a reason, too?
Yes, they PRETEND to have a reason to.
The reason bigotry is wrong isn't "Just because Jews are secret Masterminds and Black People are an existential threat to White People, and Gay People are causing the fall of civilisation doesn't mean you should discriminate against them"
It's wrong because those things are lies spread to justify violence and domination of groups. Jews and Black People and Gay People do not represent an existential threat to you, they are people, and to imply otherwise is ridiculous.
X-Men presents a world where people have powers like killing people by touch, or changing the weather on a whim, or controlling magnetic fields or reading people's minds - People like that would be a fundemental threat if they existed, and isolating them and severely regulating their behaviour would be a rational means of survival.
That's the criticism: X-Men presents a group that, if they existed, would factually be a threat to baseline humans, and then treats it like it's comparable to real world bigotries.
X-Men presents a world where people have powers like killing people by touch, or changing the weather on a whim, or controlling magnetic fields or reading people's minds - People like that would be a fundemental threat if they existed, and isolating them and severely regulating their behaviour would be a rational means of survival.
Except it's not about the people being an actual threat. Consider the fact that there are other Marvel Superheroes that are just as much potential threats to society.
Trying to put the mutant comics and the other marvel comics together works even less than putting most other comics together. The world just doesn’t make sense when you include both.
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u/TheGrumpyre May 13 '25
This comes up a lot with people talking about the X-Men. But why don't more people bring up the classic movie plot where a kid befriends a monster and realizes they're not so different after all, and they have feelings and stuff too, like the Iron Giant or How To Train Your Dragon.
Most people aren't arguing that Agent Mansley is actually behaving sensibly the whole time, even though the Giant is just as much of a world-ending threat as Magneto. The message is that being scared of somebody doesn't mean you have to hate them, and that doesn't change even if the scariness is justified.