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Hello, and welcome to this episode
of Superhero Ethics. When people think of

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the X Men, they often think
about the political or social illusions that are

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often used in them. Is Magneto
Malcolm X and Professor X Martin Luther King?

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Is the whole thing a metaphor for
queer rights, or for racism or

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for anything else like that? What
would they be like as activists or or

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the like as a meme that is
going around now? Well, we're talking

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about more than fifty years of comic
books, and so we're easily going to

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answer those questions in ninety minutes or
less. And I'm doing all that with

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good friend of the podcast, Steve
Sorman. Steve has been on this podcast

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a bunch of times, and I've
been on his. He is a comic

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book expert extraordinaire, but also has
a large background in politics and activism and

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love to talk about the kind of
things that we talk about on this podcast.

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So Steve, welcome and tell us
about yourself. Thank you so much

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for having me. Yeah, I'm
really excited. So in addition to having

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read most every X Men comic that's
ever been printed, probably about ninety percent

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of them, it's not a feat
that I'm particularly proud of, but you

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know, we roll with it.
Yeah. My previous life was as a

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activistic community organizer, starting from about
age sixteen, you know, I was

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a junior in high school in nine
to eleven. Happened and kind of got

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throw you know, grew up pour
into the punk scene and kind of got

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thrown into politics that way and started
learning just like how to be specifically,

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my background comes in politics in activism, comes from the sort of like Saul

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Alinsky in school of community organizing.
So you set a goal a group of

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people, you go out, you
create confrontations with the system and confrontations with

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power that sort of like help you
achieve your goal essentially, and and understanding

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political power and the types of community
power that normal people can can gather and

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wield. And so that's that's kind
of like, uh, you know,

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I come from the anti war movement
against the war in I Rock. I've

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also you know, both as a
freelance organizer or or a self directed organizer,

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but also working for nonprofits. I've
worked in the antinuclear movement. I've

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worked for trying to get better access
to mental health UH services, and been

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in the occupy movement, et cetera. I've been all over the place,

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but generally I think the important part
is is that I really I believe in

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this sort of the community or organizing
model as as sort of a method,

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and and I think that because we
see all the movements and injustices as as

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very intertwined. The in my opinion, is like you know what you work

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on, like as long as you
understand that you have allies and fellow travelers,

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and you know people in in other
movements are working towards the same goals

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as you. I think which movement
or which part of the movement you happen

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to be a part of is is
kind of a smaller part than or is.

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It's more interesting to me how you're
what you're doing, how you're doing,

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what your outlook is. So that's
kind of what I bring to the

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table. No, that's awesome,
And you don't actually have connected over this

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before. Yeah, I come very
much in the same school. I trained

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as a community or organizer read a
Lensky back to front, and a lot

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of my career first in you know, uh in you know, pro choice,

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pro choice doctor of justice work and
they now more recently in some other

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work all comes from that community organizing
background. And part of what inspired this

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particular discussion that we're having today is
there was a meme that was going around

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and I forget you sent it to
me, or I sent it to you,

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or our friend will send it to
both of us. But it basically

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was about, like, you know, there's a canard often that goes around

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about, you know, why is
it that the right is so incredibly well

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organized in their activism but the left, you know, you take a bunch

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of leftist activists and it's like trying
to herd cats. And someone put up

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this meme that was like the best
metaphor to explain leftist activism or even liberal

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activism or whatever is the x men, you know, in terms of how

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they are all generally wanting to go
in the same general direction, but they

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all have different ideas, and they're
always fighting with each other, and they're

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always like disagreeing, and everyone's sleeping
with each other all the time, and

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it's a giant interpersonal mess and yeah, yeah, yeah, quick quick aside.

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Because I was working for a politician
at the time, I I couldn't

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get involved more directly with occupy than
I wanted to, but I was,

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you know, it was a fairly
left wing politician, and so I was

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asked to kind of keep an eye
on it. I made friends with a

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lot of people and some of the
occupy movements, and I, unfortunately just

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have resting therapist face, and so
if I make friends with someone, they're

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probably gonna want to talk to me
about what's going on in their life.

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Sure, so I would have all
these conversations with Occupy people i'd met,

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and I'd want to be talking to
them about how things were going in the

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movement. But and I got some
of that, but a lot of what

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I got was, oh, yeah, but you know, I was sleeping

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with this person in the movement and
then this other person started sleeping with him

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and this other thing, and I
don't know how to feel. And so

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yeah, that statement of that Steve
made is not just a joke. But

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I love the meme of it though, because it's a great way to look

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at them. But also I think
it is really interesting to think about how,

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you know, we can have all
these debates about like how much politics

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was there or wasn't there in comic
books, and you know, you get

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who will be like, no,
why why are they? Why is it

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also awoke now? Why is it
all the politics now? Which is somewhat

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ridiculous, but I think, you
know, there's a lot of ways in

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which the the political ideas or the
social ideas of the authors have often been

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fairly subtle in a lot of the
comics, and a lot of them it's

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it's it's turned from being more left
wing to more right wing to you know,

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all over the map. With the
X Men, it seems there's always

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been this, you know, much
more in your face kind of social ideology,

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a metaphor for oppression, a metaphor
for being different. And so I've

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wanted for a while to get my
hands around this, and this is just

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such a great opportunity to do it. And today, just as we're still

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doing this under the strikes, we're
mostly gonna be talking about what happens in

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the comic, some of the stuff
that happens on screen. I'm sure we'll

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come up we'll be talking more about
general trends. And let me kind of

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start there with Steve, Given that
we have when fifty years of comic books

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that we're talking about, can you
say exactly like what Wolverine's politics are or

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Professor X is a metaphor for a
real life figure in American politics. Yeah,

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so, yes, and no,
I think these the like you said,

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there's been sixty one sixty years encounting
of X Men comics now, although

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fifty is more accurate because there was
ten years where there are nearly several years

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where they're nearly canceled. Whatever the
point is, Uh, there, You

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can't you can't go through with a
fine tooth comb of every single thing that

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they've done in all the storylines and
say this is you know, morally and

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politically consistent character that's out the window. And so I might draw from examples

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here and there, but generally I
want to stick to like kind of the

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conceptual true north of these characters,
because that is pretty sticky. Right when

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you do a new adaptation in film, in television, Uh, they character

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usually has like a consistent like what
makes them tick? What's important about this

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character? That's what we're going to
to uh focus on in the adaptation or

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in a new comic story most often. Uh. And that's kind of what

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I would like to talk to more
about here on the show. So why

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is it that you think the X
Men in particular is so often seen as

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the one that is the most social
justice he focused or the most kind of

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activism focused. What is it about
the X men as a comic idea that

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lends itself to that? Well,
I think there's there's two things. The

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first is that, uh, you
know, the characters of X men or

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mutants, Uh, they are a
separate class of people, you know,

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in this in this case it's genetically, but you can you can kind of

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transpose that idea. And you know, many many creators of the comics and

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the adapted media have always do right
that this is and transpose that onto different

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classes of people that are set apart, whether it's a black community or whether

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it is queer community. Uh,
you know, these this concept of this

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being a people rather than and the
X men or the representative like mutants who

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villains or heroes or whatever are rarely
they are the most visible ones, but

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they they kind of like stand out
from or speak for or kind of represent

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publicly a much larger base of just
like regular people who are mutants whose mutation

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might be like they're they have a
funny color skin, or they burp butterflies,

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or just like something that doesn't translate
to like you shoot laser blasts from

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your eye, like nine of mutants
have these extremely uh you know, much

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more subtle, less flashy mutations,
and so it is designed as the combat

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mutation someone would take when building a
character, to a lot of points for

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yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so it ends up being because

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you have this as a separate class
of people, it ends up being you

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know, always always about difference and
how difference get you know, gets dealt

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with in society, right, and
so so that's one part of it,

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I'm sorry. The other part is
that the most superhero groups I like to

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think of superheroes as activists, the
closest analog to activism that we have in

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uh, in a lot of popular
media, because they are there are people

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who want to work for community benefit
for altruistic reasons. And I think if

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you look at like a lot of
popular media right now, like we're kind

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of just exiting the goal this sort
of like peak TV, Golden prestige TV,

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that's the word, this prestige TV
era of like difficult male protagonists who

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have you know, uh, complicated
morally gray lives and all of that,

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and and that you know, it's
kind of like the classic hero of literature

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is a much more The conflicts are
internal, they don't deal with the outside

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world, and they are largely trying
to contextualize a hero's actions or protagonist actions

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through their psychological factors rather than like
a genuine desire to do good for the

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world. And these are things that
are not represented in a lot of pop

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culture except through superheroes. However,
superheroes also are extremely conservative as a cultural

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formation, and the fact that when
you go out to save the world,

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you're basically trying to save the world
as to continue to exist as it does.

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You're not trying to change anything.
And the way that the X Men

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set themselves apart is inherently they are
trying to change something. Their goal,

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their mission isn't save the world.
They do that to build credibility. They

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do that to build sort of like
goodwill towards the human world. But their

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ultimate goal is utopian or progressive.
They want to work for an equal society

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where you know, humans, mutants
have equal rights, live alongside each other,

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et cetera. I love it,
and I think it's really true.

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I think it's it's funny because again, you know, all the discussion about

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wokeness and which I bring up as
a way to understand what's happening in politics.

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I tend to think that to me, people when someone says like,

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well, are you woke or I
generally think is like, I don't think

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I'm woke because I think that word
doesn't have any meaning anymore. But the

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people who are afraid of people being
woke, I'm probably what they're afraid of,

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yes, But also I don't want
to. I don't want to,

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uh. I don't want to demean
anybody else by saying that their politics that

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don't agree with me are unwoke,
which to me connotates like they haven't woken

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up to the truth yet they can
have their truth that's different from mine,

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right, exactly exactly, And yeah, there's so much to say there,

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but it can help a shorthand for
the kind of exactly you know what I

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mean? Yeah, totally know.
It's a good yeah. But to me,

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I love the way you talk about
that because although I think we're going

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there, that originally is the yea
that like, there's often a perception that

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all these superheroes are now seen as
so woke or whatever the heck that right,

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I think You're making a good point
that there is something inherently kind of

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conservative about the idea of the not
only fighting for the status quo, but

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also of you know, the one
strong person, often but entirely a man

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today, but most of superhero history, a man who can use violence to

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do what they think is right in
the world. Absolutely, yeah, obviously

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I mean it. I say a
critique like that, which is often then

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used to dismiss superheroes entirely, Ie, like I have this podcast. That's

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not my position. I think superheroes
are great, and I think can take

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on all sorts of different social or
political or cultural meaning. But I just

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said it's important to name that as
one lens through which that can be understood.

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And I love looking at that as
the X Men being different from that,

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And I want to get more into
this. But there's two kind of

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questions I want to throw it you. First. One is because this is

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the part that I've always stumbled a
bit with it, and I think the

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X Men to address this. But
I want to hear you talk more about

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how there's a great metaphor there clearly
for the way we humans will look at

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a group and say you are different
and so we're going to treat you as

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though you are bad or skinned and
often like that, there's a lot of

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fear of you. Yeah, and
then a lot of the times that fear

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is based on stereotypes and mythology and
other ideas of difference that are wildly overblown.

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Yeah. And you can look through
history to you know, all the

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myths that were believed for so long
and some people still believe about, you

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know, people of African descent being
stronger but less intelligent than all the other

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kind of racist canards or the ideas
through history and that where we see right

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now about queer people or especially trans
people being groomers or coming for your children

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or all these things that have literally
no basis in fact. And that same

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thing with the libels against Jewish people
or Muslims or any of those things.

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That the reality is in almost all
these cases that the people were afraid of

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are a lot more like us than
we than than the fear would like to

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have us believe. Yeah, with
X men, it would seem that for

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the most part that's not true.
That the you know, this is a

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group that is significantly different from humanity, at least on the surface, and

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does have powers that you know,
uh, you know in you know the

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like well, but what if you
know I played poker a lot and Paul

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Hoppy, my regular one of my
regular guests, is also a big poker

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player. We've talked about like what
would the ethics be around, like if

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someone could read your mind at the
poker table, or someone who like couldn't

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get arrested by the police because they
have like all the powers they do.

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The police are terrible, you know
what I mean? But how how do

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00:16:56.919 --> 00:17:00.679
you how is it you think that
X men is able to square that circle

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of they're a metaphor for all these
groups that we're afraid of without any legitimate

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reason, even though they are a
group that is fundamentally different in a lot

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of ways from the rest of humanity. And is there some justification to the

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00:17:15.440 --> 00:17:18.079
fear people have X men in a
way that's not true for oppressed groups in

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our own world. I think you
come up on an incredible point here.

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Yeah. No, they don't handle
that well at all. Uh. It's

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it's it's a it's an absolute mess. Uh. And it's a big hole

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in contradiction and storytelling of trying to
you know, it comes up sometimes but

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it all it does is give the
villains justification for like, yeah, we

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are afraid of you. You're powerful. Is somebody, you know, one

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of your guys almost blew up the
world the other day, you know,

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and so it's like, uh,
and they're like, well that was the

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bad mutants and we're the good mutants
and they're like, I don't care.

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So at this point, like it
earns X Men, And this is one

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of the things I want to argue
later is it ends up turning the X

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Men comics. They're not really about
social justice. They don't do anything.

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They're not activists in the traditional sense. They have this utopian goal, but

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most of what they do is either
policing other mutants essentially, like another mutant

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is going off and planning some you
know, terrible plot to hurt an inflavor

233
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whatever, and they go and intervene, right, or they are reacting to,

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uh, you know, the government
just made new sentinels that are going

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to round up all the you know, things that are are very uh.

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They react to when whenever they have
uh, whenever they conflict with the human

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world and the bigoted world. Right. The their role is essentially reactive.

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They're not out there doing lunch counter
protests or you know, or organizing mass

239
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support in sort of this Lynskin model
that we're both familiar with to change power

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relations with the human world, you
know, and and actually work for mutant

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equality. And I think that's mostly
a fault of well, it comes from

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sort of the background of most creators
of superhero media not being of the oppressed

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class or not being familiar with social
justice movements and what actually creates change.

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And so there's a lot of you
know, uh, you mentioned the comparison

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between Martin Luther King and Xavier at
the top of the show, and I

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think a lot of that comparison comes
from the fact that they're both referenced as

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having a dream. And if you
look into the and and this is such

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a like white liberal society reading of
what Martin Luther King was, what he

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stood for, what he did.
I was like, Oh, he's just

250
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a guy who made some speeches and
he had a dream. It's like,

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no, he was an organizer.
He was creating confrontations with with white society

252
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that he would win, and he
knew he would win in order to advance

253
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a larger goal of equality. All
of that is completely missing from X Men

254
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media, and it's it's a shame
I remember to get where you're coming from

255
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there. And in some ways it's
the same complaint that I have about the

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movies and the like of all superheroes. But it's like, in the same

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way that you know, I would
want Marvel Civil War to be Tony says,

258
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we need accountability. Steve says,
maybe, but your version of accountability

259
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and the Zacovie chords really sucks.
And in the next hour is the two

260
00:21:10.319 --> 00:21:12.640
of them debating how the Zacovia A
chords should be right. But that doesn't

261
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sell tickets. You need somebody to
punch somebody in the face at some point.

262
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Yeah, yeah, And I'm guessing
gets the same thing in an X

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Men. I would push back though
a little bit in that And maybe this

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is just more what's on screen,
but doesn't Professor X often like characters like

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Professor X and Jean Gray, aren't
They often like going to testify to Congress,

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or meeting with the president, or
or speaking out in ways they are

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meant to allay the fears of the
wider public about mutants. In the other

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kind of way that like you're right, Martin lu King or any other activists

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did so much more than that,
but that is a part of that activist

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work. Sure, yeah, you
show up on you know, the news

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talk shows or you give speeches,
so it's more like an Al Sharpton,

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you know, or adjust Jackson.
Then while Jesse Jackson was pretty involved in

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the the Southern Christian Leadership Conference,
so maybe more Sharpton was too. But

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basically, you know, it's that
kind of public figure role rather than like

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the organizer, which is fine,
Like the movement needs everybody. The movement

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needs people with all sorts of skills
to do everything that they do. It's

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important to speak to the public and
give them a face of what you're fighting

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for, what it's all about.
But yeah, the generally when you're making

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these comparisons, it there are also
historically contingent based on how history views these

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civil rights figures, you know,
at different points, and that when you're

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straining for the analogy, that also
changes the characterization of somebody like Magneto over

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years, where it's like, no, he's a villain, No he's a

283
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hero. No he's a villain,
No he's a hero. Right, they

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are changing understanding through history of who
these civil rights figures are often effects how

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they are how the fictional characters are
portrayed as well, and so Billy on

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that, and I want to talk
about Martin Luther King macam X think in

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a second. But is it fair
to say then that, because I do

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think there is still obviously, and
this is why we're talking about it,

289
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there is still a lot of social
justice to be found in the X Men

290
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stories. But it's not that they
are acting in the same way there's groups

291
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would act in our own world,
and so it's not a perfect analog,

292
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but that they're meant to be a
metaphor. It's meant to be that the

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way that other people treat them is
very similar. Even if you have maybe

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the fear has some more justifications.
But still, because as you said,

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and I think there's something doesn't appear
on screen anywhere near as often as it

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does on pay and on the page, like if you just watch the X

297
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Men movies, I think it's a
fair statement to be like, huh,

298
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it's kind of weird that genetically all
the patients are deeply combat relevant. Yeah,

299
00:24:03.880 --> 00:24:06.839
but you know, as you're saying, because that's actually not the case

300
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in the comics, that there is
all these people who are act that maybe

301
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the the idea that all mutants are
something to be feared and anything like that

302
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is actually very much not true,
that there are some standouts perhaps, Yeah,

303
00:24:18.680 --> 00:24:19.240
so so do you think it is
fair to say that like that?

304
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That's where we find the social justice
messages is when it's being used as a

305
00:24:23.200 --> 00:24:26.279
metaphor, and when it's being used
as like a person can say, like,

306
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oh, even with all the powers
they have, the way the mutants

307
00:24:30.279 --> 00:24:33.680
are treated is really not fair.
Oh wait, that is actually kind of

308
00:24:33.720 --> 00:24:36.480
like the way oh wait, that's
actually kind of like the way this other

309
00:24:36.519 --> 00:24:40.000
group and in my own world is
being treated. Yeah. And I think

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there's one more thing that particularly resonates
with the sort of the metaphor for the

311
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queer community. And because like I
said, the X Men have kind of

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00:24:53.720 --> 00:25:00.000
been stapled onto every social justice uh
you know community that U anybody who's working

313
00:25:00.000 --> 00:25:07.559
for equal rights, you've got you've
got an analogy there. And and you

314
00:25:07.599 --> 00:25:14.079
asked one time, I think it
was on I forget Who's pod, but

315
00:25:14.119 --> 00:25:22.880
you asked, particular particularly what is
the difference between the X Men and other

316
00:25:22.960 --> 00:25:29.200
superheroes? Why do we expect why
do we accept that? You know,

317
00:25:29.240 --> 00:25:36.240
the fantastic for the Avengers are universally
beloved by the human population and the X

318
00:25:36.279 --> 00:25:40.759
men are feared and hated. Right, what's this gap? How how are

319
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they different? And I think the
difference is it's because mutants are our children

320
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are the humans children like it.
And it's this sort of like the the

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00:25:52.799 --> 00:26:00.000
closeness that breeds fear and distrust.
Anybody could be a mutant. Anybody,

322
00:26:00.079 --> 00:26:03.920
these kids can end up being a
mutant. And it taps into this H

323
00:26:04.920 --> 00:26:15.359
metaphor with sort of lgbt q UH
acronym plus uh uh communities where yeah,

324
00:26:15.720 --> 00:26:22.880
you don't know, there's a theory
called social reproduction right uh from sociology where

325
00:26:23.599 --> 00:26:30.799
when you you know, the society
reproduces itself by keeping people like in a

326
00:26:30.799 --> 00:26:37.279
sort of familiar space from largely what
they're used to growing up. If you

327
00:26:37.440 --> 00:26:41.480
are a worker, you're going to
continue be It's it's you know, had

328
00:26:41.519 --> 00:26:45.279
it had its origin in marks and
so it is largely viewed in class terms,

329
00:26:45.319 --> 00:26:52.200
but essentially, uh it it's a
counterpart to physical or you know,

330
00:26:52.279 --> 00:26:57.240
like physical reproduction where you're making babies, and this is this is its counterpart

331
00:26:57.279 --> 00:27:03.039
in sociology where society produces itself.
And part of this is that you expect

332
00:27:03.200 --> 00:27:07.160
your children to be like you in
certain ways values. You know, if

333
00:27:07.200 --> 00:27:11.400
your children have different, largely,
wildly different values than you, that could

334
00:27:11.400 --> 00:27:18.279
cause major strain. And for people
who view a core part of their identity

335
00:27:18.440 --> 00:27:26.799
as this sort of like white heterosexual
cis gender. You know, you want

336
00:27:26.799 --> 00:27:30.920
your kids to look like you,
or act like you or in a certain

337
00:27:30.920 --> 00:27:34.759
way. Right like, you have
this expectation of of the social reproduction that

338
00:27:34.759 --> 00:27:40.000
you're able to pass onto a future
generation in order to essentially see yourself in

339
00:27:40.039 --> 00:27:48.480
the world in the future. And
mutants subvert that in the same way that

340
00:27:48.920 --> 00:27:52.720
the queer community subverts that in a
lot of ways. Right like, your

341
00:27:52.839 --> 00:27:56.000
kids are going to have a wildly
different life than you. They're going to

342
00:27:56.039 --> 00:28:00.839
have these these these different experiences.
They are not they might be less likely

343
00:28:00.960 --> 00:28:06.759
to make more kids who are more
like you, And and sort of it

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00:28:06.839 --> 00:28:15.559
throws a spanner in the works of
human white straight humanity is conception of building

345
00:28:15.599 --> 00:28:22.880
this future that they can support and
recognize. And I think that is in

346
00:28:22.920 --> 00:28:26.359
both cases can be a source of
tremendous bigotry. I really like the way

347
00:28:26.519 --> 00:28:29.839
you phrase that. I think it's
really helpful model because I think, as

348
00:28:29.839 --> 00:28:33.160
you said, like that fear of
social reproduction is there with all these things,

349
00:28:33.200 --> 00:28:36.880
you know, if it's the reason
why people are afraid of, you

350
00:28:36.880 --> 00:28:40.720
know, their children marrying someone who's
not in the same race they are,

351
00:28:40.880 --> 00:28:45.359
who doesn't worship the same god they
do, or who has different values,

352
00:28:45.400 --> 00:28:48.079
you know, who isn't you know, of the same economic class that they

353
00:28:48.119 --> 00:28:51.519
are, or whatever it is.
And then with the queerness, there's that

354
00:28:51.559 --> 00:28:59.519
additional factor of a lot of time
you know that it And then with queerness

355
00:28:59.559 --> 00:29:03.799
there's a factor of there's this fear
of recruiting. And I one thing I

356
00:29:03.880 --> 00:29:07.119
remember distinctly from some of the movies, and I know it also came out

357
00:29:07.160 --> 00:29:10.920
in the comics, especially in the
nineties, was that, you know,

358
00:29:10.920 --> 00:29:14.240
one of the fears was that like
well, you know, parents saying to

359
00:29:14.279 --> 00:29:17.559
two kids, like, have you
just tried not being a muted you know,

360
00:29:17.599 --> 00:29:19.960
as I said to Bobby in one
of the movies, or as uh,

361
00:29:21.160 --> 00:29:26.480
you know, this idea of that
the fear is that Professor X or

362
00:29:26.519 --> 00:29:32.680
any of them are are spreading you
know, uh mutantism, which is very

363
00:29:32.759 --> 00:29:34.880
much the fear you hear today about
like grooming and stuff like you know it

364
00:29:36.079 --> 00:29:38.400
absolutely yea, and so yeah,
I think that's such an important way of

365
00:29:38.440 --> 00:29:44.680
looking at it, of how that
metaphor can be there. And we've talked

366
00:29:44.720 --> 00:29:48.960
a lot about the and we kind
of touched on the whole like the way

367
00:29:49.000 --> 00:29:52.799
they're viewed that the the original kind
of like oh, it's Martin Luther King

368
00:29:52.839 --> 00:29:56.000
and Malcolm X. I don't want
to talk more about that because I think

369
00:29:56.039 --> 00:30:00.160
now there have been a lot of
memes and other information going around like to

370
00:30:00.200 --> 00:30:04.359
debunks that theory to some extent or
another, and especially just in that like

371
00:30:04.880 --> 00:30:11.200
the public perception among white America of
who Mary King and Malcolm X were in

372
00:30:11.240 --> 00:30:14.960
the sixties, but all the way
through history has always been like the actual

373
00:30:15.039 --> 00:30:18.240
real figures has been very different,
and if anything, they were seen as

374
00:30:18.240 --> 00:30:23.400
a metaphor of the way the media
portrayed those two characters. There are two

375
00:30:23.480 --> 00:30:30.599
factors though that I wonder if it's
fair to say that, because I know

376
00:30:30.640 --> 00:30:32.400
now when some of it, when
I hear people say, oh, but

377
00:30:32.400 --> 00:30:34.880
there's so these metaphors make no sense
whatsoever. I don't want to push back

378
00:30:34.920 --> 00:30:37.680
just a little bit to say,
is there a way in which there is

379
00:30:37.720 --> 00:30:41.160
some element of it, and part
of it is it may also just be

380
00:30:41.319 --> 00:30:45.680
like writers who are viewing it through
those lands or seeing it. And what

381
00:30:45.759 --> 00:30:51.039
I'm getting at is that I think
often in activism, and this is a

382
00:30:51.079 --> 00:30:53.640
trend throughout any activist movement, but
Martin, Luther King and Malcolm X were

383
00:30:53.680 --> 00:30:59.039
kind of slotted into these social roles. With groups like that that you're talking

384
00:30:59.079 --> 00:31:03.960
about, there's often these two different
perspectives, one of which is what's often

385
00:31:03.960 --> 00:31:07.079
referred to as assimilationism or something like
that, which is like, hey,

386
00:31:07.160 --> 00:31:10.599
no, we are just like you. You need to stop being afraid of

387
00:31:10.720 --> 00:31:14.519
us and let us be a part
of what you are, because you know,

388
00:31:14.799 --> 00:31:17.599
we want the two point three two
point three kids in the white picket

389
00:31:17.640 --> 00:31:23.240
fence just like h and that and
also that the idea is and sort of

390
00:31:23.279 --> 00:31:26.359
do that. We're going to confront
your hatred, We're going to run your

391
00:31:26.359 --> 00:31:30.720
fear, but we're gonna help try
to understand that we are not scary in

392
00:31:30.720 --> 00:31:32.759
the way that you seem to think
that we are, that we should be.

393
00:31:33.079 --> 00:31:37.119
Yeah, And on the other side
there is the like, no,

394
00:31:37.559 --> 00:31:40.680
fu, if you're scared of us, you should be scared of us because

395
00:31:40.680 --> 00:31:42.839
we're going to fight back. We're
not the same as you, We're different,

396
00:31:42.920 --> 00:31:45.920
but we deserve the same seat at
the table as you do. And

397
00:31:47.599 --> 00:31:53.799
I'm taking two massive social movements and
hugely generalizing them and hugely running them down.

398
00:31:55.880 --> 00:32:00.160
But that I think like there's something
I really study in school that you

399
00:32:00.240 --> 00:32:04.279
see that kind of dynamic within a
lot of social movements. And so it's

400
00:32:04.319 --> 00:32:07.880
definitely in you know, Martin the
King and Malcolm X are somewhat stand ins

401
00:32:07.880 --> 00:32:13.640
for those two things. But to
reduce those two actual historical figures to that

402
00:32:13.759 --> 00:32:17.039
is very reductive. But you also
get it within you know, feminist movements

403
00:32:17.160 --> 00:32:21.640
or within queer movements. At the
time of the nineties, there was very

404
00:32:21.680 --> 00:32:23.240
much there was kind of like the
even today we talked about how the Human

405
00:32:23.279 --> 00:32:28.279
Rights Campaign does great work but seems
to be very much like don't be afraid

406
00:32:28.279 --> 00:32:31.200
of us and some other groups that
are like as opposed to other groups that

407
00:32:31.200 --> 00:32:35.559
are like, no fu, We're
here to help you tear down you know,

408
00:32:35.640 --> 00:32:38.000
the traditional ideas of you know,
what generals should be and stuff like

409
00:32:38.039 --> 00:32:42.400
that. Sure, yeah, so
is it fair to say that there's some

410
00:32:42.519 --> 00:32:50.039
element of that within the Professor X
Magneto of one perspective is more on that

411
00:32:50.119 --> 00:32:53.079
side of I we want to be
like you. We want you not to

412
00:32:53.119 --> 00:32:55.839
be afraid of us. We want
to just be a part of your world.

413
00:32:57.440 --> 00:33:00.559
Sorry for the little her maid quote
and the other there is more,

414
00:33:00.119 --> 00:33:06.440
No we are different, putting aside
the supremacistness that Magneto sometimes gets into,

415
00:33:07.480 --> 00:33:08.759
but just that more idea of no, we are different, and you're going

416
00:33:08.839 --> 00:33:14.240
to stop treating us badly because well, we're going to fight back. Yeah,

417
00:33:14.319 --> 00:33:17.759
We're We're gathering power that we we
will use in self defense for sure.

418
00:33:17.799 --> 00:33:23.000
Yeah. Yeah, I think there
is, uh, that is definitely

419
00:33:23.759 --> 00:33:29.720
a key difference ideologically between Professor X
and Magneto. I wouldn't say that that

420
00:33:29.799 --> 00:33:37.200
necessarily maps on particularly well to the
difference between uh, doctor King and for

421
00:33:37.240 --> 00:33:40.640
example, Malcolm X. Uh,
but yeah, I think that there's well,

422
00:33:42.400 --> 00:33:45.039
yeah, is it fair to say
that it maps on not entirely,

423
00:33:45.119 --> 00:33:50.680
but somewhat to the public perception of
those two figures. Yeah, yeah,

424
00:33:50.720 --> 00:33:52.319
yeah, yeah yeah, and which, like we said before, changes,

425
00:33:52.759 --> 00:33:57.960
uh you know, historically, based
on how we are viewing these historical figures

426
00:33:57.960 --> 00:34:02.119
at any given time. Totally agree
with that. But I think if you

427
00:34:02.200 --> 00:34:07.759
were to want to I want to
make some comparisons now between the Civil Rights

428
00:34:07.159 --> 00:34:14.760
movement, historical civil rights movement figures, and X Men characters meant to be

429
00:34:14.800 --> 00:34:20.400
in good fun. I'm not a
tremendous expert on the history of the Civil

430
00:34:20.480 --> 00:34:23.840
rights movement. If this is meant
to provoke discussion, please, if you

431
00:34:23.960 --> 00:34:30.440
have another idea of like where you
can find commonalities and metaphors, please,

432
00:34:30.960 --> 00:34:35.920
you know, respond with them in
the comments or whatever. Hit me up

433
00:34:35.920 --> 00:34:38.360
on social media. I would love
to discuss it. But I want to

434
00:34:38.400 --> 00:34:49.519
do this in a way that is
villain hero agnostic, because those constructs,

435
00:34:49.599 --> 00:34:53.920
both in the comics and in history, is so contingent based on the historical

436
00:34:53.960 --> 00:34:58.199
moment or what perspective you're viewing from. Right, Like, one group can

437
00:34:58.239 --> 00:35:00.079
look at the Black Panthers and say, well, they killed a bunch of

438
00:35:00.079 --> 00:35:04.119
cops. You know, we're involved
with a bunch of shootouts with cops,

439
00:35:04.119 --> 00:35:07.360
so like, you know, we
see them as villains. And then another

440
00:35:07.360 --> 00:35:12.039
group would be like, they fed
free breakfast to thousands of kids and lifted

441
00:35:12.039 --> 00:35:15.760
people out of poverty using only shootouts
were often dam acting in defense, not

442
00:35:15.960 --> 00:35:22.159
exactly exactly exactly, So I want, yeah, before you get into the

443
00:35:22.199 --> 00:35:24.440
individual characters I do. I just
want to use what you're saying just to

444
00:35:24.480 --> 00:35:28.639
make I think you're kind of implying
this, but I just want to state

445
00:35:28.679 --> 00:35:32.840
it directly and see if you agree
that part of how the character of Magneto

446
00:35:34.000 --> 00:35:39.280
has changed quite dramatically from pure villain
in the original too often seen as anti

447
00:35:39.320 --> 00:35:44.719
hero or even like no, Magneto
was right. Yeah, mirrors the way

448
00:35:45.360 --> 00:35:47.920
you know, in the sixties Malcolm
X was the boogeyman, was the like

449
00:35:47.960 --> 00:35:51.960
the fear, whereas today I think
for a lot of people, not all,

450
00:35:52.039 --> 00:35:52.559
but for a lot of people,
there's much more of like No,

451
00:35:52.679 --> 00:35:55.840
Malcolm X was right about a lot
of things, and yeah, or you

452
00:35:55.880 --> 00:36:00.760
know, was a great leader and
did one under full things and whether or

453
00:36:00.800 --> 00:36:06.000
not you agree with all of his
ideology, and I think there's a lot

454
00:36:06.039 --> 00:36:10.679
to nitpick in there. You know, was was an incredible figure for first

455
00:36:10.679 --> 00:36:15.679
civil rights and leadership and uh,
you know, black power in a way

456
00:36:15.840 --> 00:36:21.000
that was a strong positive for the
world. And the doctor King and Malcolm

457
00:36:21.119 --> 00:36:25.199
X we were actually and that Martin
Luther King and Malcolm X were actually much

458
00:36:25.239 --> 00:36:30.440
closer than is generally believed, in
the same way that now Magneto and Professor

459
00:36:30.559 --> 00:36:35.480
X are getting closer. Uh.
Anyway, so she's wanted to yes,

460
00:36:35.519 --> 00:36:37.280
yes, yes, yes, thank
you for scalling it out because I yeah,

461
00:36:37.280 --> 00:36:40.239
I kind of like brushed past it
a couple of times, but it

462
00:36:40.280 --> 00:36:45.920
needed full elucidation totally. But yeah, let's talk about some of the other

463
00:36:45.960 --> 00:36:47.960
specific characters and where they fit.
Yeah. So I think if you're going

464
00:36:49.000 --> 00:37:00.679
to look for I think the sort
of like Nation of Islam uh uh comparison

465
00:37:00.840 --> 00:37:05.360
to Magneto's group kind of make does
make sense in a in a in a

466
00:37:05.400 --> 00:37:14.519
way like separatist and maybe a undercurrent
of supremacist in there. I'm who's to

467
00:37:14.559 --> 00:37:21.320
say. It's not for me to
particularly critique, but the sort of like

468
00:37:21.639 --> 00:37:27.960
there's a strong almost religious following around
a character or a figure like Elijah Muhammad

469
00:37:29.320 --> 00:37:34.199
that you know, can kind of
mirror somebody like Magneto, although he has

470
00:37:34.239 --> 00:37:39.679
a tragic backstory that's closer to Malcolm
X's, So there's something there. I

471
00:37:39.760 --> 00:37:47.719
don't think that the Southern Christian Leadership
Conference, which was Martin Luther King's organization,

472
00:37:49.440 --> 00:37:52.519
is a very good comparison for the
X Men, because, like I

473
00:37:52.519 --> 00:37:57.760
said before, like they're not designing
confrontations with power. They're not going out

474
00:37:57.800 --> 00:38:01.480
there with a with a particular a
set of goals and campaign in mind for

475
00:38:01.519 --> 00:38:07.159
how to achieve equal rights. I
think really not using non violence as a

476
00:38:07.599 --> 00:38:12.199
organizing principle or yeah, yeah,
you wouldn't have the fun fight scenes that

477
00:38:12.239 --> 00:38:16.679
everybody loves exactly exactly. So if
you if you kind of look at like

478
00:38:16.840 --> 00:38:23.400
community defense and providing services to your
people as the core organizing principles of what

479
00:38:23.639 --> 00:38:29.000
the Black Panthers were, I think
that translates well to the X Men as

480
00:38:29.000 --> 00:38:35.679
well. So that would put you
know, uh, Eldritch Cleaver as Moira

481
00:38:35.760 --> 00:38:40.079
McTaggart as sort of like a visionary. It's close to the Founders who kind

482
00:38:40.119 --> 00:38:46.559
of goes a very hard different direction
later in life. And maybe uh puts

483
00:38:46.599 --> 00:38:52.480
like h Charles Xavier Moore is a
Healey Newton kind of figure, which I

484
00:38:52.519 --> 00:39:01.119
think is an interesting uh uh you
know thing comparison. And then maybe like

485
00:39:01.880 --> 00:39:07.400
the Fred Hampton is like Kitty Pride, like the somebody from the younger generation

486
00:39:07.440 --> 00:39:15.239
who everybody just really really likes and
it is brilliant and able to do wonderful

487
00:39:15.280 --> 00:39:21.760
things over and then I don't know, there's a specific figure. I would

488
00:39:21.840 --> 00:39:23.400
name this too, but I think
it's a part of the movements a lot.

489
00:39:24.000 --> 00:39:28.960
Yeah. You know, you go
to any union move you go to

490
00:39:29.000 --> 00:39:36.000
any organizing movement, and the word
organizing essential there because there will often be

491
00:39:36.119 --> 00:39:38.679
lots and lots of people who are
affected by a social justice issue. But

492
00:39:38.719 --> 00:39:40.920
when you say, okay, so
come to this rally at this point,

493
00:39:40.920 --> 00:39:44.960
at this time and place, are
gonna say, uh, come on,

494
00:39:44.960 --> 00:39:46.480
I don't want to be bothered.
That's not gonna come to anything. Yeah,

495
00:39:46.519 --> 00:39:51.119
I'm not a joining or whatever.
Yeah, and I say that somewhat.

496
00:39:52.320 --> 00:39:54.320
You know that sounds kind of derogaty
of tory. I don't mean it

497
00:39:54.320 --> 00:39:58.320
as that. Oh No, A
lot of a lot of those rallies don't

498
00:39:58.360 --> 00:40:02.079
do anything it it's not necessarily a
reason to not show up. They're they're

499
00:40:02.320 --> 00:40:08.719
they're organized to do different things.
Most rallies are not directly the tip of

500
00:40:08.719 --> 00:40:14.599
the spear for actually accomplishing social justice
goals. And a lot of even putting

501
00:40:14.599 --> 00:40:16.599
aside the rallies, a lot of
social justice movements don't meet their goals.

502
00:40:16.679 --> 00:40:22.199
And so I think the cynicism of
a character like Wolverine is super important as

503
00:40:22.199 --> 00:40:27.360
because to me, one of the
goals of organizing is to helping. Like

504
00:40:27.760 --> 00:40:32.000
it's the moment that Professor X,
or often Jean Gray or someone else like

505
00:40:32.039 --> 00:40:36.760
that is able to convince Wolverine to
join the movement, to be a part

506
00:40:36.800 --> 00:40:38.679
of what they're doing. And as
you said, the fact that like,

507
00:40:39.800 --> 00:40:44.760
sometimes he does it because he's convinced
of the rightness of their cause. Sometimes

508
00:40:44.760 --> 00:40:47.159
he does it because he thinks Cyclops
is an a hole and he wants to

509
00:40:47.159 --> 00:40:50.880
show him any better. Sometimes he
does it because he wants a chance to

510
00:40:50.880 --> 00:40:54.280
get closer to Jean Gray. And
you know, a lot of people of

511
00:40:54.320 --> 00:40:59.039
my dad's generation went to peace marches
because that's where you found people who had

512
00:40:59.039 --> 00:41:02.360
a lot more sexually liberal ideas.
Like I'm not doesn't find it, I

513
00:41:02.400 --> 00:41:06.480
think, but I'm saying sure,
Yeah, the fact that Wolverine and a

514
00:41:06.519 --> 00:41:09.519
lot of the others often have like
it's not that they become diehard idealists,

515
00:41:09.679 --> 00:41:15.239
no, dieheart idealists, but they
still sign up and come involved. It's

516
00:41:15.239 --> 00:41:16.880
actually a great part of the metaphor
as well. Yeah, for sure.

517
00:41:17.159 --> 00:41:23.800
Yeah, I was having trouble finding
a good civil rights analogy for Wolverine,

518
00:41:24.559 --> 00:41:29.159
so I didn't try too hard.
But I'm sure it's out there somewhere,

519
00:41:30.480 --> 00:41:36.679
but yeah, like I think if
you were to try and again, hero

520
00:41:36.880 --> 00:41:43.519
villain agnostic tactics agnostic. Who is
the set of characters in the X Men

521
00:41:43.639 --> 00:41:46.519
world who is trying to design these
confrontations with the system, who is doing

522
00:41:46.920 --> 00:41:54.599
big flashy public of you know,
sort of confrontations to advance human mutant rights,

523
00:41:58.079 --> 00:42:02.239
and uh, you know, has
a history of sort of like cooperating

524
00:42:02.280 --> 00:42:08.199
with the government when it suits them
and working completely independent and being targeted by

525
00:42:08.199 --> 00:42:15.480
the government when when it suits them. I would say that's Mystique's brotherhood called

526
00:42:15.519 --> 00:42:20.079
the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. But
again we're going agnostic here, and their

527
00:42:20.119 --> 00:42:25.400
tactics are often things like assassination,
which obviously wasn't what the Southern Christian Leadership

528
00:42:25.440 --> 00:42:30.039
Conference was up to. But there's
nobody else really in the X Men world

529
00:42:30.079 --> 00:42:36.239
who is like I'm going to do
this big flashy event that or or like

530
00:42:36.400 --> 00:42:40.000
act up for example, like we're
going to do something extremely public and extremely

531
00:42:40.480 --> 00:42:49.400
like h targeted in a way that
you is not only going to gain us

532
00:42:49.480 --> 00:42:54.519
visibility, but is going to directly
accomplish our goals and put the system that

533
00:42:54.559 --> 00:42:59.719
we are in confrontation with put them
in sort of a crisis point where they

534
00:42:59.760 --> 00:43:05.400
have to respond to our demands or
lose legitimacy. And just to further clarify

535
00:43:05.440 --> 00:43:08.639
that for folks who might not know, act UP was a group of queer

536
00:43:08.840 --> 00:43:15.239
and queer line activists who were really
focused on the utter lack of attention to

537
00:43:14.880 --> 00:43:19.000
a to HIV AIDS and how no
research was being done in the eighties and

538
00:43:19.119 --> 00:43:22.199
nineties and no attempt you know,
there were no really and then it was

539
00:43:22.239 --> 00:43:25.159
often beings written off as a gay
disease or a drug drug user disease.

540
00:43:25.159 --> 00:43:29.360
So we didn't care about it,
and so act UP did, among other

541
00:43:29.360 --> 00:43:32.760
things, because the Catholic Church in
New York City and accruitt the world,

542
00:43:32.800 --> 00:43:37.559
but especially in New York City where
act UP was focused, was very one

543
00:43:37.599 --> 00:43:40.760
of the strong people pushing against any
attempt to look into this because like,

544
00:43:40.760 --> 00:43:45.400
oh, you know, not that
this was the official Catholic position, but

545
00:43:45.440 --> 00:43:47.119
you know that that you know,
if this is God's punishment and all that

546
00:43:47.159 --> 00:43:51.480
kind of stuff, And there were
definitely some high Catholic saying things like that,

547
00:43:51.960 --> 00:43:53.960
and so they did things like die
ins, like they went to a

548
00:43:54.559 --> 00:44:00.440
st the cathedral Saint Saint Patrick's Cathedral
in the heart New York City and just

549
00:44:00.480 --> 00:44:04.840
took over the services in a lot
of ways. And I think you're right

550
00:44:04.840 --> 00:44:09.360
Mystique to me when I said about
how like the the you know, the

551
00:44:09.440 --> 00:44:14.199
two different polls of activism are replicated
not only in civil rights but other things.

552
00:44:14.599 --> 00:44:16.880
Act UP versus the more traditional gay
rights movement is exactly what I'm talking

553
00:44:16.880 --> 00:44:22.199
about, because in the same you
know, because like a lot of the

554
00:44:22.199 --> 00:44:27.239
more you know, traditional gay rights
movement was horrified by act UP and they

555
00:44:27.280 --> 00:44:30.639
thought what act UP was doing was
terrible. But but a lot of the

556
00:44:30.639 --> 00:44:32.760
others, you know, and there's
been some great like histories of act UP

557
00:44:32.880 --> 00:44:37.039
that were that were written in oral
histories, and I love listening to some

558
00:44:37.119 --> 00:44:40.679
of the people saying things like I
had to publicly condemn act UP, but

559
00:44:40.719 --> 00:44:46.119
I always knew that I needed Act
Up to be scaring people enough. I

560
00:44:46.159 --> 00:44:50.840
look reasonable enough that that that the
society would would negotiate with me. And

561
00:44:50.880 --> 00:44:52.320
I think that's such a thing.
And so I love that idea of like,

562
00:44:53.039 --> 00:44:58.639
yeah, that there's a way in
which Professor X needs Magneto and Mystique

563
00:44:58.639 --> 00:45:00.679
and others doing the more extreme things
is a way to be like, hey,

564
00:45:00.719 --> 00:45:02.719
talk to me, or they're going
to bring the house down. Yeah.

565
00:45:02.760 --> 00:45:07.159
No. And but also that like
what act that would often do is

566
00:45:07.199 --> 00:45:10.039
to and you said challenge the moral
legitimacy in ways that I think mystique and

567
00:45:10.079 --> 00:45:16.960
the others definitely do. Yeah cool, I'm glad. And like when we're

568
00:45:17.000 --> 00:45:23.719
saying like villain agnostic or whatever,
like if we take it from the standpoint

569
00:45:23.719 --> 00:45:27.920
of the movement, where it's like
the people who are working towards you know,

570
00:45:28.000 --> 00:45:34.280
within the within social justice movements,
they may have disagreements oppositions with each

571
00:45:34.320 --> 00:45:37.320
other. This is the leftist in
fighting, the herding cats that everyone's sleeping

572
00:45:37.320 --> 00:45:40.559
with each other, the chaos ball
that we were talking about before, Right,

573
00:45:40.800 --> 00:45:44.800
But there is an opposition, there
is a villain, there is an

574
00:45:44.880 --> 00:45:47.159
enemy, and that is like the
j Edgar Hoover, right, the ku

575
00:45:47.199 --> 00:45:52.960
Klux Klan, like the people from
outside your society who do hate and want

576
00:45:52.000 --> 00:45:57.800
to kill you, and are you
know in the in these and are lynching

577
00:45:57.840 --> 00:46:06.519
normal people or lynching you know,
the the non uh, the people who

578
00:46:06.519 --> 00:46:12.719
are not part of your movement,
who are not organizers or who are in

579
00:46:13.280 --> 00:46:19.840
like j Edgar Hoover's case, actively
assassinating and murdering your leaders. And so

580
00:46:20.079 --> 00:46:24.239
you know, there's like we're not
physically assassinating assassinating their character, or assassinating

581
00:46:24.239 --> 00:46:28.079
their finances or do one of things
to undermine their power and stuff like that.

582
00:46:28.280 --> 00:46:31.159
Yeah, but also plenty of literal
assassination as well. Like I'm going

583
00:46:31.199 --> 00:46:35.920
through all these histories and I was
doing all of the the you know,

584
00:46:36.960 --> 00:46:40.199
the comparisons of all these characters,
and I'm like, man, I wish

585
00:46:40.320 --> 00:46:46.039
Fred Hampton got you know, fifty
years of continuity, like like uh like

586
00:46:46.159 --> 00:46:52.119
Kitty Pride. You know, I
wish that we would would had the opportunity

587
00:46:52.199 --> 00:46:58.320
to see, you know, later
in life Martin Luther King or or Malcolm

588
00:46:58.440 --> 00:47:02.599
X, and that these that these
that these historical figures, these leaders would

589
00:47:02.639 --> 00:47:08.000
be able to be revived and grow
and change and continue to influence the world.

590
00:47:08.079 --> 00:47:12.719
But you know, in real life
they were just murdered by mostly by

591
00:47:12.719 --> 00:47:16.079
the government. Well, and so
let's talk about Yeah, I want to

592
00:47:16.119 --> 00:47:21.280
acknowledge that more mportunate topic. No, And I think that's such a good

593
00:47:21.320 --> 00:47:22.679
point. And I think that's in
some ways one of the things that comic

594
00:47:22.719 --> 00:47:28.440
books can do is they can tell. The reality is a lot of the

595
00:47:28.480 --> 00:47:34.480
social justice movements that we have in
throughout our society either flat out lost or

596
00:47:36.239 --> 00:47:39.039
felt like they lost at the time, but they wound up having like some

597
00:47:39.119 --> 00:47:43.119
degree of victory, you know that
they don't only really showed up, you

598
00:47:43.119 --> 00:47:45.679
know, through social reproduction and these
kind of thing decades later. And I

599
00:47:45.719 --> 00:47:51.239
think it's one of I know that
as an activist I often needed hope,

600
00:47:51.639 --> 00:47:55.000
and like West Wing was a show
that I watched all the time. And

601
00:47:55.199 --> 00:48:01.280
funny how today it's West Wing is
viewed as a liberal utopia that by leftists

602
00:48:01.280 --> 00:48:05.280
often looked at. It's like,
this is all the problems with with liberalism

603
00:48:05.320 --> 00:48:07.639
and with like the Clinton takeover of
the Democrats and all that kind of stuff.

604
00:48:08.239 --> 00:48:10.559
At the time the show was coming
out, I was working for,

605
00:48:10.719 --> 00:48:15.400
as I said, a much more
left wing politician, and for those who

606
00:48:15.480 --> 00:48:19.760
know, it was Tom Dwayne who
was the first openly gay and openly should

607
00:48:19.760 --> 00:48:22.039
be positive politician. I think I'm
one of the first elected office of any

608
00:48:22.119 --> 00:48:25.559
kind after Harvey Milk, but but
certainly one of the first in the New

609
00:48:25.679 --> 00:48:31.960
York City Senate and all that.
Yeah, and I am a number of

610
00:48:32.000 --> 00:48:36.239
the other like you know, staff
aids from other or people who knew through

611
00:48:36.280 --> 00:48:40.519
occupy or activism would often get together
and watch West Wing because for us it

612
00:48:40.679 --> 00:48:45.440
was a it was a fantasy,
because there were so many times when the

613
00:48:45.519 --> 00:48:47.960
president in that was faced with a
choice that Clinton was faced with because coming

614
00:48:47.960 --> 00:48:52.400
out like at the end of Clinton
and then during Bush where you know,

615
00:48:52.840 --> 00:48:54.760
he has the chance to say the
era of big government is over, the

616
00:48:54.840 --> 00:49:00.000
way Clinton did, and this fantasy
president chooses not to, and so a,

617
00:49:00.159 --> 00:49:04.679
I think it's funny and relevant discussion
about how the way something can be

618
00:49:04.800 --> 00:49:07.760
viewed its cultural context changes so much
later twenty years later, so much twenty

619
00:49:07.840 --> 00:49:10.320
much years later. But the point
also was that it gave me. It

620
00:49:10.320 --> 00:49:13.840
gave us hope, Like there were
times when like it because it was an

621
00:49:13.880 --> 00:49:15.599
inspiring show, and part of that's
caustic. Is very good at right,

622
00:49:15.920 --> 00:49:21.079
great characters, snappy dialogue. Yeah, and you analyze it war and you're

623
00:49:21.079 --> 00:49:22.840
like, Okay, this doesn't make
so much sense, but in the moment,

624
00:49:22.159 --> 00:49:24.760
yeah, I'm fired up, and
yeah I love Toby and I love

625
00:49:24.840 --> 00:49:29.440
CJ and etcetera, etcetera. Absolutely, yeah, and I think there's some

626
00:49:29.519 --> 00:49:30.800
value in the same way when an
X men like, Yeah, maybe the

627
00:49:30.840 --> 00:49:34.760
social justice movement wins an awful lot
more of the time, and that's good.

628
00:49:34.960 --> 00:49:37.000
You know, it gives us the
kind of hope and inspiration there.

629
00:49:38.159 --> 00:49:40.599
I want to shift to it because
we've kind of also been touching on this

630
00:49:40.679 --> 00:49:45.280
idea of like the historical evolution of
things. One of the things that I

631
00:49:45.320 --> 00:49:46.199
think we've been talking about. You
know, as I said, one of

632
00:49:46.239 --> 00:49:52.559
the reasons why the King Malcolm X
breaked one of the reasons why the King

633
00:49:52.639 --> 00:49:58.719
Malcolm X metaphor idea breaks down a
lot is that, you know, as

634
00:49:59.519 --> 00:50:06.840
socially liberates as is because you know, someone like stan Lee and Jack Kirby,

635
00:50:07.039 --> 00:50:09.679
like they were people who were trying
to be as as aware as they

636
00:50:09.760 --> 00:50:13.199
could at these movements, and they
cared about them. They were also trying

637
00:50:13.199 --> 00:50:15.159
to sell comics and make money.
I think you could say Jack Kirby a

638
00:50:15.199 --> 00:50:19.320
little more than Stanley, but yes, absolutely think that's very fair. But

639
00:50:19.480 --> 00:50:22.639
still it was also it was white
guys trying to do their best to understand

640
00:50:22.039 --> 00:50:24.840
a black civil rights movement, or
then straight guys trying to do their best

641
00:50:24.920 --> 00:50:30.599
to understand the queer movement. Yes, that's changed and to I mean not

642
00:50:30.719 --> 00:50:31.719
just like in the last two years. But you know, over the last

643
00:50:32.480 --> 00:50:38.320
fifty sixty years, the representation of
who is writing X men comics has shifted

644
00:50:38.360 --> 00:50:43.159
a lot and is not just white, straight sis men as much still much

645
00:50:43.239 --> 00:50:45.239
more than maybe it should be,
but not as much. Do you think

646
00:50:45.360 --> 00:50:50.880
that has if we can talk about
general trends over you know, eight different

647
00:50:50.880 --> 00:50:53.239
comic book lines over sixty years.
But do you think that there are ways

648
00:50:53.239 --> 00:50:58.719
in which you can see that more
and more these are stories being written,

649
00:50:59.639 --> 00:51:04.599
that if the stories are a metaphor
for oppressed groups in the United States or

650
00:51:04.639 --> 00:51:07.360
in the world, that more and
more it's being written by people who are

651
00:51:07.440 --> 00:51:14.320
in those oppressed groups. Yes,
absolutely, and and that it's slowly starting

652
00:51:14.400 --> 00:51:20.360
to do a better job of kind
of taking these metaphors tackling them much more

653
00:51:22.800 --> 00:51:28.599
intelligently rather than you know, from
the outside, like engaging overly much in

654
00:51:28.719 --> 00:51:34.280
respectability politics or trying to trying to
say that somebody gave a speech was the

655
00:51:34.360 --> 00:51:37.679
turning point for an entire social movement
or something like that. Right, So,

656
00:51:38.400 --> 00:51:44.679
like, for example, a couple
recent one one recent book in particular

657
00:51:44.800 --> 00:51:46.039
that I would love to highlight,
if you don't mind me giving a comic

658
00:51:46.119 --> 00:51:54.960
recommendation on here is New Mutants by
Vita Ayala, and that just wrapped up

659
00:51:55.199 --> 00:52:02.360
last year. All those run went
for a couple dozen issues something like that.

660
00:52:02.559 --> 00:52:09.840
Easy to pick up and read relies
it draws heavily from continuity of knowing

661
00:52:09.920 --> 00:52:15.840
these characters. I don't because I
also have that continuity in my head.

662
00:52:15.920 --> 00:52:19.800
I don't know how much the story
relies on the reader already knowing these So

663
00:52:20.079 --> 00:52:23.239
it might be a difficult one to
pick up. But it's so good because

664
00:52:23.960 --> 00:52:36.440
so Vita Yala is a non binary, black queer writer and they are they

665
00:52:36.960 --> 00:52:45.199
you know, got put they got
the job on New Mutants and completely upended

666
00:52:45.800 --> 00:52:52.400
the entire tradition of how character development
happens in comics. And I don't want

667
00:52:52.400 --> 00:53:00.599
to understate how momentous that is,
because most going back to the days of

668
00:53:00.079 --> 00:53:07.760
you know, Chris Claremont, who
is sort of like the the most influential

669
00:53:07.920 --> 00:53:13.360
writer on X Men and actually in
comics in general. I would argue from

670
00:53:13.440 --> 00:53:20.880
the seventies, eighties into the nineties, Claremont had a theory of character development,

671
00:53:21.039 --> 00:53:24.639
which was you just punish your characters, you just subject them to horrendous

672
00:53:24.679 --> 00:53:30.119
torture all the time you push them
past their breaking point and in where they

673
00:53:30.280 --> 00:53:35.639
become, where they go, where
they become in that sort of torture,

674
00:53:35.920 --> 00:53:42.639
in that pushing, that is where
your character development happens. And Iala and

675
00:53:42.880 --> 00:53:50.079
some other contemporary mostly female and femine
queer creators are saying, like, no,

676
00:53:51.039 --> 00:53:57.679
that's trauma. Trauma isn't how you
how you grow. Healing from trauma

677
00:53:57.880 --> 00:54:00.599
is how you grow. And so
they take all of these like horrible things

678
00:54:00.679 --> 00:54:05.000
that have happened to these characters,
and they do it within a lens of

679
00:54:05.119 --> 00:54:12.760
conflict that makes them fun, compelling, readable stories, but they actually show

680
00:54:12.840 --> 00:54:17.679
their characters confronting trauma, healing from
it, changing based on the healing.

681
00:54:19.159 --> 00:54:22.800
And uh, this is the kind
of like smaller piece of perspective maybe that

682
00:54:22.840 --> 00:54:28.440
you're talking about, of like how
storytelling can change and how how these stories

683
00:54:28.559 --> 00:54:35.679
can can be better developed from more
diverse creators who know a little more what

684
00:54:35.760 --> 00:54:38.039
the hell they're talking about when they
take on, uh, you know,

685
00:54:38.159 --> 00:54:45.800
writing the stories of characters from these
oppressed, oppressed and underprivileged groups and draw

686
00:54:45.920 --> 00:54:52.320
from personal experience in them, and
it ended up in some really spectacular stories.

687
00:54:52.400 --> 00:54:58.159
So you contrast that with something like, uh, even just ten fifty,

688
00:54:58.599 --> 00:55:02.280
like ten years ago. Uh,
there's a white guy named Rick Reminder

689
00:55:02.400 --> 00:55:12.159
who wrote a run combining like X
Men and Avengers. They're called the Uncanny

690
00:55:12.159 --> 00:55:15.440
Avengers, and it had hav giving
a speech about how he hates the word

691
00:55:15.519 --> 00:55:20.000
mutant and you know he's going to
be a leader, but just don't call

692
00:55:20.119 --> 00:55:28.760
him a mutant and was wild widely
reviled as just like totally tone deaf,

693
00:55:29.079 --> 00:55:36.519
just the worst kind of tone deaf
politics. And so, yeah, it's

694
00:55:37.800 --> 00:55:44.679
comics is getting more diverse, and
it really reflects well in a franchise like

695
00:55:44.840 --> 00:55:49.239
X Men, where it the intent
was there all along to to speak to

696
00:55:49.320 --> 00:55:52.559
these issues, they just didn't let
themselves do it. Well. Yeah,

697
00:55:53.119 --> 00:55:57.679
I hear that. I hear that. We've gone with an hour and there's

698
00:55:57.760 --> 00:56:00.039
kind of there's so much more we
can talk about this. This is I

699
00:56:00.159 --> 00:56:04.079
become a series we do more of
because I'd love to analyze individual characters or

700
00:56:04.480 --> 00:56:07.079
like small groups within the larger things. And by the way, we are

701
00:56:07.119 --> 00:56:13.559
going to talk more about the everyone's
sleeping with each other section member section,

702
00:56:14.079 --> 00:56:17.119
stay tuned for that. But the
last thing I want to kind of touch

703
00:56:17.159 --> 00:56:21.760
on it, and I'm curious how
much do you think this plays in I

704
00:56:21.840 --> 00:56:24.400
think one of the reasons why a
lot of superheroes are often seen as kind

705
00:56:24.400 --> 00:56:29.360
of like speaking to a more and
we say conservative, I don't mean in

706
00:56:29.440 --> 00:56:32.599
the kind of way it's defined today
in terms of like Republicans democrats of today,

707
00:56:34.079 --> 00:56:38.519
but like one of the kind of
like essential ideas of like American history

708
00:56:38.599 --> 00:56:42.960
often but often just the way we
view history is, you know, like

709
00:56:43.079 --> 00:56:45.360
the one great man of history,
Like there's one person who, as you

710
00:56:45.440 --> 00:56:50.400
said, one person gives one great
speech and everything changes or one part.

711
00:56:50.519 --> 00:56:57.800
And in superheroes it's more often like
one person defeats one evil person InCom punished

712
00:56:58.320 --> 00:57:01.159
guy in the face hard enough that
it, yeah, and everything falls apart.

713
00:57:01.480 --> 00:57:07.679
Yeah. And I actually had Becky
Allen on the Star Wars podcast a

714
00:57:07.719 --> 00:57:14.360
while ago to talk about the significance
of Star Wars moving towards more of ensemble

715
00:57:14.480 --> 00:57:20.280
shows with things like rebels and uh
one and stuff like that, or about

716
00:57:20.400 --> 00:57:24.440
like a team working together instead of
just one individual person. Interesting, yeah

717
00:57:24.639 --> 00:57:28.760
talk, And I'm curious how you
if you see kind of a similar dynamic

718
00:57:28.920 --> 00:57:31.360
in that one of the like that, because it seems to me that another

719
00:57:31.440 --> 00:57:35.519
way the X Men is kind of
a standout from a lot of other comics

720
00:57:35.679 --> 00:57:38.719
is that, you know, in
some cases, like you have one strong

721
00:57:38.840 --> 00:57:43.639
person who has their team of like
you know it's Arrow and the Arrow Team,

722
00:57:43.880 --> 00:57:46.320
or like you know, Batman and
the Robins and Overwatch or something like

723
00:57:46.400 --> 00:57:52.719
that. But then The X Men
is much less the story of one strong

724
00:57:52.840 --> 00:57:57.800
individual and much more the story of
this large ensemble of people. And it

725
00:57:57.920 --> 00:58:00.440
alone feels like it's a big challenge
to like kind of overall mythology of the

726
00:58:00.480 --> 00:58:05.360
one strong man. How you see
that? Oh, I totally agree.

727
00:58:05.440 --> 00:58:08.159
That's a fantastic point, and I
would say that it's not even it even

728
00:58:08.239 --> 00:58:15.000
goes bigger than that, like the
ensemble cast that you would expect in like

729
00:58:15.079 --> 00:58:19.519
a super like Avengers, you know
you've got like a seven person team or

730
00:58:19.639 --> 00:58:23.639
something. You've got like a much
more bounded limit. X Men are just

731
00:58:23.960 --> 00:58:30.800
notoriously messy for like they because they
just they were so popular in the eighties

732
00:58:30.920 --> 00:58:36.760
and nineties that they just kept and
the team concept is so core to it

733
00:58:36.960 --> 00:58:40.199
that the team books have always done
much better or have been a much stronger

734
00:58:40.400 --> 00:58:45.599
like part because like you said,
this is you're practicing solidarity you're part of

735
00:58:45.639 --> 00:58:47.880
a family. You're part of a
found family, which is another important part

736
00:58:47.960 --> 00:58:54.599
of the queer metaphor, and and
and so it's in your in your like

737
00:58:55.400 --> 00:59:00.800
cooperation, your confrontation, your your
interactions with other mutants that you develop sort

738
00:59:00.840 --> 00:59:05.280
of like who these characters are and
what they stand for. And then they

739
00:59:05.400 --> 00:59:07.320
just kept adding more and more and
more and more teams, so you know,

740
00:59:07.440 --> 00:59:13.480
and then they wanted to keep everybody
gets invested in these minor characters that

741
00:59:13.559 --> 00:59:16.239
get added to one team back in
nineteen eighty five, and then now they're

742
00:59:16.280 --> 00:59:20.440
like, okay, we need to
make sure that all of our characters are

743
00:59:20.440 --> 00:59:23.440
accounted for in some books. And
now you have like a hundred two hundred

744
00:59:23.559 --> 00:59:27.719
different mutants who have been part of
a team at some point and they're part

745
00:59:27.800 --> 00:59:31.119
of this, and then like hundreds
more like recently in the comics, all

746
00:59:31.199 --> 00:59:37.960
of the mutants have created a nation
called Krakoa. We've talked about it on

747
00:59:37.039 --> 00:59:43.360
this pod before, where it's kind
of like a mutant separatistic nation that wants

748
00:59:43.440 --> 00:59:51.480
to deal with other other contemporary nation
states to establish equality. So it's kind

749
00:59:51.519 --> 00:59:58.440
of a fusion of Xavier and Magnetos
visions and apocalypse as well, but that's

750
00:59:58.800 --> 01:00:12.400
for another time. And and it's
uh, it's huge. They're just hundreds

751
01:00:12.480 --> 01:00:20.239
of thousands of residents of Krikoa,
and and it they really done their work

752
01:00:20.320 --> 01:00:24.960
into making this feel not just like
an ensemble, but a society like this

753
01:00:25.239 --> 01:00:32.440
is this massive group of people who
disagree in fight, have to come to

754
01:00:32.519 --> 01:00:37.760
consensus, need to build solidarity with
one another. They've been you know,

755
01:00:38.079 --> 01:00:44.440
enemies for most of their lives and
are figuring it out. And and that

756
01:00:44.800 --> 01:00:51.039
is unique because it goes even beyond
sort of the team ensemble and into full

757
01:00:51.239 --> 01:00:59.239
social like it's not uncommon in this
Krocoa era to just have cameos from people

758
01:00:59.280 --> 01:01:02.480
who are outside of the main team
of the comic all over the place,

759
01:01:02.719 --> 01:01:06.039
and you're like, wait, am
I supposed to know who this person is?

760
01:01:06.159 --> 01:01:08.199
I do, because I've read all
the freaking comics. But you know,

761
01:01:08.960 --> 01:01:13.719
they come in, they fill a
purpose, they represent a particular point

762
01:01:13.760 --> 01:01:16.159
of view, and then they might
drop out for another, you know,

763
01:01:16.320 --> 01:01:24.039
a dozen issues or so, and
and it really builds a vision of of

764
01:01:24.199 --> 01:01:30.800
this as as a full society,
as as something far beyond just even the

765
01:01:30.920 --> 01:01:37.000
small group unit of a family or
an ensemble. Yeah, And I just

766
01:01:37.079 --> 01:01:39.920
think that's so important. And I
think that that's one area where I am

767
01:01:40.039 --> 01:01:45.519
so glad that you're so knowledgeable about
the comics because I think that, you

768
01:01:45.599 --> 01:01:49.960
know, for me, as someone
who's mostly watched the X Men on screen,

769
01:01:50.480 --> 01:01:54.559
yeah, I think that they definitely
capture some of the kind of social

770
01:01:54.639 --> 01:02:00.440
justice aspects. You know, you
watch X two and it's so clear that

771
01:02:00.480 --> 01:02:04.360
it's yeah, it's so clear that
it's about gay rights and queer rights and

772
01:02:04.440 --> 01:02:06.880
things like that, and you know, that's where that parental scene I was

773
01:02:06.880 --> 01:02:10.559
talking about comes from. But like
I was trying to do the math in

774
01:02:10.599 --> 01:02:13.760
my head, and I'm probably gonna
be wrong, and please don't yell at

775
01:02:13.800 --> 01:02:16.360
me ask Paul about how good my
math is in general. But if you

776
01:02:16.400 --> 01:02:24.079
were to take every named character who's
a mutant in every single live action X

777
01:02:24.159 --> 01:02:30.400
Men production that's been on, probably
maybe like three dozen at the most,

778
01:02:30.800 --> 01:02:34.639
you know, in any individual movie, just because of the nature of the

779
01:02:34.719 --> 01:02:39.400
movie, like maybe you have like
six to ten, you know, and

780
01:02:40.840 --> 01:02:45.480
and I think you'd be I think
it'd be easy to watch those movies and

781
01:02:45.679 --> 01:02:52.199
think the primary characters of every X
Men movie are Professor X Magneto, Mystique,

782
01:02:52.320 --> 01:02:59.920
Wolverine, Cyclops, Jean Gray Rogue, and maybe one or two others,

783
01:03:00.119 --> 01:03:01.400
and then the rest just kind of
come and go. Is bit players

784
01:03:02.199 --> 01:03:07.440
and hundreds of main characters in X
Men comics, and and they're they're all

785
01:03:07.599 --> 01:03:14.280
great. There's so many great characters. And as you said, also like

786
01:03:15.320 --> 01:03:20.280
yes, Iron Man and Captain America
and all them do team up into the

787
01:03:20.559 --> 01:03:24.119
Avengers, and there's a lot of
other team ups that happen. But whereas

788
01:03:24.239 --> 01:03:28.840
like I'm gonna get guess here,
and you can coming if I'm wrong,

789
01:03:29.360 --> 01:03:34.159
but I would guess that like if
you count up the total number of appearances

790
01:03:34.280 --> 01:03:39.079
that that that Tony Stark and Steve
Steve Rogers have had Captain America and iron

791
01:03:39.119 --> 01:03:45.000
Man, that the overwhelming majority of
times they appear is in a Captain America

792
01:03:45.079 --> 01:03:51.199
comic or an Iron Man comic,
with a small but growing number being when

793
01:03:51.199 --> 01:03:55.880
they appear in stuff that's under the
name Avengers, where it would say would

794
01:03:57.000 --> 01:04:00.480
it would be closer to fifty fifty
or slightly an Avenger is favor just because

795
01:04:00.559 --> 01:04:04.079
you can turn it. They published
so many freaking Avengers books. You know,

796
01:04:04.119 --> 01:04:09.719
they'll usually only have one like one
Captain America iron Man book going at

797
01:04:09.760 --> 01:04:13.840
once, but they'll have like three
or four Avengers books, so it's fair.

798
01:04:14.159 --> 01:04:15.719
Yeah, yeah, well, I
guess my question though, would you

799
01:04:15.800 --> 01:04:20.320
say that like the number of individual
Wolverine comics versus times Wolverine appears in an

800
01:04:20.400 --> 01:04:25.280
X Men comics in a similar ratio, because my guess is that the ratio

801
01:04:25.519 --> 01:04:29.559
Wolverine or a Cyclops or Jean Gray
has going much higher to well, maybe

802
01:04:29.639 --> 01:04:32.079
let's say Wolverines maybe the bad example, but for like a Magneto or a

803
01:04:32.280 --> 01:04:38.639
Cyclops or Jean Gray or total.
Yeah, Cyclops has been you know,

804
01:04:39.280 --> 01:04:44.920
a member of the X Men most
of its existence for you know, fifty

805
01:04:45.239 --> 01:04:51.920
sixty years whatever, and he's he's
very rarely had a solo title at all,

806
01:04:53.239 --> 01:04:57.639
you know, like you could,
I would guess that he's had maybe

807
01:04:59.000 --> 01:05:04.639
two dozen issues of solo titles m
and he's you know, yeah, his

808
01:05:06.079 --> 01:05:13.800
poster child for this sort of like
found family aspect of of of the X

809
01:05:13.880 --> 01:05:18.559
Men. Cyclops a very interesting character
that doesn't get translated into into adapted media

810
01:05:18.599 --> 01:05:23.079
ever. But that's fine. Earlier, if we're looking at protest movements,

811
01:05:23.400 --> 01:05:26.440
Psyclops to me as the person who's
like okay, but we have to make

812
01:05:26.480 --> 01:05:30.719
sure that we have every permit and
that our protests never jay walks, and

813
01:05:30.840 --> 01:05:33.119
that, like, I would disagree
with that, but that's a that's a

814
01:05:33.159 --> 01:05:43.400
comics reading. I would I would
characterize Cyclops as the march tactics organizer that

815
01:05:43.920 --> 01:05:53.920
is also is absolutely making sure that
both the Black Block and the street medics

816
01:05:54.280 --> 01:06:00.039
are extremely well organized and prepared,
as well as the you know, the

817
01:06:00.159 --> 01:06:04.000
police lady is on or whoever.
Okay, here's a character I'd love for

818
01:06:04.079 --> 01:06:06.760
us to talk about more about at
some point, because I think in the

819
01:06:06.840 --> 01:06:11.559
movies at least, Yeah, my
impressions a stick in the he's normal,

820
01:06:11.760 --> 01:06:15.719
he's normal, Vanilla white guy is
stick in the mud, represents rules,

821
01:06:15.800 --> 01:06:21.360
he's the contrast to us. He's
just Wolverine's foil essentially. Yeah, exactly.

822
01:06:21.519 --> 01:06:25.559
He's the person who's there to make
it clear why Jane Gray should choose

823
01:06:25.559 --> 01:06:29.880
Wolverine instead of him, which in
the comics I know is because I remember

824
01:06:29.880 --> 01:06:30.239
we talked about this and you were
like, yeah, I kind of like

825
01:06:30.320 --> 01:06:32.920
Socbops and I was like, what, he's such a dork, but like

826
01:06:33.039 --> 01:06:36.079
anyway, yeah, we weren't talk
about there, all right. Uh.

827
01:06:36.519 --> 01:06:40.280
One thing I want to mention,
by the way, because I was thinking

828
01:06:40.280 --> 01:06:42.719
about this as I said it and
then didn't get a chance to put it

829
01:06:42.800 --> 01:06:45.519
in. I earlier said that,
you know, stan Lee and Jack Kirby,

830
01:06:45.679 --> 01:06:49.599
like often were writing about they were
writing metaphors from movements that they weren't

831
01:06:49.639 --> 01:06:53.639
a part of. Yeah, I
do want to say that they were white,

832
01:06:53.719 --> 01:06:55.920
they were cists, they were straight, least as far as we all

833
01:06:55.960 --> 01:07:00.280
know. They were Jewish at a
time when I don't want to minim is

834
01:07:00.280 --> 01:07:02.920
anti Semitism. Today it still very
much exists, and I'm not going to

835
01:07:02.960 --> 01:07:06.079
get into debates about like, you
know, we are Jews fall exactly,

836
01:07:06.480 --> 01:07:10.719
but I think it is important to
understand that at the time they were writing,

837
01:07:11.719 --> 01:07:16.840
being Jewish was a much more overtly
oppressed you know, non favored group

838
01:07:17.440 --> 01:07:21.440
vanity is today in some parts of
today, et cetera. Again, Jack

839
01:07:21.519 --> 01:07:25.599
Kirby would go out and find neo
Nazis and beat the hell out of them

840
01:07:25.719 --> 01:07:28.920
for fun. Right, But it's
not even mean Nazis like actual Nazis.

841
01:07:29.199 --> 01:07:31.280
Well, yeah, yeah, that's
right, it was. It was the

842
01:07:31.400 --> 01:07:35.559
time in which they were actual Nazis. Yes, But I just wanted to

843
01:07:35.599 --> 01:07:40.320
say that say that thing anyway.
Are there any other last comments you want

844
01:07:40.320 --> 01:07:43.320
to make or throw in here?
Uh No, I think we had a

845
01:07:43.400 --> 01:07:47.119
great conversation and we touched on.
Anything else that we didn't touch on,

846
01:07:47.239 --> 01:07:51.079
we can always come back and talk
about again. And of course, listeners,

847
01:07:51.159 --> 01:07:54.119
if you think there's something we didn't
touch on, or something you want

848
01:07:54.119 --> 01:07:56.719
to argue us about or tell us
you agree with, or tell us about

849
01:07:56.719 --> 01:07:59.800
your own experience as any of these
things, please let us know. If

850
01:07:59.840 --> 01:08:01.760
you go to the website, the
Ethical Panda, or just find us on

851
01:08:01.840 --> 01:08:05.519
the True Story FM web page,
or just look at the show notes,

852
01:08:05.559 --> 01:08:10.480
you'll find all the ways to contact
us. You can reach out on Facebook,

853
01:08:10.559 --> 01:08:14.000
on Twitter, on TikTok. I'm
going to be trying to make a

854
01:08:14.119 --> 01:08:18.800
post about these episodes every week in
both. I'm gonna revitalize the Facebook page

855
01:08:18.840 --> 01:08:24.039
and also do something on Twitter.
Right now, I know there's a lot

856
01:08:24.039 --> 01:08:27.039
of people leaving Twitter, I think
for very good reasons. As far as

857
01:08:27.079 --> 01:08:29.520
I can tell right now, they're
all leaving to eight different ships. And

858
01:08:29.600 --> 01:08:32.000
I just I wound up within a
span of four days, I created three

859
01:08:32.039 --> 01:08:34.840
different profiles on three different things that
everyone's telling me. No, this is

860
01:08:34.880 --> 01:08:39.600
going to be the main Twitter replacement. I can't, so I'm gonna stay

861
01:08:39.600 --> 01:08:42.479
on Twitter for the moment, but
once it kind of solidifies, if you

862
01:08:42.520 --> 01:08:45.960
think there's one I should be on, let me know, but certainly let

863
01:08:45.079 --> 01:08:47.279
us all know, or just send
us an email. Whatever you want to

864
01:08:47.319 --> 01:08:49.319
do, I will share it with
Steve. If Steve will be back on,

865
01:08:49.439 --> 01:08:53.119
We'll make sure to go over that
feedback when that happens. Steve just

866
01:08:53.239 --> 01:08:56.560
gave a thumbs up, which you
can't see becausistant streaming, but I definitely

867
01:08:56.560 --> 01:08:59.920
wanted to report it. I'm not
like my co host Will, I will

868
01:09:00.159 --> 01:09:03.279
verbalize things. I was just waiting
for a conversation to do so well.

869
01:09:03.319 --> 01:09:06.439
And look, Will is a streamer
first and foremost, so it totally makes

870
01:09:06.479 --> 01:09:10.560
sense, and we have streamed some
of these episodes, so it's fine.

871
01:09:10.600 --> 01:09:12.840
But yeah, let us know.
In the show notes, and of course

872
01:09:13.039 --> 01:09:15.640
by going to the ethical Pana dot
com, we're finding us in a true

873
01:09:15.680 --> 01:09:17.680
story. You can also find all
the information about my other podcast, Star

874
01:09:17.760 --> 01:09:23.079
Wars Universe podcast. During the strike, we are continuing to cover. We're

875
01:09:23.119 --> 01:09:26.560
not covering the stuff that appears on
screen, but it turns out actually there's

876
01:09:26.600 --> 01:09:30.560
a huge amount of Star Wars content. There are comic books, there are

877
01:09:30.359 --> 01:09:35.680
novels. There are people who do
as both professionals and just because they as

878
01:09:35.720 --> 01:09:41.680
amateurs. They love it. Incredible
work making lightsabers and cosplay and the fiction

879
01:09:41.760 --> 01:09:45.439
of their own fan fiction in the
Star Wars universe. So there's lots to

880
01:09:45.479 --> 01:09:48.359
talk about there. And of course, if you want to support these podcasts,

881
01:09:48.640 --> 01:09:51.039
the best way to do it is
to become a member. I've mentioned

882
01:09:51.079 --> 01:09:55.479
this before, but I want to
kind of reiterate. I've now officially shifted

883
01:09:55.520 --> 01:10:00.560
these podcasts over to the True story
dot fm family of podcasts. If you've

884
01:10:00.600 --> 01:10:01.960
heard the Modevel movie a minute that
I've been on, that's a big part

885
01:10:02.000 --> 01:10:04.000
of it, and a lot of
other great podcasts there. I think,

886
01:10:04.119 --> 01:10:06.119
Steve, have you been on that
at all? I know we haven't.

887
01:10:06.239 --> 01:10:11.039
No, Just well, okay,
I'll definitely make sure you get connected one

888
01:10:11.079 --> 01:10:14.359
of them, because I think they
just do great analysis of Marvel movies.

889
01:10:15.119 --> 01:10:16.840
Again, you know, wait till
after the Strike. But on the True

890
01:10:16.840 --> 01:10:20.439
Story FM, there's so many other
great podcasts and things like that. But

891
01:10:20.680 --> 01:10:25.239
if through there you can become a
member of this podcast. It's basically the

892
01:10:25.279 --> 01:10:29.800
same as Patron just with a different
different people running it less overhead costs,

893
01:10:30.520 --> 01:10:32.079
but it's the same kind of a
thing. All the patrons have gotten,

894
01:10:32.079 --> 01:10:35.279
you know, their membership transferred over
to there, and it's a great time

895
01:10:35.319 --> 01:10:39.479
to become one. For five dollars
a month or just fifty five dollars for

896
01:10:39.520 --> 01:10:42.680
the year. You get every content, you get all the bonus content we

897
01:10:42.800 --> 01:10:45.359
make, you get access to a
lot of other cool things. And most

898
01:10:45.359 --> 01:10:48.800
importantly, right now during the strike, twenty five percent of all the profits

899
01:10:48.880 --> 01:10:51.960
that we make from that not all
the profits, twenty five percent of all

900
01:10:53.000 --> 01:10:58.039
the money that comes in through the
membership plan is being donated to the strike

901
01:10:58.119 --> 01:11:00.680
fund. So it's a great way
to help support that great help support us

902
01:11:00.680 --> 01:11:02.880
because it does, you know,
take a lot of effort and time and

903
01:11:03.159 --> 01:11:06.880
resources to make this podcast happen.
So please think about doing both of those

904
01:11:06.920 --> 01:11:10.720
things. There will be that member
of the content in just a moment where

905
01:11:10.720 --> 01:11:14.800
we get more into the tangled web
of love lives of these characters. But

906
01:11:15.239 --> 01:11:17.880
Steve for people who want to find
more about your stuff, You've got a

907
01:11:17.920 --> 01:11:21.079
podcast, You've got places you create
content. Where can you find your voice?

908
01:11:21.840 --> 01:11:27.199
So I co host along with my
best buddy Will Freeland a podcast called

909
01:11:27.279 --> 01:11:32.159
Hype is My Superpower. You can
find it wherever podcasts exist. And then

910
01:11:32.920 --> 01:11:39.760
I also write and self published independent
comics if that's something that you're interested in

911
01:11:40.079 --> 01:11:44.920
checking out. My first title was
about is called The Pros. It's about

912
01:11:45.039 --> 01:11:49.720
spies who work for an insurance company. It's kind of a absurdist comedy slash

913
01:11:49.760 --> 01:11:57.279
political thriller. So if you're if
you're interested in that, find me on

914
01:11:57.359 --> 01:12:00.800
social media, send me a DM
because my web store is working right now.

915
01:12:00.439 --> 01:12:03.079
Okay, sounds good. Sounds good? Well do you? Thank you

916
01:12:03.079 --> 01:12:05.319
as much for being a part of
this. Hello over fans, Thank you

917
01:12:05.399 --> 01:12:11.079
so much for listening. We have
spoken. Thank you so much for having

918
01:12:11.119 --> 01:12:13.720
me on. This was a great
time and I really enjoyed this conversation.