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To be fair, mutants are just an allegory for gay or otherwise non-heterosexual people. This scene makes a lot more sense when you factor this in.
Nah. It was more about disability. Prof X is in a wheelchair, Cyclops is blind, Beast or Nightcrawler disfigured, Wolverine is Canadian, etc.
Nah. It was more about disability Wolverine is Canadian
I think its just minorities in general
X-Men comics are. X-Men movies are coded to sexual minorities in particular. Like the way they come out to their parents. Including parents who are politicians who are vehemently anti-mutant.
Bi/pansexuals are often accused of skirting around the problems other LGBTQ+ folk have. They can live an outwardly heteronormative life and not have to deal with social stigma. I fit in this category. This critique is sometimes unfair, but not always.
Storm is taking up this position in OP. Rogue might be analogous to a very obviously trans person who gets a lot of looks in public, if not worse. You could see why someone in that position might want a shot that makes all their problems go away.
That's because the whole point is responding to the issues of the day. The comics first came out in the 60s, and the main players are clear allegories for MLK, Malcom X, and the KKK. 2000s movies play off 2000s issues.
yeah this is basically true, but the X-Men also surpass their allegory, often, to real life problems, by both actually treating their mutants as though they have mutant powers, and as though they have problems that go along with, say, randomly being able to explode anything you touch, right. but they also surpass their allegory by just having real world problems just exist for their characters. prof. x used to be a football star or whatever before he got wheelchaired, he's not innately wheelchaired as a result of his psychicness or mutantcy or whatever. cyclops isn't even blind, he just has laser vision. if you look at the origins of the team in giant-size x-men, they're all more, like, multiracial. you get the introduction of storm, thunderbird, colossus, nightcrawler, and none of those new characters are american, the two that would be white otherwise are basically weird monsters, and they all have to deal with shitty racism. X-Men, new and old, has kind of infamously just straight up had gay characters, and I think more recently you've had some trans characters too but idk much, maybe an area for improvement. there's no reason for their mutant powers to serve as allegory when they already portray those issues in the comic.
the distinguishing factor of X-Men in my mind is that it's a fantastical commentary on race, sexuality, gender, whatever, but it's not using the mutant powers for allegories for that. the mutant powers are just the element that makes it fantastical, and they're kind of an exploration of the concept of random mutant powers more in earnest, than just like sort of, as a vehicle for something else.
Nah. It's more of a general allegory encompassing all forms of minority groups and social outcasts. Different writers and editors choose which ones to highlight. For example, while the original Lee, Kirby 60s run--and Chris Claremont during the 70s--might have emphasized disabilities, through numerous stories like Days of Future Past, God Loves Man Kills, and New Mutants #45, Claremont during the 80s prioritized race and sexual orientation.
Wolverine is Canadian,
But still ended up Vietnam somehow.
Isn't Wolverine like 500 years old or something? I'm sure there's some movie (possibly Logan) in which he fights in the American civil war.
So I suppose maybe he just moves countries every 50 years or so, so people don't notice he never dies or ages.
Oh yeah that one too. This one, it's a a good intro https://youtu.be/kpcQOPz-HaE. Don't remember the exact date but I think it showed 18xx as his childhood.
I got more of a sense that they loved war and fighting so sought it out wherever they could.
And yet he's still Canadian somehow. He's canonically Canadian.
Won't somebody PLEASE find a cure for Canadianism, eh?
best laugh I've had all week
I remember the one Wolverine issue where he had to kill some teen whose specific mutation caused everyone around him to die. And Wolverine had to kill him and cover it up so that mutants wouldn't be hunted down.
I definitely get that's the point, but the analogy breaks down when applied to characters like Rogue. Like there may be something there about how you can feel guilty about who you are because it "hurts" other people, but there are real world ways to give those people support and love without needing to "cure" them. Rogue doesn't have that option, there's not a found family that can make her not kill people when she touches them. There's something innately and indisputably dangerous about her, which is not a great feel to apply to any marginalized group.
I see that meme a lot in autism communities, and it seems to fit very well. Every time it's posted, it gets controversial between people with low support needs claiming that there's nothing wrong with us, and people with higher support needs, claiming that it's not wrong to seek a cure.
Pedophiles. Also (historically) AIDS.
Yeah, but in those cases, no one would say "we don't need a cure."
I disagree. There are definitely people who would be “you just need to control it, no need to change it”. Which is why Storm is portrayed like that. It's a lack of empathy.
I suppose it depends on how the scene puts delivered. If it is portrayed as a lack of empathy or just understanding, then yes I absolutely agree it's realistic. If it's portrayed as an empowering moment, that's where we run into issues.
From distant memory, it was the latter, but I'm trying to find clips that put it in context. Let me know if you find one.
Tell that to the gay kid in the 80s during the AIDS crysis when everyone was scared of gay people, who just wanted the thing that makes everyone hate them just go away.
But there's a difference here. Yes there is a parallel to the AIDS epidemic here, but the difference is that the panic surrounding those with AIDS was unfounded and steeped in bigotry, while the fear of being killed by touching Rouge is very real.
Like, no it's not a moral failing to have AIDS, but that doesn't mean the incredible advancements we've made in HIV treatment are a bad thing.
To be clear, Rogue is still absolutely valid as a character who struggles with an innate affliction that is, for perceived or misguided reasons, considered dangerous. There's definitely parallels to conversion therapy and the like. But the analogy to the persecution of marginalized groups is just broad enough to contain both those whose identity is the "disease" (Storm) and those whose identity is tied to but not synonymous with their affliction (Rogue). It's the distinction that makes this particular line hit just a bit off the mark. Conversion therapy vs AZT, as it were.
Whether the threat is real or perceived, the end result is the exact same. Society blames a particular trait shared by a group of people even though a very small percentage of those people pose any sort of threat due to that trait. Gay people were literally killed because of that perceived threat. And often no one was punished.
You also have to remember the time when this movie was released. Gay people had only just started being accepted, and there was a concerted effort by certain religious groups to try to derail any legal recognition of gay people. Don't Ask, Don't Tell was still a very real thing in the military. The entire trilogy is an allegory for gay people. The original comics may have been about race, but these movies were for a different audience. It was a commentary on exactly what was happening during that time.
You can criticize the sloppy writing of the third movie, but don't dismiss the efforts by people trying to get a message across to the general population.
This scene makes a lot more sense when you factor this in.
this scene ONLY makes sense when you factor that in.
So Rogue is like Dean Pelton in this?
Gay doesn't even begin to cover it.
then maybe don't have one that literally kills people she touches, or is that some fucked up reference to aids?
In the comics they had the Legacy virus which was basically AIDS for mutants.
No. It isn't. People read way too much into children's comics. I guess when you know nothing about anything other than being gay, everything becomes about being gay.
i think you need to get some help dude, you seem to have anger issues.
i'm not gay lol
It works even better if you expand to include neurodiverse individuals as a group, with gay etc being a subset.
There is a huge spread in abilities and disabilities. What all share is being different from normal, and the reaction of "normal" people to that.
Some have massive benefits, with relatively small downsides akin to storm (e.g. well adapted autism or ADHD). Others have a mix akin to beast etc. Others are completely screwed over, akin to Rogue.
In real life, I know people who would slap you in the face for suggesting a cure. I also know others who would bite your hand off, if one was offered.
My autism doesn’t require a cure. I have my Issues but overal i am valid and content with my gifts.
Some people with autism are looking for a cure, There reasons are just as valid.
You are 100% correct and the xmen disagreeing on this topic is completely true in real life.
as a person with autism and probably adhd, my take on it is that it would be real fucking nice to be able to take a pill that makes more neurotypical for a couple hours, which is sort of what adhd meds seem to do and a big reason why it annoys me that everyone glosses over my adhd symptoms.
like yeah there are benefits to having autism, but it'd also be pretty fucking sweet to not feel like i'm going to explode because people around me are being too loud
They're more meant to be an allegory for race, with the competing mutant organizations being the competing parts of the Civil Rights movement. Professor Xavier is MLK and Magneto is Malcolm X.
No they're not. They're mutants with superpowers. Not everything is a gay fable.
This is giving strong "I don't mind gays but they don't need to shove it in my face" energy
It's an allegory for the civil rights movement with prof. X as MLK Jr and Magneto as Malcolm X. In proper allegorical fashion this means it can be representative for any form of civil resistance by a repressed class, including the fight for gay rights.
Jesus, the need to be the victim in everything is so strong nowadays.
That's how the original comics were written... in 1963.
Add in heavy elements of anti-racisim and you have a more accurate picture.
Mutants were the marginalized, of every stripe.
After all, the early 60s we're the height of the civil rights movement. The human enemies in the comics were saying shit that was lifted whole cloth from what white supremacists were saying in the US.
Tell me more! I want to hear! I had no idea.
Who, me?
No, Mutants were more than an allegory for gay and non-hetero people. They were more focused on other marginalized groups at the time. That included the aforementioned group, but bonehead worded it in such a way that it made it sound it was only for that group of people.
Yeah, they're the bonehead who worded things poorly...
I mean their username is literally Bonehead, so...
I may have accidentally implied that all mutants are just a stand-in for gay people, which the scene in question very much IS about gay people since no one talks like that about a disability. But at least I didn't just brush them off as just crying victim.