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X-Men has always been very subtle with its messaging (hexbear.net)

submitted 9 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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https://twitter.com/CerberusXt/status/1759527828427583920

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[–] [email protected] 30 points 9 months ago (3 children)

I mean, it was very nakedly a metaphor for the Civil Rights movement of the 60s. X-men didn't get particularly gay until the 90s/00s.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 9 months ago (2 children)

You're right, but X-Men can be a metaphor for any oppressed people vs a society that oppresses them. It's almost as if there is some fundamental oppressor/oppressed dynamic that is universal across history and manifests in different but recognizable ways.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 9 months ago

Yeah, I don't think its ever been intended but I see applicability to the struggle of ND people in the mutant allegory, particularly in mutant cure storylines.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 9 months ago

big if true

[–] [email protected] 12 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Wrong. X-men is about Judaism and Israel.

It was gay since 1981 at the latest with Mystique and Destiny. Going back further. But the civil rights stuff also was not there at the start, mutants was just an easy origin for Stan and Jack.

X-men have been “woke” since 1975 when the team got very international (Soviet, anfrican, Irish, Canadian, Japanese, west German, Native American) after being gone since 1970.

Magneto being a Holocaust survivor came later. Xavier was a Korean War vet who was late 20s during the initial run, Magneto wasn’t much older.

A lot of the Claremont stuff is also very much about his mixed feelings regarding Israel.

Genosha is an idealized version of Israel’s narrative - where there were people there, but they were bad to mutants, mutants won and made a mutant nation.

Krakoa is the dream version of Israel as it’s an island that wasn’t inhabited and invited them, the whole second language and mutant names being real, it’s very inspired by Israel. The difference again is that it’s not a colony on other people’s space.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I guess he could be backfilling but Stan has been pretty explicit that he intended the civil rights metaphor from the start. Obviously a lot of the best stuff didnt come till Claremont, but it was still there. Just like, without Magneto being more morally interesting and stuff.

I do agree about the applicability to Judiasm, though I didnt know that Claremont was explicitly working with mixed feelings on Israel.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago

Never trust Stan Lee when given the option to take credit.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 9 months ago

Yeah the first part of the post is the point. That it was always political, not that it was always gay. The rest is just bonus.