mirrorgrets

[mirrorgrets]

chris martin accidentally exposing a CEO for cheating with his employee via a kiss cam at a coldplay concert is the funniest thing i’ve heard in a while

[mirrorgrets]

this is what a ss+ wit gold ship looks like

[mirrorgrets]

Unimaginable Utopia vs the believable Colonized World

"Why can't we make Krypton, Superman's home planet, flawed or evil instead of a utopia (as it was traditionally portrayed)?"

Much of the justification for an evil or flawed Krypton is that it "adds depth" or "makes it believable/ interesting" when Krypton isn't a utopia. Because utopias, in a lot of people's minds, are unimaginable. We can imagine aliens, distant planets, magic, superpowers, but utopia without suffering is "ridiculous".

I have been gripped by this Little Joel video on Omelas: How We Talk About Utopia for ages now because I think it succinctly wraps up everything I feel about the topic. Omelas and Krypton are both fictional worlds (in the case of Omelas, explicitly a fiction within the short story fiction where the author herself encourages you to imagine utopia with her as a thought experiment), yet in the demand to make these fantastical worlds more "believable", suffering (regardless of how nonsensical) needs to be added in order to "make sense of the good that exists". The idea of utopia without suffering is unimaginable.

For Krypton, this means any sort of interpretation from "Kryptonians are colonizers now" or "Kryptonians are evil aliens who hate Earth, plot twist!" or "Kryptonians have a class system that punishes progressive thought" or "Kryptonians are racist, sexist, ableist, etc."! Somehow this fictional alien world has to look a lot more like our flawed world in order to be "believable". But that's not the full picture. Many real world societies in themselves are hard to believe, especially in the American mindset.

["From A Native Daughter" by Haunani-Kay Trask excerpts]

People are shocked to learn of societies outside of the West with more broad systems for gender, or that queerness existed at all in indigenous cultures around the world without the influence of white people. Societies outside of a patriarchal or capitalistic system? Is that really possible?

["From A Native Daughter" by Haunani-Kay Trask excerpts]

I'm not here to paint all these cultures as perfect or necessarily enlightened before colonialism set them back. But I am saying that the way many of these societies were built were so unimaginable to colonizers that they had to lie and label these worlds as barbaric or worse-than-they-were as a means of "civilizing them" through colonization. Projecting familiar European structures on them, regardless of accuracy. "These indigenous genderqueer roles are perverse, they must fit our binary two gender system!" And now all of these cultures are set back, and we'll never really know what they'd have looked like had they been allowed to develop and grow without colonizers intervening. Many have bought into the European structures enforced on them. Because that's believable.

(American Missionaries in the 1800s abolishing the genderqueer practices of the Māhū, from Kumu Hina documentary)

The basic premise of Superman is that he was born on a utopian planet, but sent to Earth as a baby when said planet faced world-wide destruction. He is raised by his adopted American parents and culture. Superman is by all technicalities, an undocumented immigrant.

So why do I think utopia is important to Superman mythos? Isn't there an argument to be made for portraying a refugee allegory when Superman leaves a bigoted Krypton to find safety in a flawed Earth? Because any other alien character in DC's roster could do that. Martian Manhunter used to be written as coming from a utopian Mars, but I personally think that him fleeing from a bigoted one works better for his themes. What makes Superman different? What makes him unique from all these alien migrants?

Because being the Man of Tomorrow, an ideal to strive for, is inherit to the best Superman stories. Part of what makes his rivalry with Lex Luthor so compelling is that Lex Luthor has bought into the flawed Omelas premise. He's been raised to believe that power without stepping on someone else is impossible. So when he sees Superman, he's frustrated that this alien man flaunts power without malice. It's unimaginable to Lex that someone can be powerful and selfless. It's even become a meta discussion for fans that someone as kind as Superman is unbelievable. "Too good to be true".

When you remove utopia from Superman's backstory, this contrast is lost. Superman just becomes an exception from an evil planet. A miraculous white savior, assimilated into American culture to be our hero.

(the infamous, xenophobic John Byrne panel)

Nowadays, people want to shake up the formula. It's a trendy twist to make Krypton a planet of colonizers. Or maybe a morally grey one. Or a feudal, classist, and bigoted one.

Superman is no longer a guy from a native utopia who hopes to bring our flawed world into a better tomorrow like the one he came from. He's now just magically the best guy from the shitty planet. Sometimes he's like that because his Kryptonian parents happen to be activists (Absolute Superman). Other times, Superman is good because he was raised by upstanding American citizens. He's not like those other aliens; barbaric, feudal, bigoted. Superman's good because he's assimilated into being an American. And he will spread that American goodness throughout the galaxy to bring them into the American Way- oh wait that's the less progressive line, I mean- "A Better Tomorrow".

Think for a moment about Superman as an immigrant allegory and how that parallels real human experiences for a second. What does it mean to change Superman's home planet to be something "more believable"? To add elements of American/western bigotry into these distant sci-fi worlds? Why make Kryptonians evil colonizers like yourselves? Why make a Superman that disavows his Utopian Kryptonian roots? Why make a Superman that assures us he is more human than alien? It's because our modern imaginations are limited by colonial constructs. New writers think they're twisting the Superman formula, but they manage to bring it backwards to xenophobic directions.

"The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting. This is the treason of the artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain."

-Those Who Walk Away from Omelas, Ursula K. Le Guin

[mirrorgrets]

i miss tumblr i wish it was still around. but it’s not

[mirrorgrets]

[mirrorgrets]

You know for the first 18-ish years of your life everyone your age is mostly doing the same things and then all of a sudden every year for the rest of your life somebody your age is getting divorced while somebody else just learned what a leaf is and you have no idea what’s going on or what you’re supposed to be doing

[mirrorgrets]

if you tell an indigenous trans man to cut his long hair so that he "passes better" then im tying you to an anchor and dropping you in the middle of the ocean

[mirrorgrets]

gay little cow finally finds its moo

[mirrorgrets]

an absolute fuckton of people at pride rn

[mirrorgrets]

I'm the #1 time travel fix-it fan like yess send that blorbo back in time to save the future but destroy the world they knew in the process!!! let them give everyone a happy ending while they have to deal with leaving their versions of those people behind

[mirrorgrets]

anyone else wish they would get roped into a freaky friday body swap situation just for the hope that the other person will go "oh jesus fuck how do you live like this" and instantly validate your feelings of being Strange and Built Wrong.

[mirrorgrets]

wow insanely low price for disco elysium in the steam summer sale. if you somehow haven't played it yet there's never been a better time to go pirate it instead of giving the vultures who ousted the creative team from their own studio even four measly dollars!! you won't regret it!

[mirrorgrets]

seeing more and more artist alley artists put out merch exclusively available via gacha or blind boxes, and watching stamp rallies go from fun little bonuses to basically pay-to-win questlines people are locking their high-end products behind, and noticing the increasing adoption of elaborate bespoke branded packaging that is just going directly into the trash as soon as people get home from the con. ohh its nauseating it really is. i understand Why so many independent artists are adopting business practices we would instantly be able to recognize as predatory or disproportionately harmful when anyone but a ~small business owner~ does it but what i understand less is how everyone just seems to be okay with this.

[mirrorgrets]

I am Kareman Dohan، From besieged Gaza

I record this message in the 21st century, specifically in the year 2025, fully aware and in sound mind. I hereby testify, confess, and declare that a criminal entity—ruled by violent gangs—has revived the horrors of Nazism, and has even surpassed them. For over 600 days, it has committed one of the greatest atrocities of our modern age, in a place called Gaza. They murdered our children before our men, our women before our youth. They destroyed homes, displaced families, and starved the innocent. And this brutal campaign has not stopped—not even as I speak these words. The world today counts more than 8.2 billion people, Yet not a single force has been able to stop the bloodshed, or protect the defenseless.

I call upon every free soul, every conscience still alive, Spread this message far and wide.

Speak up. Act.

Support my people. Support my family.

Let your silence not be another weapon used against us.

Silence is complicity.

Solidarity is a duty.

Donate to my family and my little boy, donation links below the post or by clicking here

Short video of 600 days of war

Donate here🌸:

GoFundMe: Click here

PayPal: Click here

Chuffed: Click here

My campaing vetted by/ @90-ghost here @gaza-evacuation-funds here My number in post 6

[mirrorgrets]

finding out vapes have been lead poisoning people for the past 20 years almost suddenly made a lot of things make sense

[mirrorgrets]

[mirrorgrets]

nothing close to the military or the prison complex or anything like that, but it can still affect people by the 2nd or 3rd degree