tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6345577.post2281052627950697544..comments2024-03-28T09:53:43.900-04:00Comments on The Hurting: Tegan O'Neilhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14815842488966694944noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6345577.post-59312276956845832562013-01-31T06:51:38.558-05:002013-01-31T06:51:38.558-05:00Oh man you want blood on the floor don't start...Oh man you want blood on the floor don't start the whole "Falcon is a mutant" thing again.Timothy O'Neilhttp://twitter.com/timoneil5000noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6345577.post-80080587767499701282013-01-31T04:17:37.906-05:002013-01-31T04:17:37.906-05:00Frankly, the X-men have never had an in-universe l...Frankly, the X-men have never had an in-universe logical moral or ethical leg to stand on. They believe in peace, equality and civil rights for everyone; yet live in self-imposed Apartheid conditions at the Xavier/Grey School/Utopia/Muir island. How many non-mutants have EVER been allowed to join? Captain Britain? Moira MacTaggart? aaaaand -? Their sole (again, in-universe) aim is basically self-policing (self-loathing), and have almost no discernable engagement with the larger human population. <br /><br />At least Cap, Iron Man, etc believe in REAL equality - Wanda, Pietro, Hank, Firestar, Justice, Namor (a cheat IMHO, but still), Falcon (an even bigger cheat, "but still") are all allowed to join the main team. <br /><br />All the above said: Whilst his motivation may have thusfar been all over the place, this is the most interesting Scott has been since, well, Inferno. The story that there might be a younger, more credible mutant taking the 'Magneto' role - and being Xaviers chosen protege, no less - is a damn good idea. It never 'took' with Exodus, or Fabian Cortez, or *etc etc*. But with Scott? And having Magneto acting as the whisper in his ear? Intriguing...<br />It may well ruin Scott for a few years as the X-Men's 'natural' leader; but I would argue that the story potential upside way outweighs any negatives.Mords Jayhttp://www.facebook.com/mords.jaynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6345577.post-85184055400123848262013-01-29T14:19:21.594-05:002013-01-29T14:19:21.594-05:00Well, if we've done this dance before, you kno...Well, if we've done this dance before, you know that's a particularly ungenerous reading of what I said. It's not that if they aren't human they should be rounded up and put in camps, but that they *are* human already. And if the term "human" is too anthropocentric for you, well, you can just say "living sentient beings" or whatever, to grab whichever stray Zenn-Lavians or Inhumans or synthezoids happen to be hanging around. Human rights are a tricky and hard-to-pin Enlightenment concept that is never quite so easy to defend in practice as it is to air on a piece of paper, but in this case I think the argument isn't that if they aren't technically human they don't deserve human rights, but that any branch of the human family tree has a right to put its own interests above any other, to the point of courting planet-wide destruction on a hunch. <br /><br /><br /><br />The larger point is that fighting so hard for new mutants without giving two seconds' thought to the fact that there are a lot of people who would legitimately suffer if new mutants started popping up again. That' not something that any of the characters ever acknowledged.Timothy O'Neilhttp://twitter.com/timoneil5000noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6345577.post-1185532123306991482013-01-29T13:03:51.579-05:002013-01-29T13:03:51.579-05:00We've been down this road before, Tim, but you...We've been down this road before, Tim, but you're just plain wrong on this one - and viewing things too mechanically on the whole "mutants as a species" thing. Being a different species doesn't mean you don't have rights - the Vision clearly isn't human, but just as clearly deserves rights as a sentient being, as does the (also non-human) Silver Surfer, as do the Atlanteans, the Inhumans, the Kree, the Skrull, etc. The list of sci-fi and fantasy characters who wouldn't qualify as strictly "human" but would deserve to be recognized as persons and protected as such under law is a long one: think of Spock and Data, E.T., Frodo and Sam, etc. I'd hate to think you'd be okay with the denizens of Marvel Earth rounding them up into camps just because they don't have the proper set of DNA. And so it is with mutants: Cyclops has every right to fight to preserve his species in the wake of a series of genocidal threats to its existence.moose n squirrelnoreply@blogger.com