Squadron Supreme #3

[history79]

Comments

[cyberghostface]

That's a Land cover, isn't it? Looks like the woman's having an orgasm.

[doctor_spanky]

If you look close it looks like Gary Frank signed it. Not that I'm defending it

Also it's gross that Greg Land has become so known for porniness that the automatic assumption is that it's his work. Oh and art theft I guess

[roxas832]

Early Gary Frank was a little porn heavy. In contrast Greg Land started out without being porn heavy then devolved into tracing porn for Marvel's numerous Weapon X series.

[nyadnar17]

Man Stan is such a real dude. I missed a lot of his character development other than "token nice guy" when this series first came out, but looking back now? His struggles are so fucking real it hurts.

[beyondthefringe]

This was not subtle in the least.

[starwolf_oakley]

J. Michael Straczynski is not exactly know for "subtle."

[doctor_spanky]

No, but I don't think that makes it bad writing

[lordultimus]

JMS did a similar "Africa doesn't need outsiders to solve their problems" aesop in his run in Thor.

[commodus]

Great work. Try to guilt your own readers for the colour of their skin.

[coldfury]

I don't know that it's calling for guilt as much as self-reflection? It's a heavy handed allegory, but it's one rooted in real life truths. Would you like the writer to ignore reality when crafting this 'superheroes but in a world like ours' tale?

[commodus]

It's not really self-reflection when you're telling people that a certain racial group are responsible for all the worlds ills, or when you're portraying ANOTHER racial group as unfailingly noble and selfless and as perpetual victims just there to wag a finger in our face.
How exactly am I supposed to feel reading this?

[razsolo]

Lol Stan literally says "you're not responsible for all our problems", how much more coddling do you need? Also I think it's pretty clear that the African men raping and pillaging aren't blameless saints....it's not a subtle message but it's not as All White People Are Evil as you wish it was either ffs

[commodus]

Please don't insult me. If you want to talk, we can talk, but not when you're behaving like that.

EDIT: Oh, you've deleted your account, and again chosen to insult me by claiming I am part of the "All Lives Matter" crowd.
Well, I'm sorry you chose to leave this site, and I'm sure you're a nice person, but you're making some pretty big generalizations about me. For a start, I'm not an American, so your social movements are not mine. Secondly, your tacit implication that I am some kind of alt-right racist is deeply offensive. Do I HAVE to be some kind of knuckle-dragging neo-fascist to find racial generalizations offensive?
You didn't take the time to ask, you didn't take the time to know who I was and what I believed in before you insulted me, judged me, and then left the site as though I had done something wrong.
I hope you come back, and we can discuss this like adults.

[doctor_spanky]

"Please don't insult me. If you want to talk, we can talk, but not when you're behaving like that."

This type of response is what actually shuts down communication

[commodus]

I don't see how. I voiced an opinion, I did so without insulting anyone, I have responded to people questioning that opinion without insulting them. Everyone else has spoken to me in a mature manner, without getting aggressive as razsolo did.

More, I am not prepared to talk to people who speak to me in that way. Those are my boundaries, and there is nothing wrong with me establishing what I will and will not accept.

[doctor_spanky]

Refusing to communicate unless someone meets your terms shuts down communication. To me, his response didn't read as aggressive

[commodus]

But my terms are merely that we shouldn't insult one another. How does that shut down communication? You and I are speaking quite politely to each other, and that's how it should be. You shouldn't have to put up with me or anyone else swearing at you or insulting you or calling you names.

And making the statement: "how much more coddling do you need" is incredibly derisive. Had he apologised, and spoken to me in a civil manner, I would have been more than happy to speak with him. But none of us should be expected to put up with that kind of behaviour.

[doctor_spanky]

A common complaint from black people I know, when talking about race, is that their white friends will derail the conversation and make it about their own feelings. Being a straight white dude I have a lot of built-in privileges, including a bubble that protects me from ever having to address the way our history of white supremacy in the US damages others, because it only benefits me. It's not unfair to call out a defensive response as being a coddled perspective

This site has lots of insightful perspective:
https://everydayfeminism.com/2015/12/not-responsible-white-feelings/

[commodus]

Thank you for the link. I've read that and heard those arguments many times before, and honestly to me it's mostly victim blaming, and trying to encourage people to accept abuse out of a sense of guilt.
A person isn't "coddled" for not wanting to be insulted or ridiculed. And, in the case of this comic, that's precisely what's happened. It does not feel as though the writer wants any kind of discussion, but rather wishes to hector and emotionally manipulate the audience. I've seen it in a lot of other comics, too, and not once has it helped me to actually digest what they're trying to say.

[sadoeuphemist]

Where are you getting this, though? You've already said that you have no issues with what Stan is saying, per se. And the African heroes frame their issues as geopolitcal rather than specifically racial - they blame America and other nations, not the white race. They outright tell Stan that he cannot be part of them because he's an American.

Yes, of course there is a racial component connecting the two scenes, but how on earth are you getting hectoring, or emotionally manipulative, or guilting readers for the color of their skin? There's nothing in the text that overtly does this!

The reason people are calling you coddled is because you are seeing insults where there are none.

edit: I mean, you're calling this shit 'victim-blaming', how has any white person in that article been victimized??

[commodus]

No, they called me "coddled" because they believe it's appropriate to insult people who have done you no wrong. Do you know my past? Do you know anything about me? Of course not. But perhaps if you did, you would see how disgusting and offensive that accusation actually is.

[sadoeuphemist]

I have been coddling you right now, through this discussion, walking you step by step through your arguments in an attempt to find out what the hell it is you are taking offense over. You are, factually, being coddled.

This is what I mean when I say that you see grave insults where there are none. You assume that this is an attack on your past, on your entire personage, on your entire history as a human being. No, this is an attack on the words you have typed out for all the world to see, the parameters for discussion you insist on, the ridiculous offense you are taking at all this. You insist you are unknowable to me, unjudgeable. Dude, I am engaged in an argument with you, of course I can judge you based on that.

[strejdaking]

The mouthpiece character literally says white people are not responsible for all of black people's problems and that the guy who acts as if they are is treated as wrong, and the main vilain of this comic is a 100% bugfuck evil black man.

Look, I admit I'm tempted to go all "you need to grow thicker skin" to enjoy the role reversal, but I think it's impossible to deny people haven't been taking social issues, or at least percieved issues beyond any line of reason and excusing bigotry. But if that is what you take from this, that just looks like any acknowledgement of white on black opression offends you.

[commodus]

In truth, it does offend me when media like comic books are used to promote feelings of guilt and self-hatred in the people who consume them. Because at that point, it's not seriously about exploring themes of oppression, it's just beating your own readership over the head about how evil they all are.

Honestly, I'd rather people not try to discuss these things rather than trying to do so in the most offensive way possible. It's like that issue of Captain America where a synagogue got vandalised, and the whole "moral" of the story was that the Jewish people being angry made them as bad as the Nazis. It would have been better if the story had never been written, rather than doing so and presenting a warped moral message with no basis in reality.

[sadoeuphemist]

You are not addressing the argument: your claims about the story are factually wrong. Stan outright says that white people aren't responsible for all of black people's problems. Black people in this story are not portrayed as "unfailingly noble and selfless and as perpetual victims." The villains and his henchmen are all black. Even the African heroes are portrayed as acting out of self-interest: they are protecting Africa because they live there. They're not planning to use their superpowers to go out and protect the rest of the world.

Unless you can back up your reading of the story with factual claims, you are just making things up. This story is not promoting guilt and self-hatred, you are just imagining it.

[commodus]

Considering the whole diatribe the African heroes went on about how evil America is, and how sympathetically it was framed, and how they only extended ANY kindness or basic human decency to Stan, I think my point stands. The comic is taking their side, that is how the moral message is being framed.

And I fail to see the distinction between blaming a racial group for ALL your problems and blaming a racial group for MOST of your problems. It's the same basic message either way.

[sadoeuphemist]

There is a marked difference between "the comic is taking their side," and "the comic is trying to guilt readers for the color of their skin." You have yet to provide any evidence for the latter.

Here's a statement: white people were responsible for centuries of slavery and racism and discrimination against black people in America, which directly led to a lot of problems that black Americans have today.

Do you find this statement offensive? If so, how would you rephrase the same basic facts so as not to guilt trip people? Because I think it's an essentially factual statement, and communicates the same idea as what Stan said, and I have no idea why you're taking such offense at all.

[commodus]

That's a factual statement, it's completely true. No one could possibly take offense to that.

[sadoeuphemist]

Then how is it meaningfully different from what Stan says, that white people are responsible for a lot of black people's problems?

[commodus]

A good question. The answer is that the statement you provided is historical and factual, it is not weighed down with attempts at emotional manipulation or attempting to shame anyone.
Let me give you an example:
"The Germans provoked World War 2" is a statement of fact.
"You Germans started the war and killed millions of people." is emotionally cruel, and denies the agency of the individual.

[sadoeuphemist]

That's purely contextual, though. People do not speak precisely and purely factually all the time. If we are talking about WWII, and someone says that the Germans started the war and killed millions of people, without specifically accusing anyone, I would not find that to be emotionally cruel or an attempt at shaming. It's just someone speaking casually.

Conversely, someone can yell "The Germans provoked WWII!" in an argument, and be actively trying to insult a whole nation.

In what sense does Stan seem like he is trying to shame or be cruel to Hyperion, as opposed to just speaking imprecisely?

[commodus]

Taken by itself, it's true that Stan's comments seem innocuous, but viewed from the wider narrative of the story, it's clear they're part of the author's moral message.
Stan - the character - is perfectly fine. What the writer is using him to imply is where I take issue.

[mastermahan]

MOUTHPIECE MAN: We were going to deal with him, quietly, in our own way.

HYPERION: Okay, but... why haven't you dealt with him already? Again, M'Buku has been murdering thousands of your people. What exactly are you waiting for?

MOUTHPIECE MAN: Your government...

HYPERION: Is terrible, I know. They lied to me my entire life and tried to kill me, so preaching to the choir.

MOUTHPIECE MAN: Stop involving yourselves...

HYPERION: Look, I'm watching M'Buku with my hypervision, and I literally just saw him murder another person, so... have this conversation later?

MOUTHPIECE MAN: We shall deal with him now. We shall. Not outsiders. We and we alone. For it is our country. Our right...

HYPERION: FOR FUCK'S SAKE, GO STOP HIM ALREADY!

[wizardru]

I think part of the issue here is that they're acting out of their own self-interest. They COULD have stopped M'Buku earlier...but they chose not to so that they could avoid exposing themselves. But now that meta-humans have basically intervened, they can't avoid revealing their existence to the US government. So they're not exactly saints, here.

In the shadow of the Black Panther movie, the character designs for the African metas is...dull and unimaginative. I mean, look at the fashions and colors on display in that movie, the different styles. If this is supposed to be a Pan-African metahuman group, maybe choose something other than leopard patterns on jeans, a biking and some gold bangles? I mean, National Geographic is a quick reference, guys.

[miramira]

It might be better that they didn't try, if they were just going to pick stuff that looked cool without understanding the meaning behind it or what made sense together.

[jlbarnett]

headcanon: this guy is the Ollie Queen of the group and doesn't speak for them as much as he wants people to think. The guys who took out the dictator had probably wanted to before but were outvoted

[sisterofbloomerjunior]

Nice to see M'butu with normal sized ears rather than having it look like a second face is forming on the side of his head.