When X-men were first introduced to the public, it made sense that the public would fear them. There was limited knowledge on mutants, these beings popped up at adolescence with some very destructive powers, aliens were not generally accepted as being real, and there were only a handful of known superbeings.
Now there appeared to be thousands of heroes and villians, earth has been invaded dozens of times by various alien species, and I can not count the number of times that NY or DC been attacked and destroyed.
So why is hatred still limited to mutants only and why not ALL superpowered beings and/or aliens? It doesnt make sense to me that a hero can be well liked if his origin is unknown, or he got his powers by random chance, radioactive spider, or whatever, then as soon as you find out he was born with his powers, you hate him. Maybe this is why I can't really get into X-books anymore. It's hard for me to think that there are anti-mutant radicals that dedicate their life to the extinction of mutants, but they are silent when Skrulls attack every city or when Galactus is walking around New York.
How do you guys feel? Am I the only one tired of superduper sentinels going after the X-men while the rest of the world is facing extinction level attacks?
X-Men
Team » X-Men appears in 13410 issues.
The X-Men are a superhero team of mutants founded by Professor Charles Xavier. They are dedicated to helping fellow mutants and sworn to protect a world that fears and hates them.
When is the mutant hysteria going to end?
In the grand scheme, it's simply the way the creators want their own visions expressed in their own books as opposed to being part of a larger comic universe containing other heroes.
I feel the same, The X-Men should exist in their own universe, cause, like you said, how the hell do people know where certain heroes or villains got their powers from. It's really kind of silly
adressing the fact of why people still hate them.....racism, bigotry, Mutants (some), believe they're the next step in evolution, which is pretty much calling all us non-mutants apes or neanderthal, which would piss some people off
Imagine if a man of a different race said your race was less evolved, you would be pretty mad probably.
Also you could ask the same question of how come their still such hostile racism ( there is in America) and such religous indifference in places like the Middle East.
The correct answer---Humanity is stupid
You could ask the same question of why the KKK still exists or any hate group for that matter or why our government wants to build a huge fence to keep out Mexicans yet they don't seem to care about the Canadian border Racism still exists in comics because it still exists in the real world and it doesn't really make sense in either
The thing about the non mutant super humans is that for the most part they were once normal humans so the regular people feel they have something in common with them where as they see mutants as something they can't understand and probably won't ever be able to and yes I believe some jealousy is involved and humans usually tend to hate and fear what they don't understand and that fear prevents them from trying to understand which just makes the hate worse where as the super humans who were once normal humans have a reason that people can wrap their heads around for being different, and they give people (unfounded) hope that maybe they can be more than what they are so its basically 2 sides of the same coin they place their hate on the side of the more chaotic way of gaining powers (mutants get abilities by random chance) and their hope is placed with the more orderly side (non mutants who are given their power from a specific source)
itll end about the same time human stupidity endsSo your going to wait for humanity to die out first?
Hatred and bigotry is rarely founded on logical basis or means, and its far too captivating and compelling a story tool. So it'll probably end when X-Factor outsells Uncanny X-Men, by one hundred thousand books.
As for being tired of that theme? Well I can be myself now and then, but it usually depends on how well the writer is telling his story. So its relative. I think it has the potential to be overused, but that applies to anything really.
It funny that you say that while your avi is Thor. Marvel citizens love Thor and other Asguardians even though they know they will never become gods. What about Hercules? Captain Marvel ? the Vision? There are a number of non-human beings that still get a lot of love from the general public.
You also mentioned the KKK. The KKK initial purpose was based on hatred of black people. Over the years, their hatred flowed to Jews, Mexicans, Arabs, and to pretty much anyone who is a non-white-Baptist. Thats how I would expect some of these anti-mutant groups to do. I dont expect them to stop hating mutants, but you would think other groups would draw hatred too.
Asgard in OKlahoma? Atlanteans? Inhumans? Monster Island? Mole man's world? They cool, but we so hate the muties? So does it make sense that Bastion is driving sentinels to kill mutants while the Savage Land exists? I would think that he would be more like Maxwell Lord in DC and hate all superpowered entities.
Yeah maybe so. i understand that there is no clear logical explanation for hatred but I get tired of the same stroylines even when they occur simultaneously with other big storylines like Secret Invasion. You would think that there would be a strong anti-alien bias after the Skrulls attacked just about every country. Outside of S.W.O.R.D., you would think someone would have sent some sentinels into space to wipeout non-human lifeforms.
@Avenging-X-Bolt said:itll end about the same time human stupidity endsSo your going to wait for humanity to die out first?
yup yup
I think it's mostly a "first thing first" As with any racial purist, they look at home first. Mutants are divergent humans, therefore they sully the human genome. Before going after Aliens or Spidermen and such they need to "purify" the genome. Mutants genocide is pretty much step one, the human purists would go after the others after the mutants are done.
Also wasn't this the plot to Days of Future Past?
Actually extension by humans in Marvel, to hating and fearing and expressing prejudice to Asgardians, Avengers, those with super powers etc has happened, in various storylines, just its skewered by the types of stories writers want to write and fans want to read. Likewise there are quite a few storylines where mutants are treated warmly and favorably by 616 public in limited degrees.
I think that is what makes the X-Men so relatable. I think since they were being persecuted it makes the reads able to relate to the characters. I think Marvel and DC could make a lot more characters relatable if they did have the people start fearing superhumans. I think that would be great but I think they kinda did stuff like that in Civil War. The people were afraid that these heroes could hurt them so they introduced the Registation act.
Much in the way people actually hate those who are different because they fear the fact that only a few factors need be present for them to become
that person, I think the mutant factor is more accessible to most humans rather than say taking a serum. The belief seems to be that if mutants
are contained or ended, no more will breed. When will it end? When will it in our world might be the better question, maybe then the reflection in
art will as well?
Oh and its worth noting after reading some other posts, that X-Men characters were never meant to be that super powerful to begin with as well, just like most mutants. The goal was unique and strange powers, as opposed to powerful hero type powers. So mutants were sort of seen as an easy target. The 05 weren't really that powerful. Just enough combined with their strangeness to be considered a potential threat. These days though, they are so overpowered... (which of course lead to the depowering of so many nameless mutants and deaths of so many on Genosha) its still a weird and delicate balance that some writers use better than others.
The reason that mutants exist within the same universe as everyone else, is because they relate to millions of people world-wide. It is constantly stated that the radical beliefs that humans have against mutants, are a parallel and akin to the discrimination that we have in our own world. Homophobia, racism, sexism, and whatever else. The reason they're thrown in with everyone else, is to be the main focus of the hatred, while other groups of people (mutates for example) are still picked upon for being different, as they closely resembled mutants. This is similar to gay people being hated on, and then any straight man who is slightly effeminate being hated on just the same, as they are 'similar'.
Mastermold from the Cartoon in the 90's when he was trying to replace Senator Kelly's brain with a computer.Anyone remember where this piece of dialogue is from? "That is illogical, Mutants ARE humans".
Gold star to the first to get it right
I have always felt that mutants were the whipping boys of the Marvel universe. A group that others could vent their fears and anxieties about super powered beings on without being viewed as radical or racist. One reason the X-Men attract such a large
following is that racism and exclusion of one kind or another exist around the world and seeing heroes receive that kind of treatment and overcome it resonates with a lot of people. For a while after Stamford and the Civil War it seemed as if everyone
with super powers would be lumped into one group but the story veered away from that, so the heroes got a taste of what the mutants go through all the time.
Anyway as the the original premise of the topic when would the anti-mutant hysteria die down, well I don't think it ever really will. Right now relations between X-Men and governments while not friendly is not hostile right now. This of course will change
the next time the writers feel the need to make things difficult the X-Men to force changes on us ( of course I am referring to Schism).
^ LOLthis one
Well, it is true. Mutants are humans, regardless of what Magneto or Apocalypse would like to admit. Also, I wasn't aware that humans were exterminated in the Days of Future Past timeline.
When mutants stop suing their powers to blow things up. I'm not even being sarcastic. The sad truth is as long as mutants are more powerful then humans and as long as evil mutants use their powers in destructive ways there will always be some type of hatred. Look at Muslim Extremist and the World Trade Center. That happened nearly 10 years ago and some people still fear even average everyday Muslims. Remember all they hype about putting a mosque in Time Square. Can you imagine if that sort of thing happened every day like in the comics.
I don't like the idea of removing the social commentary the X-Men once had on their underbelly in favor of them being superheroes. It takes away what makes them special. The whole direction of the X-Books has reduced the X-Men to typical superhero sci-fi what with nature's involvement in mutantkind being replaced by Wanda/Hope, the mutant-hating NYC replaced with fun-loving San Francisco, and the Avengers even sort of taking the "hated and feared" approach from mutants.
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