John Walker: U.S. Agent #2

[cyberghostface]

"John Walker is not Archie Bunker, but he ain’t Steve Rogers, either. Much like myself, John Walker fails the Steve Rogers test, but it ain’t for any lack of trying. He is Everyman, hefting Captain America’s shield while demonstrably lacking Cap’s strength of character. He means well, but at the end of the day he’s just Rocky Balboa working the suit." -- Christopher Priest

Warning for suicide

Comments

[themajesticmoose]

"I am them"

Yep, and that's one of the many reasons why I utterly despise John Walker just like I despise braindead trash like him in real life

And John Walker definitely is not a representation of "Every man"

Just every man who is a pathetic worthless moron

[beyondthefringe]

I feel like you're coming on a little too strong with terms like "braindead trash" and "pathetic worthless moron" in relation to John Walker representing what's clearly supposed to be the rural/conservative aspects of America.

I also feel like John Walker has never gotten a good consistent depiction of what it really means to hold that set of values.

Honestly? I'd like to see a series that puts Steve Rogers, Sam Wilson, and John Walker all in the same place and forced to work together to defend the country as a whole while still coming at things from their respective values and experiences. Heck, when you think about what Steve's values as a guy growing up in 1930s New York City would be like, there's room for a much more liberal white perspective... and of course that's not even taking into account so many other ways in which America can be depicted, represented, filtered and defined...

[bravest_spinja]

I think a big reason Walker's politics has never really been expounded upon until now was that his biggest foil for a while was Hawkeye, who unlike his DC counterpart is not particularly liberal. (I don't think he's ideologically conservative. He might even like the cut of Bernie's gib. But he can be immensely sexist, and is totally against any identity politics that may mean he misses on an Avengers slot.)

[themajesticmoose]

I utterly despise all conservatives in real life and everything they believe in and stand for so obviously I utterly despise a character that's meant to represent them.

And while I definitely don't want to see Steve and Sam team up with this moron I would love to see them both kick hiss ass and tell him that he doesn't deserve to wear that uniform and never did. That would be extremely satisfying

[mrwalker]

"a guy growing up in 1930s New York City would be like, there's room for a much more liberal white perspective... "

That makes me think of Sandman Mystery Theatre. Great series. I'd imagine that given Wes and Dian would be considered extremely liberal for the time period.

[jlbarnett]

there was a post on here about his days as Captain America with him teaming with Lemar Hoskins/Battlestar. And he genuinely wanted to do the right thing, because we got his thought bubbles, but actions ended up leaving Hoskins to free himself and Walker getting there to late.

I think that was meant to be what he represented. Well meaning but over all to little to late

[armycat23]

Is that the love and tolerance that the left has made their battle cry?

....'Cuz It looks a lot like intolerance and hatred. But what do I know? I guess I am just one of the brain dead people.

I will give you one piece of advice. You can disagree with somebody and that's fine. However, your attitude will never change a person's heart. Never

If you don't care about others enough to want that, than it says more about you than them.

[bravest_spinja]

While I think mm comes dangerously close to alienating folks with the same political beliefs, I always found the idea of Trump supporters lament over civility to be pretty disingenuous. We all knew he was combative and abrasive, and has gotten into public feuds for as long as he in public life. He trolled the president (and many believe ran largely out of spite). He even pretty brazenly insulted people within the party, or sometimes their wives. What did you think was going to happen when he won? What did you think the discourse. If you voted for Trump, then you made the statement that being nice or pleasant is the absolute least important characteristic in person, maybe even a net minus.

[themajesticmoose]

I am proud to say that I am not remotely tolerant of any of the views, beliefs or opinions that conservatives hold and I think that tolerance of such bigoted garbage is utterly moronic.


And no, I don't remotely care about morons who are conservative and I don't remotely carea bout "Changing their hearts". I have no interest in "Convincing" conservatives. I don't remotely care about anyone on this planet who holds any form of socially conservative views for any reason


All I care about is that the kind of people who actually matter to me are happy and free to live their lives and do whatever we want to do without oppression, persecution, harassment or violence and that there are laws in place that keep right wing trash from being able to do any harm to us

[lordultimus]

I appreciate the attempt to make it clear that rural Americans and Trumpists aren't necessarily the same people (they certainly wouldn't be able to pay for a plane ticket and buy all that Trump merch, if you know what I mean).

I just wish it was written by someone who actually knows what rural Americans are actually like.

[armycat23]

There's a third category that's not being named. Its neither anti-trump or pro-trump.

There's tons of people who voted for Trump because of his stance for freedom of religion, free speech, anti-abortion, and pro-Israel.

Those same people recognize and commonly can point out when Trump is wrong, whether it be his insults or past.
Yet, so many people act like if you arent against everything about Trump, you are a "Trumpist" .


Its a very flawed logic. The reason why so many people in this category get dragged into "fights" is because they see the overwhelming unfair attitude. In 4 years, have you ever seen the left give credit to Trump for anything? Like at all? I haven't.

I want to be fair, I think this happened with obama as well in his presidency.....but not to this extent.

[cyberghostface]

“I want to be fair, I think this happened with obama as well in his presidency.....but not to this extent.”

Trying to equate Obama and Trump in any capacity is beyond disingenuous. If Obama had pulled even a quarter of the shit Trump did he would have been eviscerated. That’s assuming if he even got elected in the first place. This went well above partisan politics.

(Also if Trump was for freedom of religion he wouldn’t have enacted the ban targeting Muslims.)

[beyondthefringe]

Sadly, I can understand why people voted for Trump the first time around, despite everything that came up--the scandals, his history, his actions, etc.

But after four years where we saw exactly what sort of person he was, what kind of people and things he encouraged, it's hard to see anyone who voted for Trump and not think "They supported him despite the lies, hate, corruption, white supremacy, and so forth." People who voted for Trump a second time? Just yikes. Because they were ready to double down on the hatred, greed, violence, xenophobia, and white supremacy.

And the scary thing is that it almost worked. I tell you, if Trump had done the BARE MINIMUM needed to be President, especially during the pandemic, and NOT pulled quite so many of his shenanigans, he'd have gotten the second term because America loves giving Presidents second terms.

It's a real shame that the conservatives who are, as you say, pro-Israel, anti-abortion, etc, couldn't find someone who -actually- upholds their values, instead of... well... Trump. If he DID do anything positive in his term, it was purely by accident, because he stood to benefit from it, or because someone said the right thing into his ear at the right time.

I'm a flaming liberal. But I would be happy if the conservative part of America could field someone who's a decent human being instead of the Trumps, McConnells, Grahams, Cruzes, Greenes, and whatnots who embody the very worst the country has to offer.

[thezmage]

Trump did not believe in freedom of religion. He restricted the religious freedoms of Muslims and made that clear from his campaign

Trump does not support free speech. He bullies and cajoles and attacks people and tries to keep others from telling the truth about him.

Trump is not anti-abortion. He tried to force his ex-wife to have an abortion.

Trump might be pro-Israel, I can't tell. But he assigned his unqualified son-in-law to try for peace so clearly he didn't care that much.

In the past four years, the left has given Trump credit for a lot of things:

They've given him credit for trying to ban Muslims from traveling into our country.

They've given him credit for installing a cruel, inhumane, genocidal policy of separating children from their families at the border and neglecting them with no intention of ever reuniting the families for the "crime" of seeking sanctuary.

They've given him credit for ignoring Puerto Rico when they lost power.

They've given him credit for deliberately sabotaging all efforts to keep this virus from killing people by dissolving the pandemic response team, intercepting orders of important medical equipment, telling people not to wear a mask or take it seriously, pushing drugs that he knew would not cure COVID, and not even making an effort on vaccine distribution.

They've given him credit for trying to pressure an ally country to make up an attack on his political opponent. Surely you've heard of when they impeached him?

They've given him credit for inciting a violent coup attempt to overthrow the results of a free and fair election that he lost.

To be fair, in 2016 you voted for a cruel, immoral, valueless, incompetent man and then four years later you did it again, with no illusions that he could possibly be anything else, under the guise of being mad at "unfairness?" To pretend that you could possibly have had any motivation other than to propagate cruelty and death is not being fair to you.

[fra080389]

Man, this place used to be cool. Now every post is an excuse to vomit hatred against each other and to say it's okay dehumanizing who you don't like to hate them better. Too bad.

[deh_tommy]

That’s exhausting and disheartening to see, but either I’m incredibly lacking in self-awareness or that’s mostly being done by the same one or two people.

[cyberghostface]

You’re largely referring to the actions of one user here.

[beyondthefringe]

I think both Moose and Cat need to chill the fuck out, as it’s clear that they manage to represent the most intolerant and aggravating extremes of the American political spectrum, and are dragging the rest of us into the fight. Either that or they need to get a room. Can we get a mod in here to shut this down before it gets any uglier?

[scelestus]

If anything, it's interesting to see the absolutely polarized sides going at one another. But yeah, like deh_tommy posted, MM's comments definitely violate the site's Code of Conduct.

[deh_tommy]

Back on topic, I think that’s nice to see a gay male couple in a semi-mainstream book like this.

[themajesticmoose]

Wait where was there a gay couple in this issue?

[leahandillyana]

What's going on here to anger so many fans? I only see the usual dose of Anglo antiintellectualism.

[beyondthefringe]

It's not the material, per say, it's that the mere existence of the character and Priest's comments is enough to rile up multiple sides of the American political schism, so now people are yelling about stuff which doesn't relate to the comic book itself.

Around here, we call that a Tuesday.

[zachbeacon]

Thinking you're meeting Captain America when it's really US Agent must be like suddenly realizing those "chocolate chips" are raisins.

[thezmage]

Or dead bugs