WAS Magneto right?

[Vegosiux]

That was so needlessly antagonistic and entirely unnecessary. Not to mention a ridiculous false equivalence. Please take your emotional outrage elsewhere.

"Emotional outrage"? Crazy, I know, but I was completely calm when I typed that. False equivalence, why, "because he's not human, but a mutant"? Come on, seriously.

I stand behind what I wrote there. You don't like it, fine. But I'm not going to edit it out just because people got annoyed that I see one of their favorite badasses in a more cynical light.

 

[lacktheknack]

Oh sure, when a fictional character goes on a rant about how "humanity is keeping us down" and how they "fear us because we're better than them" it's all good and the guy's a fucking hero no matter the kill count, but when a real person grabs a gun and goes and kills a bunch of people because the universe just refused to acknowledge their greatness so they had to take some lives to assert their obvious superiority, it's an entirely different thing, now isn't it? Suddenly it's a megalomaniac with a superiority complex with all kinds of labels attached to them, even if they say they fight for the weak and oppressed!

Not as fun when it hits close to home, but I guess doublethink is a part of the human condition.

This, a hundred percent.

The instant that Magneto killed someone without touching them was the moment where he lost me forever.

 

[DaWaffledude]

Magneto is right, because it's a fundamental part of the human existence. A lot of people focus on the Vs-Mutant side of the oppression he fights against, while forgetting his oppression began at childhood devoid of all considerations for mutant powers or mutant kind. He recognized that humans oppressed each other for every reason conceivable under the sun, and being mutant was merely the next reason.

Evolutionarily speaking, he and Charles were correct that given enough time, humanity as we know it today would eventually cease to exist. Charles merely fought for a peaceful transition, whereas Eric simply fought against any opposition to the eventual inevitability.

Eric is further reinforced by every anti-mutant activist and government sanction imposed on mutant kind. His justifiable reaction to it merely plays to their insecurities and fuels their fears in opposing mutants, who represent change, instead of evolution, to the common close minded anti-mutant individual. The not-so-veiled jealously of Trasc was a pretty powerful reflection of that.

Eric is a reactionist. He's a holocaust survivor and does whatever he can to prevent the next one.

He does whatever he can to not be on the receiving end of the next one. He's quite okay with another one happening, as long as it happens to someone else. He, in fact, attempts his own holocaust at the end of X-men 2.

 

[Vault101]

I don't have this complex of being bette than other people

hence why I find it difficult to gel with magnitos veiws...hence why I don't like X-men plots

snip.

if were talking about actual evolution it really shouldn't matter

1. aint gonna happnen in anyones life time

2. as much as people can debate it humans and mutants aren't really that different, mutants are only humans who can do weird/awsome parlor tricks

 

[EternallyBored]

Magneto is right, because it's a fundamental part of the human existence. A lot of people focus on the Vs-Mutant side of the oppression he fights against, while forgetting his oppression began at childhood devoid of all considerations for mutant powers or mutant kind. He recognized that humans oppressed each other for every reason conceivable under the sun, and being mutant was merely the next reason.

Evolutionarily speaking, he and Charles were correct that given enough time, humanity as we know it today would eventually cease to exist. Charles merely fought for a peaceful transition, whereas Eric simply fought against any opposition to the eventual inevitability.

Eric is further reinforced by every anti-mutant activist and government sanction imposed on mutant kind. His justifiable reaction to it merely plays to their insecurities and fuels their fears in opposing mutants, who represent change, instead of evolution, to the common close minded anti-mutant individual. The not-so-veiled jealously of Trasc was a pretty powerful reflection of that.

Eric is a reactionist. He's a holocaust survivor and does whatever he can to prevent the next one.

He does whatever he can to not be on the receiving end of the next one. He's quite okay with another one happening, as long as it happens to someone else. He, in fact, attempts his own holocaust at the end of X-men 2.

Yeah, I know the movies are ancient in internet terms, but people seem to forget that the movie magneto is basically a-ok with human genocide, he's long past the point of just being reactionary when he proactively tries to off pretty much every non-mutant.

Comics Magneto is a little more diverse, and his motivations and goals change depending on the story, but there have also been incarnations of Magneto there that are basically blatantly portraying Magneto as a hypocrite who is essentially a mutant version of a Nazi, there have even been comics where other characters explicitly point this out to Magneto, which usually causes him to brutally kill the person making the comparison.

 

[Dragonlayer]

Magneto is right, because it's a fundamental part of the human existence. A lot of people focus on the Vs-Mutant side of the oppression he fights against, while forgetting his oppression began at childhood devoid of all considerations for mutant powers or mutant kind. He recognized that humans oppressed each other for every reason conceivable under the sun, and being mutant was merely the next reason.

Evolutionarily speaking, he and Charles were correct that given enough time, humanity as we know it today would eventually cease to exist. Charles merely fought for a peaceful transition, whereas Eric simply fought against any opposition to the eventual inevitability.

Eric is further reinforced by every anti-mutant activist and government sanction imposed on mutant kind. His justifiable reaction to it merely plays to their insecurities and fuels their fears in opposing mutants, who represent change, instead of evolution, to the common close minded anti-mutant individual. The not-so-veiled jealously of Trasc was a pretty powerful reflection of that.

Eric is a reactionist. He's a holocaust survivor and does whatever he can to prevent the next one.

Oh sure, when a fictional character goes on a rant about how "humanity is keeping us down" and how they "fear us because we're better than them" it's all good and the guy's a fucking hero no matter the kill count, but when a real person grabs a gun and goes and kills a bunch of people because the universe just refused to acknowledge their greatness so they had to take some lives to assert their obvious superiority, it's an entirely different thing, now isn't it? Suddenly it's a megalomaniac with a superiority complex with all kinds of labels attached to them, even if they say they fight for the weak and oppressed!

Not as fun when it hits close to home, but I guess doublethink is a part of the human condition.

That was so needlessly antagonistic and entirely unnecessary. Not to mention a ridiculous false equivalence. Please take your emotional outrage elsewhere.

To be fair, "I'm afraid and distrustful of you because you could make my head explode with a sneeze" is a lot more valid a reason for oppression then "I'm afraid and distrustful of you because you look different to me" (which pretty much gives away my position on the issue).

I know the comics and movies play up the homosexual analogy to show how evil the anti-mutant side is, but as far as I know, gays don't have the power to level entire towns if they lose their temper from stubbing their toe.

 

[Dragonlayer]

Oh come the fuck on - fucking internet eating my post!

*Disgruntled sigh*

RIGHT.


A while back, MovieBob posted an episode of "The Big Picture" in which he discussed how some people held onto the notion that the reason society looked down on them was because they were somehow better than them, and that bullies and others kept them down because they feared their intelligence, skills etc.

When it's framed like that, the scenario is almost a tale of high-school jocks locking innocent nerds in lockers, all because the dum-dums are scared of their brainpower. You almost forget that the mutant ranks include the likes of emotionally unstable reality warpers, "rebel without a cause" style teenagers with insane psychic powers and a guy who literally shoots laser beams of death whenever his eyes are open....

My opinion? Screw Magneto! Humans have very good reasons to fear and hate mutants! Besides, doesn't his ultimate plan to save mutantkind always turn out to be "Exterminate/enslave humanity, then sit back and watch as factionalism takes hold and mutants turn on each other"?

 

[Bluestorm83]

I'd say that they're both wrong to degrees, but Charles is closer to right than Eric is. I mean, it's a little idealistic to Think that nonviolent resistance will always work. Self-defense is an unalienable right. But it's definitely wrong to organize and simply attack the normals. I mean, that just kinda tells them that they were right about you all along...

If I were Charles Xavier, I'd probably take Magneto out somehow, even though we were old buddies, and then take up his mantle... as a show, at least. I'd organize all of mutant-kind, but when they were all organized together NOT take up arms or laser eyes or touch-people-and-drain-them-to-deaths against normal humanity. I'd instead start Politics. Run advertisements showing people that mutants love their parents and want to live the american dream. Start up some sitcoms starring partially mutant families. Make a PR wing of superheroic metahumans to stop crimes and save victims and stuff. I mean, some footage of Storm stopping Hurricane Katrina would go pretty far to turn opinion. I'd get up on Faith-based talk shows talking about how I believe that mutant powers are clearly a gift from God and therefore are there to help people. I'd be president of the damn world when I was done.

Honestly, I wouldn't even have to go that far. I'd just have to buy time. At the rate that Mutants are being born by the time I'd be in Xavier's position, I'd wager just another generation or two until the entire human race had some mutant characteristics.

And hey, if anyone tries to organize some sort of anti-mutant task force, I'd do some sort of Brain Stuff, Cerebro style, and change his mind.

 

[KalCyan]

It really does depend on the incarnation of magneto. As far as the movies are concerned I would definitely be siding with Magneto.

Despite some peoples comments, humanity in the X-Men universe consistently abuses, kills and experiments on mutants and tries to use them as living super-weapons (Weapon x project anyone?) the sentinel project is just the the most iconic method of that. If humanity was trying to kill you for simply being born then I would sure as hell lose any sympathy for them.

This applies even to the common citizen, sure its the "Government" killing, torturing and imprisoning the mutants but its their government so the citizens are every bit as guilty (yes I know the people don't always know but for the most part they do in this universe).

I mean hell look at toad his superpower is.... slightly stronger and tougher than a normal human, can jump well and has a long tongue... and for this he is attacked and imprisoned for life without trial and possibly experimented on. Yeah im fairly sure ill side with the guy who kills the people who do that shit.

Yeah Magnetos right and even at the points he steps over the line you can understand why, hell in the x-men world most of the government's are Nazis and mutants are the Jews.

 

[EternallyBored]

My opinion? Screw Magneto! Humans have very good reasons to fear and hate mutants! Besides, doesn't his ultimate plan to save mutantkind always turn out to be "Exterminate/enslave humanity, then sit back and watch as factionalism takes hold and mutants turn on each other"?

Depends on which version of Magneto we're talking about, there are versions where he mostly just wants to take all the mutants on earth and have them live on an island away from the rest of humanity, but then that usually gets fucked up by whatever big event gets thrown at Marvel Earth that usually resets Magneto back to the "kill all humans" status quo.

There was one time he was handed control of the earth when Wanda (Scarlet Witch) rewrote reality (because her baby died), and it ended up with humans and mutants living peacefully, of course the mutants had all the political positions and powers in that world, so the world was ruled by mutants, and humans basically just lived in it. It was kind of peaceful, but then again Wanda explicitly recreated the world to give most of the X-men their deepest desire, so it pretty much was designed to be that way from the ground up, and it still mostly fell apart in the end.

 

[marche45]

I'd be magneto leaning.

I don't care much for his disregard of human life,but i'd rather live in a mutant utopia with magneto than have to worry about being offed by a sentinel/government/religious nutjob.

 

[Proto Taco]

I see a lot of peeps approaching this topic from the angle of right vs wrong, good vs evil. It's not that cut and dry. Remember what Magneto says in "First class";

"I have been at the mercy of men just following orders....never again...."
~Magneto

Now not everyone here is going to understand this, but when all power over your own life is stripped from you at that young of an age, it can seed you with a special kind of rage that never really goes away. It won't happen every time, with every person, but when it does happen it leaves you with a kind of smoldering anger, a 'caged beast' if you will. It's always there, lurking, watching, waiting for someone to try controlling your life again, and when they do it tends to pounce.

But what about when no one is doing anything to you and you have to get along in normal society? Where does all that energy go? The answer is nowhere, that's why the scene with Charles teaching Magneto how to focus is so powerful. Magneto has been attempting to control his rage by channeling it into the goal of killing the man who caused the suffering that left him with the rage in the first place. In that scene Charles teaches Magneto how to find peace, how to sooth his rage and channel it effectively. That scene is the scene when Magneto gains the capacity for good where he had none before. However this does not heal Magneto's emotional scarring, and that is what continues to motivate him to evil.

Magneto then starts on the path of killing his oppressors, or 'standing up' to his bullies. Magneto does not view these actions as 'evil' or 'excessive' he views them as necessary to secure the future of himself and others like him. Basically, Magneto is so afraid of the humans that he doesn't feel like he can trust them to be alive. Like a bully who keeps pummeling you and all your friends whenever you turn your backs; do you flinch every time you turn arond and run down the hall, rather than walk, so you don't get hurt? Or do you finally snap, beat the bully unconscious and tell your friends it's ok to come out? So comparing Magneto to Hitler is tempting, but ultimately doesn't hold up as Magneto actually was/is oppressed by humans, since childhood. Does that make what he does right? No, of course not. But Magneto, as a character, makes more sense when we know that.

So that said, I identify with Magneto's pain and mindset far more strongly than I do with Charles's, but I agree with Charles's methods more. The violence has to stop somewhere.

"Be the change you want to see in the world"
~Ghandi

 

[Dragonlayer]

My opinion? Screw Magneto! Humans have very good reasons to fear and hate mutants! Besides, doesn't his ultimate plan to save mutantkind always turn out to be "Exterminate/enslave humanity, then sit back and watch as factionalism takes hold and mutants turn on each other"?

Depends on which version of Magneto we're talking about, there are versions where he mostly just wants to take all the mutants on earth and have them live on an island away from the rest of humanity, but then that usually gets fucked up by whatever big event gets thrown at Marvel Earth that usually resets Magneto back to the "kill all humans" status quo.

There was one time he was handed control of the earth when Wanda (Scarlet Witch) rewrote reality (because her baby died), and it ended up with humans and mutants living peacefully, of course the mutants had all the political positions and powers in that world, so the world was ruled by mutants, and humans basically just lived in it. It was kind of peaceful, but then again Wanda explicitly recreated the world to give most of the X-men their deepest desire, so it pretty much was designed to be that way from the ground up, and it still mostly fell apart in the end.

That's a fair point, as the various incarnations mean the character can have some variety of different personality, but he is always pretty much *the* extremist to Xavier's idealist.

See, that's precisely what I had in mind when I mentioned reality warpers: a child's death is traumatic but the child of someone with that level of power? Waaaaaaaaaay too dangerous!

 

[DudeistBelieve]

I'm Team Xaiver.

You gotta understand, Racists, homophobes, misogynist, are just really fucking ignorant people, To stamp out the hate you don't need more hate, more violence, what you need is proper Education. You gotten enlighten these people.

At the same time, you gotta make sure your fellow Mutants are doing shit thats going to stir the pot. If they're getting arrested by the police or going on Ricki Lake talk shows (is that a dated reference?) then they're doing nothing but ruining the Mutant reputation to the normies.

That said, I could never understand how Mutant hate is a thing among the Marvel Civilians, but they're okay with Captain America.

 

[Zontar]

That said, I could never understand how Mutant hate is a thing among the Marvel Civilians, but they're okay with Captain America.

I think the narrator of "Marvels" summed it up best: "While the Marvels where the light in this new age, they where the darkness. They where stronger then us, they where faster then us. They where better then us.

And they where here to replace us.

And they didn't have to do anything at all, they only had to wait."

I'm paraphrasing since it's been too long, but basically it gets down to "people who have gained powers and protect us with them" (Marvels) and "people born with powers who claim they will replace humanity and even go so far as to call themselves 'homo-superior'" (Mutants). It also doesn't help that the X-Men, the heroes of the Mutants, keep harbouring terrorists and criminals who turn back to their old ways within a year, which doesn't improve their image on the East Coast (aka 90% of the Marvel Universe). The reaction seems to be more positive in the West Coast and Japan though, and unsurprisingly it's very negative in Canada (can't believe how few people understand that Marvel's Canada is the Nazi Germany of their world, going so far as to have Alpha Flight introduced as Villains and having their history retconed to having mutants gassed. And heroes actually escaped to there after Civil War because "freedom"?)

 

[DudeistBelieve]

That said, I could never understand how Mutant hate is a thing among the Marvel Civilians, but they're okay with Captain America.

I think the narrator of "Marvels" summed it up best: "While the Marvels where the light in this new age, they where the darkness. They where stronger then us, they where faster then us. They where better then us.

And they where here to replace us.

And they didn't have to do anything at all, they only had to wait."

I'm paraphrasing since it's been too long, but basically it gets down to "people who have gained powers and protect us with them" (Marvels) and "people born with powers who claim they will replace humanity and even go so far as to call themselves 'homo-superior'" (Mutants). It also doesn't help that the X-Men, the heroes of the Mutants, keep harbouring terrorists and criminals who turn back to their old ways within a year, which doesn't improve their image on the East Coast (aka 90% of the Marvel Universe). The reaction seems to be more positive in the West Coast and Japan though, and unsurprisingly it's very negative in Canada (can't believe how few people understand that Marvel's Canada is the Nazi Germany of their world, going so far as to have Alpha Flight introduced as Villains and having their history retconed to having mutants gassed. And heroes actually escaped to there after Civil War because "freedom"?)

I just remember in the 90s cartoon, Juggernaut having to explain several times as he rampaged that he wasn't a mutant. That his super powers were magical.

But it's still just like, how could you tell a Mutant from a Normie /w powers? Are they just okay with Capt/Thor/Hulk running around? Fucking Hulk?

And Spiderman gets called a menace all the time, but you'd think in reality Jonah Jameson would be working the mutant pretty hard.

 

[Zef Otter]

I would never trust mutants. Hell I would never trust anyone with powers that can melt your face, mind control you, fry you with fire and such.

 

[Little Woodsman]

You see this is why I love "X-Men: First Class". The relationship and conflict between Xavier and Magneto in terms of ideology is the most interesting bit about X-Men. Wolverine's super-cool-bad-ass spike weapons can fuck off!

Maybe that's why we call Marvel the 'House of Ideas' not the 'House of guys in tights whumpin' on each other.--Stan Lee

 

[EternallyBored]

That said, I could never understand how Mutant hate is a thing among the Marvel Civilians, but they're okay with Captain America.

I think the narrator of "Marvels" summed it up best: "While the Marvels where the light in this new age, they where the darkness. They where stronger then us, they where faster then us. They where better then us.

And they where here to replace us.

And they didn't have to do anything at all, they only had to wait."

I'm paraphrasing since it's been too long, but basically it gets down to "people who have gained powers and protect us with them" (Marvels) and "people born with powers who claim they will replace humanity and even go so far as to call themselves 'homo-superior'" (Mutants). It also doesn't help that the X-Men, the heroes of the Mutants, keep harbouring terrorists and criminals who turn back to their old ways within a year, which doesn't improve their image on the East Coast (aka 90% of the Marvel Universe). The reaction seems to be more positive in the West Coast and Japan though, and unsurprisingly it's very negative in Canada (can't believe how few people understand that Marvel's Canada is the Nazi Germany of their world, going so far as to have Alpha Flight introduced as Villains and having their history retconed to having mutants gassed. And heroes actually escaped to there after Civil War because "freedom"?)

I just remember in the 90s cartoon, Juggernaut having to explain several times as he rampaged that he wasn't a mutant. That his super powers were magical.

But it's still just like, how could you tell a Mutant from a Normie /w powers? Are they just okay with Capt/Thor/Hulk running around? Fucking Hulk?

And Spiderman gets called a menace all the time, but you'd think in reality Jonah Jameson would be working the mutant pretty hard.

The comics have played with this a few times in the past, with things like Spiderman being considered a mutant in order to drum up hate against him, and a few occasions where Sentinels have attacked non-mutant superheroes in the past by mistaking them for mutants. There have been mistakes in the past, with mutants posing as normal superheroes, and non-mutants being mistaken for mutants.

But this all goes back to the basic point of Marvel Earth civilians, and that's that they are all retarded. Regular people in Marvel are generally just dumb as fuck, doing things like attacking mutants with melee weapons, when said mutant can basically explode city blocks, or trying to kill Jubilee who at one point was both a mutant and a vampire (don't ask), or thinking that they could harass Magneto with metal robots. Basically, not being a superhero on Marvel Earth means there's a good chance that you have a 60 IQ and/or a death wish.