X-Men and Civil Rights

[lisaquestions]

So I was thinking, earlier:

The X-Men comic book series started in 1963, featuring Professor Xavier and his five students, trying to show the world that mutants were just like everyone else by training them to be superheroes so they could fight other mutants. Specifically, the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, led by Erik Magnus Lensherr, aka Magneto (although I don't think he got a real name until much later). When humans spotted mutants, as seen in the first issue, they'd almost immediately form a mob and start attacking the mutant with whatever came to hand. I can only imagine how many times Stan Lee imagined that scene playing out and ending with a dead mutant, since most mutants at the time weren't really all that powerful - and most only had one or two powers, otherwise being fairly normal people.

The X-Men debuted the same year that Martin Luther King led a peaceful protest against segregation in Birmingham, Alabama, where he wrote the famous letter from a Birmingham Jail. The next year, three black civil rights workers were murdered by Klansmen in Philadelphia, Mississippi.

So this is the political environment that the X-Men are born in - the black civil rights movement and violence directed at it. As they mature, the gay rights movement and second wave feminism get started.

So: Why, during all this actual activism, do mutants spend so much of their time kicking each other's asses? Why does the militant, violent faction call itself the "Brotherhood of Evil Mutants?" Why does Professor Xavier feel that the best way to win acceptance for mutants is to train them to fight other mutants? Why don't mutants have a Stonewall?

This isn't really intended to be a criticism - comic books weren't really all that great at social relevance at the time. It's more, "what social forces would drive mutants in the midst of being massively persecuted to turn on each other and not take any cues from the civil rights struggles going on around them?"

Yes, I am a geek. I wear that label with pride.

Edit to clarify: I'm not criticizing the comic books or asserting they should have been written differently. I'm just asking: "Look at the history of civil rights. What would it look like to put the X-Men into that context on a political level?"

Also, read this page for an article highly relevant to this post.

Comments

[gender-euphoric.livejournal.com]

You should lj-friend homo_impetus.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

Like out of the blue?

I'll totally tell him you sent me.

[gender-euphoric.livejournal.com]

As far as I know he lives to read comics-based geekry. So this entry would hit the spot for him.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

Ha! Done. :)

[drakyn.livejournal.com]

Hmm, warning you: I've only read some comics of the various xmen series, as well as the recent movies, and the xmen: evolution cartoons.

One possible reason is Xavier's idealism; Showing humans that not all mutants are evil and some will even fight for you instead of against you is sure to win some points. Even though it doesn't change the view of mutants as fighters/killers. *rolls eyes*
One would also hope there was less dramatic, more useful activism going on behind the scenes of the comics; but then again, if it isn't shown in the source it isn't strictly canon.

And of course, Erik decided that the best defense is a good offense.

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

Mutants do have something like a Stonewall. Only they have it over and over again....
They have various rebellions and massacres and M-day.
Professor X actually is not intending to train anyone to fight other mutants per se but more training mutants to help humans and keep themselves safe.
Eric/Mageneto was originally training "evil mutants" in order to take over as Homo Superior. To enslave all non-mutants essentially. A sort of mutant manifest destiny if you will.
Grant Morrison does a really great job of showcasing that in his run on New X-men.

There is infighting within any political movement.
Magneto is/was the Malcolm X figure originally (of course prior to Malcolm turnabout in regards to violence later in his life) and Professor X was MLK.

I think comics had as much social/political relevance as they could during that time. I think many of the comic plots mirror that of SciFi during the same time period on shows like The Outer Limits for example.

The X-Men and any "good" offshoot there of do not stand for just actually kicking the asses of random mutants. They believe in protecting mutant and human kind alike from any threat that may come there way. They are working towards positive relations between humans, and if that means putting down another mutant than so be it.


Read this (http://www.alternet.org/blogs/mediaculture/94185/equality,_progressive_politics,_san_francisco_..._and_the_x-men/)
This (http://peiratikos.net/archives/2004/01/05/political-metaphors-in-new-x-men/)

And this (http://www.playahata.com/pages/morpheus/xmen.htm)

What causes the story to suffer the most is that comics are episodic tales. New writers take over and start the tale over again and re-engineer the back story when and where they can in order to sell books. Continuity be damned...especially in this age of the rockstar comic writers and artists and their one company only contracts.
We are never going to get a peace for them...it is unattainable within the medium because it wouldn't sell copy.

Did you read New Mutants in the 80's?

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

Right, but I can't help but think there were more forces at work than just "Erik's so pissed off at the Shoah that he wants revenge for that and preemptive strikes to save mutantkind from the same."

And also, yes, the entire point of Xavier's X-Men was showing that not all mutants were bad and some would fight to defend humanity - although this was hardly ever portrayed as effective. Once the X-Men defeated an enemy, they'd get verbal abuse until they went away. And of course the abusers were safe because the X-Men were fundamentally the good guys, and even threatening them would be inflated into more anti-mutant sentiment.

And yeah, I didn't mention it in my post, but the vast majority of mutants are closeted. It's considered unusual that Warren Worthington III is out in the open as a mutant, and he's largely shielded by his rich white maleness, and you see very little actual activism, lobbying, and the like.

PS

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

trans_comicgeek

Mostly dead comm, but I believe in promotion whenever possible.

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

Warren is the bucks behind the scenes. He does his activism with his checkbook like all high powered white dudes who don't believe in being the face of a movement but the force in the shadows.

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

A good use of "useful activism" in regards to any of the X-books can be seen in X-Factor Layla Miller that came out last week.
I don't want to spoil the plot, but I thought/think it was awesome in regards to social justice politics.

ETA: and activism/political action

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

Hmm - they have violent events, with the rebellions, massacres, M-Days and so on, but I'm thinking of a single defining moment where they stand up and say "no more" and do their best to make it stick.

I agree that there's a vibe of MLK/Malcolm X with Professor X/Magneto, although I think that wasn't really developed very well until the 70s-80s under Chris Claremont. I am very glad that it was developed, even though it seems like much of it has been tossed aside since.

And it's not so much the infighting, because of course there's infighting. I think it's more that the factions were so extreme and opposite each other in every way - and of course, Claremont improved that during his time by giving us the Hellfire Club, the Morlocks, Marauders, the New Brotherhood, and so on.

I'm not at all criticizing the comic books of the time - they had to deal with the Comics Code Authority, and I think that comic books as a storytelling medium were still pretty simplistic - Marvel actually went a step further than the norm for the time by acknowledging prejudice and bigotry in the first place - and the juxtaposition of a comic book at least looking at these issues right in the midst of the real civil rights struggles of the time is particularly interesting to me.

And yes, the "kicking asses" comment was unfair. What I meant was that the X-Men spent more time fighting the Brotherhood of Evil - which they had to do, because the Brotherhood of Evil kept doing evil stuff and threatening human lives. I'm just wondering "what if mutants were doing the activism as well?"

I completely agree with your point about episodic tales and new writers, too.

Anyway, again, this isn't a criticism of the comic book stories, I'm more looking at "What would the X-Men look like if all this stuff were taken into account?"

The New Mutants are the reason I became a comic book fan. Started with the first issue. I still have the first 30 or so issues plus the graphic novel.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

That's totally reasonable, and I think it's something he would do. I can't remember if he ever actually did it?

I'm also thinking of stuff like how Shaw Industries supplied Project: Wideawake with sentinels and just what the Hellfire Club did or whether they cared about civil rights, or just preferred the closet.

Also: Would mutants try to out closeted prominent mutants to increase visibility? Or is being a mutant so dangerous that it'd be a really awful thing to do?

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

I'll check that out - thanks. :)

Also, thank you for the links in your earlier comment.

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

You can look at any alternate reality available so far to decide what it would look like.
M-day brought us what the world would look like if Mags won.
Age of Apocalypse brought us what it would look like if he had won.
Grant Morrison's future visions in New X-Men or the mini-series X-Men:The End give us yet another story.

Any Exiles arc has some interesting tidbit in it of the possibilities.

Although honestly the issue that I mention of the X-factor Layla Miller special is one of the first times I have seen things put together so well.
I love Layla though, so I could just be biased.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

I don't mean the outcome, I'm fascinated by the story ideas that come from showing the process.

I also wonder about characters who have seen the future (Kitty Pryde and Rachel Summers) in Days of Future Past, and how much energy they'd put into preventing that, spreading the word about it so people know that "things are going to hell and we need to do something about it" and what that would mean.

And yes, it seems far-fetched, but hey, telepaths nearly everywhere might help with the convincing.

And yes, The End was one of the reasons I started thinking about this stuff. I haven't read Grant Morrison's future X-Men materials, though.

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

Warren is doing it currently in Uncanny. He might have done it back on the original X-factor series too, but I don't remember offhand.

Hellfire Club - the old school version anyway - only cared about making more money. They are like the corporate nation states of mutants!

Early storylines about the character Dazzler might answer your last questions or at least give some insight into it.
Outing anyone - no matter what it is for - is a pretty awful thing to do IMO.

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

Kitty would do anything.

Do you remember when Doug died and the speech she gave at his funeral?
That changed my life. I think I was like 10 or 11 or something.

You should write some fanfic about what you mean. I think this is the first time I have actually said that, so this moment is monumental. I am going to stick a flag in it.

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

I am not proving this theory wrong currently.

[drakyn.livejournal.com]

This is why I love fanfiction. I haven't read much xmen, but there is definitely this sort of story in HP; agitating for muggleborn/house-elf/werewolf/etc rights.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

Initially, he used his money to fund X-Factor, and the political implications of a group of mutants setting up a company with the intended purpose is to rescue mutants from lynch mobs, but the likely outcome of increasing anti-mutant prejudice even more, are interesting.

And yeah, I read pretty much all of Dazzler - she was in the closet until the Movie graphic novel, which temporarily torpedoed her career and sent her to the X-Men. Is she back from MojoWorld or wherever now?

The outing thing - I think outing should never ever ever be done, but I was thinking of how gay activists did (or supposedly did) the involuntary outing thing? Would this be something mutants would do?

And the backlash from other mutants for doing it, of course - never mind the damage to people who are outed.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

I agree - Kitty would but I didn't see much talk of it. IIRC, Rachel didn't talk much at all about her future experiences.

And yes, I remember when Doug died! :(

I hadn't thought of fanfic, to be honest, but it might be worth trying out. It'd be writing something, at least.

[lisaquestions.livejournal.com]

True that.

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

Kitty talks of it randomly and in small ways. I think the most she mentions it are in The End when she is running for political office (mayor of Chicago if I remember correctly).

All of my older comics are in storage across the country from me, or else I would try to find the issue I am talking about.
Kitty's speech at his funeral was and is to me still one of the most moving pieces of writing in comics.
The memory of it is anyway. I could reread it and think it was tripe, but I think that is actually an unlikely scenario.

[drakyn.livejournal.com]

Outing sounds like something Magneto would do imo. Since he wouldn't care if the prominent mutant got killed because they should have either been helping mutantkind and/or out already and therefore were betraying mutantkind.

I happen to think that the Institute/refuge of Xavier's school is a good idea. And Grey did some lobbying in the first movie. Also, would Mystique pretending to be Kelly be considered lobbying? honestly, Magneto should have kept her there until she either got found out or voted out. She could have been incredibly useful in many, many ways.

[homo-impetus.livejournal.com]

I definitely think some mutants would to advance their cause kind of in a similar queer nation way.

Have you ever heard the rumor about the time that Queer Nation activists like attacked Morrissey on stage and tried to make out with him in order to out him....
That went around when I was in junior high, but it still makes me feel like laughing at the idea of it.

Dazzler was last in the newest Excalibur, but I dropped the book from my monthly pick up list. I can not say what happened to her more recently.