Captain America Vs. The Tyranny Of "Dark"

[Azahul]

Snip

Like I said, the issue is complicated and hard to get your head around. But since my first attempt didn't work, let's begin with the basics.

First of all, it is possible for one brand of right-wing philosophy to be different from another right-wing philosophy. The same goes for the left. The Nazi brand of right-wing philosophy is quite different from the modern American one, so it isn't that surprising that you're focussing on some superficial similarities. The terms "left" and "right" are extreme oversimplifications that do not accurately convey reality. There are a broad spectrum of different policies that make up each of these "wings", and an extreme version of either philosophy may only focus on a handful of those policies.

Second, as a result of the above, it is possible for a group to simultaneously be right-wing and be a proponent of big government. In the case of the Nazis, the aspect of the right they chose to focus on was social inequality, based on race. Their Nationalism was largely predicated on the fact they saw Germany as an Aryan state. They justified their big government by using it to advance the cause of their chosen people. It's stupid and not much like America's current brand of far-right politics, but it is what you get when you focus on one tiny aspect of a philosophy and advance it to an insane degree. It's not always going to look the same. In this case, Big Government is a tool often used by extremists because a democratic system makes it very hard to enact radical change. Totalitarian rule can be used by either wing if they need to advance a truly extreme set of policies, and was in the case of the Nazis.

Third, all philosophies want to attract supporters from the majority of the populace. That "Volkswagon in every home" quote you keep tossing about isn't an indication of left-wing philosophy. The far-right in Germany, heck, the right in most countries both at the time and in the present, promise the exact same things, but had different ideas to the left on how to go about getting them. The important difference is that the right promised these things to only a certain portion of the population. The hard workers, if they were emphasising a capitalist policy, or to those of the superior race, in the Nazis' case. The left, by contrast, would aim for total equality. And if you really think there isn't some level of political spin in the above statement to trick people outside of the chosen few into voting for the Nazis, you're being pretty naive. All these policies aiming to attract support from the working class, and discriminating against the rich, were based in the rhetoric of a superior race for a reason.

Finally, the policies that are generally believed to fundamentally define the extreme right is a rejection of equality and a rejection of democracy, combined with a powerful sense of nationalism. The Far-Right in this case believe that there are naturally superior people, and rather relying on economic forces to raise these people to the top automatically, they believe it is the job of the state to put them on top and to remove the inferior members of the population.

Like I said before, no one, not the Nazis themselves, their enemies, their allies, their supporters, or the overwhelming majority of modern historians and political analysts, call the Nazis left. Their policies are rooted in a distorted version of right wing philosophy. They flagrantly attacked the traditionally left standpoint of universal equality.

I'm sorry, but by every modern definition we have, the Nazis sit on the right. You can continue to point at things that, to you, look left wing, but I can assure you that you are factually incorrect in this matter (insofar as it is possible to be when discussing social sciences and arbitrary terms life "Left" and "Right"). I won't deny that the Nazis occasionally instituted a left wing policy, but the foundations of their philosophy were all coming from the other side of politics. To reiterate though, this isn't an association that the right should be ashamed of. Political philosophy generally gets to a point where it's so extreme the only policies you can really equate it to are other, equally extreme ones. I tend to think of the Nazis as extremists, more than any particular political affiliation.

And, for the record, I'm not even going to touch on your opinions on modern politics. Some things are just beyond me.

 

[Therumancer]

[

Finally, the policies that are generally believed to fundamentally define the extreme right is a rejection of equality and a rejection of democracy, combined with a powerful sense of nationalism. The Far-Right in this case believe that there are naturally superior people, and rather relying on economic forces to raise these people to the top automatically, they believe it is the job of the state to put them on top and to remove the inferior members of the population.

Like I said before, no one, not the Nazis themselves, their enemies, their allies, their supporters, or the overwhelming majority of modern historians and political analysts, call the Nazis left. Their policies are rooted in a distorted version of right wing philosophy. They flagrantly attacked the traditionally left standpoint of universal equality.

I'm sorry, but by every modern definition we have, the Nazis sit on the right. You can continue to point at things that, to you, look left wing, but I can assure you that you are factually incorrect in this matter (insofar as it is possible to be when discussing social sciences and arbitrary terms life "Left" and "Right"). I won't deny that the Nazis occasionally instituted a left wing policy, but the foundations of their philosophy were all coming from the other side of politics. To reiterate though, this isn't an association that the right should be ashamed of. Political philosophy generally gets to a point where it's so extreme the only policies you can really equate it to are other, equally extreme ones. I tend to think of the Nazis as extremists, more than any particular political affiliation.

You are basically either a victim of propaganda who thinks this because it is what you've been told to think (historical and social re-invention in schools are a big thing) or your trying to project based on the labels you want and/or justify the side you want to back in the current context.

Left wing philosophy is about the sacrifice of personal freedom for the state. It's typically sold in terms of equality, so that it appeals to the masses on the lowest rungs of society who are to be conceptually lifted up, while those they see as their oppressors, or the ones they envy, brought down. It's based heavily on the idea that true communism does not work because if people are left to their own devices, none of the required jobs to support the society are going to get done. Every person wants to do something they enjoy, and contribute in their own way, or otherwise do a job they feel is important and rewarding. Society only needs so many people who are doctors, lawyers, leaders, etc... but tons of people who do backbreaking labour in farms and factories. The idea of socialism is you have a government that controls everything presumably to ensure everything gets done and fair distribution of what society produces, which basically amounts to the politicians who represent the idea (ie members of the party) controlling everything. It also comes with tight societal controls in the name of allowing freedom.

This is both the Nazis, and the American democratic party in a nutshell. Both appeal to the lowest rungs of society by promising them more than they have. Appealing to feelings of persecution (even when not grounded) among minorities, and the poor working class who look up at the top 1% with envy. The left wing basically pushes a social agenda that amounts to a central, all powerful government, forcing equality. It's great when your being lifted up, but not so great when the system settles in and you hit that ceiling. The truth usually doesn't fully sink in until you have the left wing government fully in power, running around slapping down anyone who disagrees for "hate speech" or whatever while insisting it's promoting freedom and protecting people, and of course all the people at the bottom realize that at the end of the day someone still needs to dig ditches and they wind up in pretty much the same place. Except instead of a bunch of nobles, corporations, or merchant lords running everything it's party officials filling pretty much the same role.

In comparison the right wing tends to be more about individual liberty, with a certain degree of "might makes right" thrown in for good measure. The right wing is more or less about the ability of people to reap the benefits of their success, and to pass it onto their family dynasties. The government is supposed to largely be there to take care of the people and deal with "big" issues like maintaining roads, fighting wars, and defending American business interests. Ideally most laws and social policies should be set and resolved on a local, or state, level where the people in a community (lead by their leaders who tend to be the most prosperous citizens) decide what happens in their own back yard.

In reality the two sides are the opposite of what most people seem to think they are. It just seems different because the left wing generally comes running in on behalf of minorities who otherwise wouldn't get much say in anything, and forces them down the throat of the majority. Basically having Uncle Sam come into a town and say "we don't care what the people here want you can't do this, and have to let these people do whatever it is they wanted to do". If your on the receiving end of the benefits of that "social justice" or have been convinced academically it's a good idea, your all for it, and think that giving the government more power amounts to protecting the freedom of the people. Sadly it's not a perfect world, and freedom generally means a lot of people are going to have the right to be oppressive dickheads when enough of them get together.

In reality neither "side" here is correct. Taken to the extreme it's pretty much "Nazis Vs. Cowboys" for a simplistic analogy. As a result I don't fully lean towards either camp. However all semantics aside, yes, the Nazis were, and always will be, a left wing movement.

Nationalism and other things tend to be something that exists outside of the left wing/right wing context. In the Nazis case the nationalism came from feeling they were wronged during "World War I". What's more once a left wing power structure took over, it rapidly became a cult of personality, except rather than an emperor, king, or congress, it was being run by the higher ups of the party who themselves had their own agendas, and control of the media. That's pretty much one of the problems with a strong central government that controls everything and the left wing philosophy. If some dude like Hitler and his lackeys control everything and they decide they not only want to get revenge on the world, but also genetically resurrect a bunch of psionic blonde haired giants they believed once ruled the world... well, that's going to be your national agenda.... and by the way the whole occult angle and teachings of "The Brotherhood Of Thule" were the key to the whole thing. Hitler's "Master Race" didn't yet exist, he planned to (re)create it, which is why he didn't match the description of the people he thought should be ruling us all. On and odd and frightening note I'll add (just to ramble) that one of the things that Hitler did that made him so powerful was being able to convince a lot of his political rivals to join him in his crusade. He pretty much walked into a room with people who hated him, put on a presentation, and BOOM, now the guy is on his side. The thing is that a lot of Hitler's theories also inspired a lot of his archaeology expeditions and so on, what's more a lot of effort was made after the war to cover up a lot of Hitler's research and findings. Given that a lot of the biggest experts on history and such in the world teamed up with him to one extent or another, it's lead to a lot of conspiracy theories that Hitler might have been right about certain things, including another race in pre-history, the location of Atlantis, etc... this is what inspires a lot of those "weird tales" about Nazi expeditions and the like, along with "X-files" like theories about how the allies agreed to more or less hide the evidence to keep the peace, etc. The big point is that Hitler was a whacky dude whether he was right or not, and half the problems with the Nazis going militant was because he was so bloody charismatic, and was calling the shots. The antics of him and his followers have little to do with the nature of the central philosophy or where it went.

Now it's great to sit here and try and make academic points about what right and left wing might mean in different parts of the world. But in the context of this discussion it's pretty straight forward. The Nazis were left wing, and Hitler built his little army off of left wing philosophy.

For the most part though, you are correct to an extent that usually right wingers will be the more aggressive ones, but largely when their interests are threatened. One of the few uses for the central government is of course to fight wars. This means the military is going to be used to leverage this like trade, and to seize and protect resources, and otherwise try and ensure as much power as it can for it's patron nation. The old maxim "Free trade means he with the biggest guns trades freely" pretty much represents this kind of attitude.

 

[softclocks]

Maybe people enjoy Captain America (in the comics at least) because at this point he's almost the only one who hasn't had a mad slip into grimdarkness. His ideals aren't limited to the Empire of America anymore, but he's become more of an international symbol. As with everyone in comics it always comes down to the writer and any criticism levelled against a character is often just the case of someone having only seen a movie or read a handful of comics. Or as is the case with Superman, they've never touched a comic or severely lack imagination.

Superman's unbeatable? really? Because he's strong? He's been down for the count more times than I can count. And though he's arguably the top member of the Justice League, he's at the very least surrounded by his nigh-peers. Which is not the case wtih Thor, someone who's more or less Superman's equal yet has to function on a team where most people hover around hawkeye's level....

 

[JoshuaMadoc]

I think I can simplify this whole situation by saying that the ones wanting Stevie to be a prick are the same people who would curse and lambast anyone playing as Paragon Shepard, swearing to be a Renegade Shepard or a Sith or even a dickhead Dragonborn that joins the Dark Brotherhood at the earliest opportunity, just so they can have fun killing everyone and everything.

Sociopathy's cool, guys. If you're an 8th grader. Plus, compassion and empathy aren't strictly American values.

 

[WaltIsFrozen]

Captain America was a nice guy, but was presented in the context of a commando who was pretty much doing stuff behind enemy lines, indeed the entire team name "The Invaders" kind of summarizes what their intended profile was.

If you're going to keep pointing to the name of the Invaders to insist that Captain America was intended to be more militant than portrayed in the movies, just keep in mind that the first appearance of "The Invaders" was in 1969. In the 40's (after the war) the group was called "The All-Winners Squad". Like DC's "All-Star Squadron" it was a retcon group of Golden Age superheroes. Knowing Stan Lee's writing, it's almost certain that the Invaders were so named because it sorta sounded cool. The Invaders probably did as much invading and the Avengers did avenging or the Defenders did defending.

 

[sXeth]

At his grittiest, Captain America should be James-Bond but American with Superpowers. Which is still fairly lighthearted and healthily cheese-dipped.

If anything, he stands out because he does heroics because its the right thing to do (similar to Superman), rather then the myriad of anti-hero motivations (Revenge, money, disrespect for the law, angsty childhood, etc)

 

[Therumancer]

Captain America was a nice guy, but was presented in the context of a commando who was pretty much doing stuff behind enemy lines, indeed the entire team name "The Invaders" kind of summarizes what their intended profile was.

If you're going to keep pointing to the name of the Invaders to insist that Captain America was intended to be more militant than portrayed in the movies, just keep in mind that the first appearance of "The Invaders" was in 1969. In the 40's (after the war) the group was called "The All-Winners Squad". Like DC's "All-Star Squadron" it was a retcon group of Golden Age superheroes. Knowing Stan Lee's writing, it's almost certain that the Invaders were so named because it sorta sounded cool. The Invaders probably did as much invading and the Avengers did avenging or the Defenders did defending.

Actually they largely operated out of a British castle controlled by "Union Jack" from which they made incursions into Nazi territory. Albeit this was presented as "liberating" the area from Nazi control, since of course The Invaders were the good guys, and of course Captain America and company did go behind enemy lines, and actually entered Germany (invasion) to fight the Nazis at various points.

The gist of which is that Captain America and company was big on offense, and going after those that threatened the US. He didn't sit there and go "well gee, maybe of the Nazis come here I'll do something, but otherwise I'm going to sit here and munch Bon Bons". He would properly be all for going after guys like Kim Jong Un, Vladimir Putin, China, or various Middle Eastern powers. Indeed even Mr. "I hate bullies" would be looking at the cause for the kinds of security Nick Fury was promoting which came from playing defense, when arguably Cap would be looking to deal with the cause of the problems. On some levels I'd imagine Captain America would have probably supported going further than Nick Fury and doing something similar to Hydra's plan, say moving the Helicarriers over China, North Korea, and The Middle East and using them to pick off leaders and people threatening the US. His form of idealism would pretty much be that once those kinds of threats are dealt with, then we don't need this level of paranoia anymore. On a lot of levels the Helicarriers were a human war fighter's dream, since they could pick off enemies without causing huge amounts of collateral damage.

 

[coheedswicked]

[quote/]All of these complaints may call to mind the timeless question about Superman: Why should we care about a guy who's invincible and endlessly nice? But in recent decades, comics writers have done a great job explaining that Superman is basically a god, capable of doing godlike deeds and inspiring us to be as good as we can be.[/quote]

Captain America being a guy with very limited power (especially in comparison to Superman) and still being the paragon of good and an idealized person makes him a much more powerful symbol. You don't have to be an invincible god in order to achieve an ideal. Captain America shows us that [i/]humans[/i] are capable of great things, not just OP space aliens

 

[coheedswicked]

Furthermore, a degree of militant nationalism is sort of what the country needs for a lot of reasons. The only way to really defeat a culture is to break them, it's not nice, and you avoid going to war, but when you do it, you need to go all out. All this idea did was send a bunch of reserves overseas so we could fight a bunch of guys rifle to rifle in their back yard, and totally negate our tech advantage and invalidate the trillions of dollars we spent on weapons to ensure where if something like 9/11 happened we could break the culture of the offenders quickly and easily with minimal risk to American lives.

Militant nationalism? Break the other culture? I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure you just quoted Hitler.

Btw despite whatever Fox News may have told you "terrorist" is not a culture.

 

[Therumancer]

Furthermore, a degree of militant nationalism is sort of what the country needs for a lot of reasons. The only way to really defeat a culture is to break them, it's not nice, and you avoid going to war, but when you do it, you need to go all out. All this idea did was send a bunch of reserves overseas so we could fight a bunch of guys rifle to rifle in their back yard, and totally negate our tech advantage and invalidate the trillions of dollars we spent on weapons to ensure where if something like 9/11 happened we could break the culture of the offenders quickly and easily with minimal risk to American lives.

Militant nationalism? Break the other culture? I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure you just quoted Hitler.

Btw despite whatever Fox News may have told you "terrorist" is not a culture.

Hitler wasn't wrong about everything, that's how you fight a war for real, furthermore it's what we did to him. Once we broke through their defenses guys like Sir Arthur "Bomber" Harris pretty much set about decimating the civilian population and infrastructure. He was the guy who said (a close quote) "I value the life of one British Grenadier more than the lives of 10,000 Germans". We pretty much rounded up groups like The Hitler Youth and mass murdered them (kids), fought the Volkssturm (citizens militia basically) building to building as we destroyed their homes, businesses, etc... on our way across the countryside. Even once the war was over we continued to pretty much hunt down anyone even suspected of having any connection to the Nazis or loyalist sentiments. That's how you fight a real war.

The thing is that the US hasn't really won a signifigant war since World War II because we've become too moral and started believing our own hype. We won "World War II" because at the end of the day we were bigger bastards than the Axis was, and we literally broke the people we were fighting. When it comes to this kind of stuff about "antiseptic wars" and "not targeting civilians" you accomplish nothing. After all an intact culture is just going to rally and seek revenge at some point (arguably this is part of what caused World War II, since Germany was not properly broken during World War I), what's more even if people do not actively fight you, the ideas they hold and practice publically as a culture leads to an endless source of fighters. When a nation is incapable of direct confrontation, it produces things like terrorists. The US is incapable of dealing with problems like "The Middle East" because at the end of the day we won't simply decimate the populations and break the cultures, which ensures a countless stream of insurgents will appear, when one terrorist organization is destroyed, another one will simply appear.

It should be noted that when I talk about The Middle East I talk about "Muslim Culture" that is to say theocracies that are organized around tribal and religious laws, where faith overrules rationality and logic. Basically a group of barbarians that still enslave women, and can only be dealt with by outsiders if the women pretend to adopt a submissive posture, and have other policies and laws society-wide that are just as off kilter, represents a problem. Especially when those people are out to force their way of life onto others, and you see leaders of major nations in the region openly referring to countries like the USA as "The Great Satan" during diplomatic events. Sure your average dude down there might not be strapping on a bunch of bombs and preparing to board a plane, but his beliefs, due to the culture he was raised in, and what he supports, combined with all of the other people like him, ensure that the conflict continues and there will always be enemies and ignorance. We kind of saw the failing of a humane approach when the first thing Afghanistan and Iraq did with their new constitutions was declare themselves "Islamic States" (ie theocracies). To really deal with the problem we need to pretty much purge the Muslim people's in that area to an extent similar to what we did to the Nazis (ie have modern equivilents of "Bomber" who was known as "Butcher" to the Germans, flying over towns, villages, and fleeing refugees dropping daisy cutter bombs like raindrops). Followed of course by chasing down anyone known to have serious Islamic beliefs and executing them using intelligence services and general hunters, much like how people spent decades chasing down bloody camp guards after World War II (which also ensured any surviving Nazis stayed deep underground and did very little in order to survive, which caused their ideologies to die out as they did). Had we not done what we did, we would have had German patriots and Nazis fighting us from the shadows as terrorists pretty much eternally as the culture of the time survived, and produced more fighters, even if they never produced enough support to build standing armies (especially with all eyes on them).

Despite how this might sound it's not because I revel in death that I say such things, it's simply because it's what works. War as a general rule sucks. But it sucks more when you don't pursue it properly and keep it going endlessly. To put things into perspective if someone actually invaded the US, if we weren't eradicated much the same way, we ourselves would produce an endless insurgency, we even make this point ourselves in the media. To be honest it's foolish not to give other peoples (all men being equal) the same credit that we give ourselves.

In general I use the terms I do when talking about problems in The Middle East largely because I'm tired to getting into it about what to call the people I'm talking about. For the most part the people I argue with seem to like playing sematic games, in the hopes that if they can avoid easily labeling the group, that means we won't have to deal with it. For the most part I talk about Middle Eastern culture as the enemy, because there are people who practice Islam peacefully and don't cause any problems or contribute to that culture overseas. What's more I feel that if you take out the problems at the source, and then follow through beyond that, like we did to the Nazis, you can deal with an entire movement of cultural fanatics.

I've love to see the entire Middle East go through a renaissance tomorrow and fall to it's knees collectively weeping tears and apologizing to the western world en-masse. But I don't see it turning over a new cheek in the near future, and honeslty I'm tired of the crap, bending over backwards, and living in fear. As far as I'm concerned this stuff started before 9/11, and I long ago just flat out had enough. Sure, the US isn't moral paragons, but then again all wars come down to "us or them" when you get down to it, cackling comic book evil doesn't really exist. They call us "The Great Satan" okay, fine, let's be the bad guys then and show them what Armageddon looks like. While I don't think actual racial genocide will be nessicary, though in my darker moods I occasionally think it would be amusing to restore the ethnicity in test tubes if they pushed it that far (via stored egg and sperm) if that happened, and then point out to the "New Arabs" as they learn about the old culture that their creators... their god so to speak... is now basically an American in a lab coat.

Alright well, thinking about this stuff gets me depressed, so thanks for that, but this should answer your questions. I am not going to argue the points here, or continue this any further, because we are getting WAY off subject.

In the context of Captain America, being a bloody super hero, of course he's not going to focus on the gritty realities of war. He's all about forcibly pushing the US's agenda, but he does it in a comic book fashion where the bad guys are bad, and the good guys are good. You generally don't see Cap pushing bombs out of Arthur Harris' bomber, and giving him a fist-bump as the explosives blow poor fleeing schlubs to pieces down below him. Captain America doesn't say grab a bunch of 11 and 12 year olds, put them against a wall, and machine gun the lot of them. Captain America doesn't leave behind giant corpse piles, or make a bunch of Volkssturm defending their homes after the allies enter Germany dig their own graves. Nor does Captain America say run down some 70 year old dude running a candy store and decapitate him with his shield because he once slung hash in a Nazi barracks. Yet all of these things are part of war, and what's going on in the background. If you think about it Cap supports all of this, but the point is your not supposed to think about it that much. In the context I'm talking about Cap should be say invading North Korea, China, Russia, or The Middle East and thwarting plans there, and in favor of defenses against those enemies (and hating them for making such things necessary, defeating these enemies means not needing to sacrifice that much liberty, much like how winning World War II meant an end to martial law which was even more oppressive). You can say have Cap go up against China or Putin without having him slaughter civilians, in a proper Captain America story, something like that just should never come up, and focus on him fighting soldiers and such and crazy patriotic super villains, taking them out before they can have an influence on the greater conflict.

That said we'll have to agree to disagree, I don't see much more being said, and as I said, war sucks, and just discussing the realities depress me. I really wish it was different, but well... it's not. As I said, wars become inevitable, and it's never about right or wrong, but competing agendas where both sides are right and wrong simultaneously, and things are resolved by whomever the biggest, most murderous bastard is. The winner makes their biggest bastards heroes, the losers get to have theirs executed as war criminals. The history books tell it all from the perspective of whomever won. Whether the resulting changes are good or bad in the overall sense is something people are going to argue about for centuries afterwards.

 

[Gunnyboy]

Cap is a certified hypocrite. The only reason he exists, is because of an unethical weapons program. He now despises the same things he was a part of. He also has no problem doing illegally covert missions, but gets upset when others do as well. He's nothing but a naive fool, rooted in "greatest generation" romanticism. He's nothing but a propaganda tool

 

[P912]

Captain America Vs. The Tyranny Of "Dark"

Is the Star Spangled Avenger too nice? Hell no. Wishing he was meaner is failure to grasp the concept.

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Yeah I'm also just quoting for a possible reply tbh sorry ;-D

But what I find about these dark and nasty characters is that they seem to be a reaction to the rash of antiheroes on TV e.g. Tony Soprano, Dexter, etc. But what a lot of people seem to miss is that they only work if they do bad things BUT there is some mitigating factor. Heisenberg is a ruthless drug dealer BUT he was once an ordinary decent guy. Dexter is a serial killer with violent urges BUT he understands this and enforces a strict moral code to keep innocents safe from his "dark passenger". Even in video games and movies we see this: Cpt. Martin Walker from Spec Ops The Line is bloodthirsty and deranged, BUT his innate desire to do good and be a hero clashes with his inherent brutality.

Where less talented people go wrong is just assuming that being a bad person is the same as being complex. Joffrey isn't complex because he's a prick. He's just a spoiled prick, and a TV show that made him the protagonist would suck. The only reason he works is because his concentrated prick-ness provokes interesting reactions from the more rounded characters. In my opinion, this is what made GTA V's story fall flat for me. Trevor was universally cruel and nasty, and his few moments of redemption are pathetically crowbarred in to give him some depth i.e. clarifying that he doesn't condone torture after he GLEEFULLY tortures a guy without hesitation. Michael was just greedy and mean to his family and friends. And Franklin was just... sorta there? I guess he was more a case of "trying to get out the game" cliche, but he didn't even have the angle that he was sick of the immorality of crime: he just wanted to get more money. Niko Bellic was an exploited immigrant who tried to fight his violent nature. This bunch just went along with all sorts of shady bullshit with no pause or consideration for the consequences. They weren't antiheroes. They were cold-hearted villains who we happened to be playing as.

Captain America's characterization comes from something much more deep than "I'm a prick, now I need to stop being a prick". His flaw comes from the fact that he can't save everyone. He has the moral firmness and bravery of Superman but without the invulnerability. IMO this makes him more compelling as a paragon of justice. He wants to save everyone and he tries to save everyone, but unlike Superman, he can't. He couldn't save Bucky. He couldn't stop his best friend being turned into the Winter Soldier. He couldn't prevent SHIELD from being taken over by HYRDA. He couldn't stop Red Skull's scheme without giving up himself. Unlike Superman, he has to make sacrifices to stick to his moral code. And the great thing about him?

He still does it. He fights gods and aliens. He loses out on the prime years of his life. He finds his love interest in a nursing home with Alzheimer's. He finds that his best friend has been brainwashed. He finds the organisation that he fought for has, like his country, been slowly cannibalizing it's ideals out of fear and seeking to dominate the world rather than lead by example and help those in need. He is hunted down by said organisation and forced to be a fugitive. He is forced to fight his best friend and gets shot several times trying to foil the HYDRA plot. But he never stops. In a world with walking WMDs like Iron Man and The Hulk, this mere soldier with his shield will never stop. He will never waver. And he suffers for it, yes. But it is in this suffering and struggling that his commitment to do the right thing becomes both inspiring and significant in a way aimless cynicism could never be.

The Cap is a good person AND a good character. He has flaws in that he is naive and incapable of dealing with moral ambiguity. He deals with tragedies. His character changes as he is forced to deal with a world of moral ambiguity. But his inherent decency makes for a compelling and sympathetic character on a level that we rarely see.

And if we're going on pure wish fulfillment and escapism... well as awesome as brooding and money is Mr. Wayne, I'd personally prefer to fantasize about always having the bravery to do the right thing like the Captain.

 

[coheedswicked]

..That's how you fight a real war...

I understand your point, you're basically describing total war. But total war is unrealistic in modern times for several reasons.

1. Nazi was a polictal party, not a religion, it is much more difficult to "wipe out" a religion than it is a nation or political system.

2. (and this is the biggie) Global economics. We won't declare total war on an Arab state because we need their oil. Arab states won't declare war on us because we buy all their oil. Same could be said of China or basically any other country we have an idealogical disagreement with. China won't invade us because we buy all their stuff. They'd be broke without us.

Basically it comes down to the heirarchy of what people really care about.
Politics/Ideals<Religion<<<<<<<<<<<MONEY

Money is how the world works. Literally everything is controlled by money and there is no money to be made by crushing the Muslims so it won't ever happen.

 

[Azahul]

Snip

Where you're going wrong and clearly getting terribly, terribly confused is your belief that "right" and "left" wing have set meanings. You can't just disregard my point about having an academic discussion about what these terms mean in different parts of the world, because that is literally what this argument is about. We are just debating which of the the entirely academic terms of "Left" and "Right" best describe the Nazis.

To reiterate, Left and Right do not always mean the same thing. A lot of those common policies and philosophies you listed are, generally speaking, true to a greater or lesser extent. The world does not fit into your boxes as well as you think it does though, and sometimes you end up with groups like, say, the Nazis, who do not fit so easily. It is possible, amazing as it may seem, for one side of politics to use the policies of another side. It is possible for some groups on one side of politics to emphasise certain aspects of that side's philosophy to a greater degree than any other aspect.

This is what the Nazis did. They took the quintessential right wing "some people deserve to have more" (usually justified by having worked harder for it) and bundled it in with racial policy and Nationalism. They, and this is quite obvious given even the most basic knowledge of the Nazi Party, despised the essential "left" philosophy of "all people deserve to be equal". They took a philosophy usually found on the right, twisted it, perverted it, and carried it through to an extreme that few people could even comprehend.

To do this, they used a measure of big government. They look left because they sought to elevate the majority of the people to a certain level, but their motives for doing so were racially and nationally motivated. They were founded on principles of inequality, which divorces them from what is generally regarded as the fundamental principle of "Left" philosophy. If you examine their economic policies, they were actually a lot less controlling than the majority of Far-Left economics at the time. When combined with social conservatism and a philosophy that is practically the antithesis of what the left is supposed to stand for, not to mention the wealth of historical evidence we have, it's hard to call the Nazis anything remotely left-wing.

Basically, all I'm saying is that the use of a big government can be used by any side of government. The world is a complicated place, and it's not always going to conform to the way you think it should. That said, trying to argue that the Nazis are left wing, when historians, political analysts, contemporary allies and enemies of the Nazi party, and the Nazis themselves consider it either right-wing or impossible to place on the spectrum... well, it's a little bit laughable.

 

[Therumancer]

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Basically, all I'm saying is that the use of a big government can be used by any side of government. The world is a complicated place, and it's not always going to conform to the way you think it should. That said, trying to argue that the Nazis are left wing, when historians, political analysts, contemporary allies and enemies of the Nazi party, and the Nazis themselves consider it either right-wing or impossible to place on the spectrum... well, it's a little bit laughable.

No, the problem is that the media and those scholars, historians, etc... that are given a platform say that largely because of the negative connotation with the Nazis. It's laughable, and makes any "reputable" source look ridiculous when they claim that a movement that even had "socialist workers" in it's name was a right wing philosophy, it was very much a people-oriented left wing movement based around the perception of social justice. Indeed this fits in with the constant issue of leftward historical reinventionism (presented as being "the truth that had been surpressed" or new information or whatever), something which of course comes about largely due to liberal control of a lot of schools, and campuses and the like being one of the hotbeds of left wing thought, at least currently.

That said, there isn't much more that can be said on this subject. We'll have to agree to disagree. At the end of the day the name of the Nazi party says it all (along with other things I've already pointed it out) anyone who disagrees with them being a left wing movement is pretty much discrediting themselves as a valid source by pretty much trying to fight a painfully self evident truth.