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You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / Popular Culture Open Thread: Onward, Social Justice Warriors!

Popular Culture Open Thread: Onward, Social Justice Warriors!

by Anne Laurie|  March 10, 201910:27 pm| 151 Comments

This post is in: Foreign Affairs, Open Threads, Popular Culture, Vagina Outrage

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What people actually mean when they say they want “non-political” comics like when they were kids is that they’re devastated to have woken up one day as an adult, read a comic book, and realized they’d grown up to become the kind of person their childhood hero punches in the face

— Andy Khouri (@andykhouri) March 6, 2019

Whoever decided Captain Marvel's release date should coincide with #IWD deserves a bonus for top tier trolling of the misogynist manbabies.

— Danielle Blake (@abradacabla) March 8, 2019

We are SJWs and we leave the house. https://t.co/bcVK8YhgUJ

— Schooley (@Rschooley) March 10, 2019

Director of FANTASTIC FOUR ?? pic.twitter.com/hKea0bQjK5

— Dana Schwartz (@DanaSchwartzzz) March 10, 2019


 
Elsewhere: Engage, Magic Lasso of Truth:

On Instagram @GalGadot rebukes @netanyahu: "Love your neighbor like yourself. It's not about right or left, Jew or Arab.. It's about dialogue, talking peace, equality and patience for each other. The responsibility to sow hope and light for a better future for our kids is on us." pic.twitter.com/kRbKsukji8

— Batya Ungar-Sargon (@bungarsargon) March 10, 2019


Per the Washington Post:

… With less than a month to go before Israelis head to the polls on April 9, the long-serving leader [Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu], who is hoping for reelection in a tight race, publicly challenged on Sunday one of the country’s most popular celebrities — model and TV presenter Rotem Sela.

In the process, he seems to have sparked the ire of Israeli actress Gal Gadot — better known as Wonder Woman.

Sela, [whose] face adorns billboards across the country and who appears on Israeli television in one reality show or another almost every night, had aired concerns about the way Israel’s Arab population is being used in a derogatory manner during the campaign…

In his weekly cabinet meeting Sunday, Netanyahu reiterated his message to Sela, stating: “I want to respond to a few people who are confused. The state of Israel is not a nation-state of all its citizens; other minorities have a national representation in other countries.”…

Writing to her 28.2 million followers on Instagram, the “Wonder Woman” actress made clear her support for Sela:

“Loving your neighbor as yourself is not a matter of right-left, Jewish-Arab, secular or religious, it is a matter of dialogue, of dialogue for peace, equality and tolerance for each other,” Gadot wrote in Hebrew. “The responsibility for such hope is on us to create a brighter future for our children. Rotem, my sister, you’re an inspiration for us all.”…

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Reader Interactions

151Comments

  1. 1.

    Patricia Kayden

    March 10, 2019 at 10:33 pm

    Good on Gadot for speaking up. Netanyahu is a bigot. He needs to be soundly defeated.

  2. 2.

    NotMax

    March 10, 2019 at 10:34 pm

    Shades of Rodney King.

  3. 3.

    SiubhanDuinne

    March 10, 2019 at 10:38 pm

    @Patricia Kayden:
    Would love to see him soundly and decisively defeated next month.

  4. 4.

    john b

    March 10, 2019 at 10:39 pm

    “I want to respond to a few people who are confused. The state of Israel is not a nation-state of all its citizens; other minorities have a national representation in other countries.”

    Wow.

  5. 5.

    Mathguy

    March 10, 2019 at 10:40 pm

    No wonder Bibi and the shitgibbon get on so well-two turds in a load.

  6. 6.

    dmbeaster

    March 10, 2019 at 10:42 pm

    How quickly will RWNJs dump Israel if Netanyahu was replaced by a leftist?

  7. 7.

    Mike in NC

    March 10, 2019 at 10:42 pm

    Gal Gadot would make an excellent PM for Israel.

  8. 8.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 10:44 pm

    Just a heads up: expect a troll account to suddenly resurface claiming that Gadot set the account owner up to be raped in Italy over a decade ago when they were both modeling there. The entire story is garbage. It appears to have been created by a neo-NAZI, posted on Medium (since deleted by Medium) under the name Ima Survivor, and then spread through the usual channels – 4Chan, Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, and then into the fringe right social media and digital platforms – though in this case it never made it all the way to Gateway Pundit, Breitbart, Daily Caller, Daily Wire, Fox News, etc.

  9. 9.

    SRW1

    March 10, 2019 at 10:45 pm

    In a slightly earlier time Bibi probably would have made a good kapo. The basic talent seems to be there.

    [ducks and runs]

  10. 10.

    RepubAnon

    March 10, 2019 at 10:47 pm

    I wonder how long it will be before Liz Cheney condemns Netanyahu’s obvious racism… my guess is sometime after the heat death of the universe.

  11. 11.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 10:47 pm

    @john b: Is it too soon to talk about allegiance issues?

    Asking for the Elders…

  12. 12.

    Hob

    March 10, 2019 at 10:48 pm

    While I don’t think the makers of Captain Marvel really gave a shit what misogynists would think, they made some rather sly decisions that may make it hard for such a person to identify where the message is that he doesn’t like. For example—and I don’t think I’m giving away the plot by saying this—early on there’s a scene where Brie Larson’s character is told by her alien mentor that in order to succeed, she needs to be better at controlling her emotions. This is a very familiar type of movie dialogue, and the expected outcome is that the character will eventually manage to do so; and you might guess that in a movie like this, they’ll change it up so that maybe she succeeds by using her emotions instead, or something like that. But no: it turns out that the mentor’s advice was just completely irrelevant, because she didn’t actually have any problem related to emotions at all—he was just saying that because he didn’t have any better advice to give. While his condescension can be explained in context of the story as “he thinks she’s weak because she’s a human“, it’s a kind of thing that will be instantly familiar to about 50.8 percent of the audience… yet on the surface it’s just the same “tough mentor” scene that’s in lots of action movies. The eventual payoff to that scene at the end involves another very familiar fight-scene trope and gets the biggest laugh in the movie.

  13. 13.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 10:49 pm

    @dmbeaster: There will be separation, but it won’t be complete as the Evangelicals need Israel as part of their a-textual rapture and millennial fantasies.

    Also, Lapid and Gantz are, at best, center left. The actual left in Israel hasn’t had any real political viability since Rabin was assassinated. Which, in terms of stochastic terrorism, was some of Bibi’s best work.

  14. 14.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 10:52 pm

    @SRW1: Bibi’s grandfather was a member of the Stern Gang, otherwise known as Lehi. They were so out of control and engaged in so much terrorism during the Yishuv period that the leaders of the Haganah essentially forced them out and then ran most of them to ground. They were religious supremacists and racist fascists then, their descendants on Israel’s right, like Bibi, are still religious supremacists and racist fascists.

  15. 15.

    NotMax

    March 10, 2019 at 10:53 pm

    @Adam L. Silverman

    Damn. Thought they were all off boning up on tactics on Oa.

    :)

  16. 16.

    Brickley Paiste

    March 10, 2019 at 10:54 pm

    Although this is very painful for me to discuss, I feel like I have no choice but to stand up and tell the truth about Gadot. In the 1990’s we were both modelling in Italy. We did the sort of things that you would expect models in Milan in the 1990s to do: parties, coke, the horrible oversized sunglasses, all of it. One night after we’d both spent the entire day volunteering at a soup kitchen together, like we did every Tuesday, Gal (I called her Gal) sat me down and had a heart to heart talk with me. Brick she said, you’ll never make it in this game. You’re forty. You’re fat. No designer makes clothes large enough to fit you. And you’re a guy. You’re not fooling anyone.

    It was hard to hear, but in the long term, it was the best thing that’s every happened to me.

  17. 17.

    eemom

    March 10, 2019 at 10:55 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Interesting article on that point in the Atlantic the other day, which you may have seen.

    I didn’t actually know any of this.

  18. 18.

    Pete Downunder

    March 10, 2019 at 10:56 pm

    What Bibi and his government are doing to the Palistinians amounts to genocide. My Jewish great grandfather fled the Russian progroms so I have great sympathy for the Jewish people but this conduct is criminal and must stop. Whether a new government, if elected, will make a difference remains to be seen.

  19. 19.

    eemom

    March 10, 2019 at 11:01 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Which reminds me of another question. I was talking recently with a colleague who attended a lecture by an Israeli political scholar (don’t know the name) who was advocating for the so called one state solution, and was cool with the fact that it would result in a no longer majority Jewish state. It seemed to me, though I don’t know, that that idea was unlikely to have much traction, even among the Israeli left. What say you?

  20. 20.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:02 pm

    @RepubAnon: She has to check in with Megan “I’m almost Jewish because I know Joe Lieberman” McCain first.

  21. 21.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:03 pm

    I’d like to report a murder:

    .@JerryFalwellJr threatened to shoot @AOC if she tried to ‘take his cows’ during #CPAC.

    Here he threatens to kill Muslims: “…if more good people had concealed carry permits, we could end those Muslims…"

    But I’m spreading hate 4 condemning racism…pic.twitter.com/Hb6VWOc3wk

    — Bishop Talbert Swan (@TalbertSwan) March 5, 2019

    Two words…

    POOL BOY pic.twitter.com/UqJtWEmeMC

    — Bishop Talbert Swan (@TalbertSwan) March 9, 2019

  22. 22.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:04 pm

    @NotMax: That’s the Guardians. Wrong group of really old guys.

  23. 23.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:07 pm

    @eemom: Yep. It is both sad and frightening that Bibi is, for all intents and purposes, the closest to the center of anyone in his coalition. The handful of New Likud members of Knesset who ran specifically because they’re center to center right with the intention to pull the party back to the center are basically either powerless back benchers or have moved towards Bibi and the extremists.

  24. 24.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    March 10, 2019 at 11:07 pm

    On Tumblr all of the anti-“SJWs” thought
    Captain Marvel was going to bomb. Idiots. Oh and Brie Larson is totally a sexist and a racist! LOL!

  25. 25.

    Pete Downunder

    March 10, 2019 at 11:07 pm

    @eemom: Mrs Downunder and I were there last year and most of the Palistinians we spoke to (not a scientific sample) felt one state was the the only possibility because the settlements have made a two state solution more or less impossible – which was of course the intention. It is truly an intractable problem. Too much history for the available geography.

  26. 26.

    Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)

    March 10, 2019 at 11:08 pm

    O K., so I’m not Jewish, and maybe I just don’t get this because it’s a Jewish thing and I don’t understand, but how is it that Israel is only a country for some of its citizens? Doesn’t being a citizen mean it is your country? What does that even mean? I swear, I keep thinking this guy is going to trot out some “final solution to the Arab question” any day now.

  27. 27.

    NotMax

    March 10, 2019 at 11:08 pm

    @Adam L. Silverman

    Jewish. Bluish. So easily confused.

    :)

  28. 28.

    Luthe

    March 10, 2019 at 11:10 pm

    @Hob: The message the misogynists don’t like is that a woman can be powerful and resilient and independent of male authority (see the trope upsetting fight scene).

    I think the biggest “screw you” to the misogynists was the brilliant use of No Doubt’s “Just a Girl.”

  29. 29.

    B.B.A.

    March 10, 2019 at 11:10 pm

    Netanyahu should be hanged for war crimes, no question, but don’t let that distract you from the fact that his main opponent, Benny Gantz, should also be hanged for war crimes.

  30. 30.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:11 pm

    @eemom: That has been the consensus position of the governing/ruling Israeli rightist coalition since 2014. When I was working on the DOD’s side of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process in 2014, I kept coming across references to this and actually wrote an analytical report on it so that the Commanding General of US Army Europe and the Special Envoy for Middle East Peace would be aware of the actual problem: there is no constituency in Israel for a two state solution with any actual power or realistic hope of coming to power. Especially as Bibi has already stolen one election and illegally formed a government. The purpose of the report was to argue that the US either needed to adjust its policy to reflect this reality or it needed to adjust its strategy to account for it.

  31. 31.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    March 10, 2019 at 11:12 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:
    So let’s say the Dems have unified control of the federal government (Congress and the White House). Is there anything the US could do to pressure regime change in Israel, with the help of our allies?

  32. 32.

    Jay

    March 10, 2019 at 11:12 pm

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.):

    Israel has an aparthaid structure based on race and religion.

    All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.

  33. 33.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:14 pm

    @eemom: One of the reasons that Bibi uses Ehud Barak as a political foil, even though he’s not running for office, is that Barak was the commander for the raid on Entebbe. The only Israeli commando that was killed in action and didn’t make it back from Entebbe was Yoni Netanyahu, Bibi’s brother. Bibi hates Barak and personally blames him for his brother’s death on that operation. He even wrote a book about his brother entitled: Yoni: Hero of Entebbe.

  34. 34.

    Jay

    March 10, 2019 at 11:14 pm

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:

    Nope. There is neither the understanding, or the will.

    Allegiance.

  35. 35.

    eemom

    March 10, 2019 at 11:18 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    But didn’t Bibi come close to losing to a center left party in the last election….until he trotted out that trump-esque bullshit about terrorists being bussed in to vote, or whatever it was? Tzipi Livni was the opposition leader, right?

    I’m interested in this stuff. As noted, I really didn’t understand that the majority of Israelis were intractably to the right of center.

  36. 36.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:19 pm

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): It’s blood and soil citizenship based on eliding Judaism, which is a religion, into a race or an ethno-nationality. It basically takes the NAZI psuedo science that Jews are a distinct race and remakes it so that it can be put in service of Bibi’s goals. As a result, the Arab Israelis whether Christian or Muslim, Christian Israelis who aren’t Arab, the Druze Israelis are, at best, second class citizens.

  37. 37.

    clay

    March 10, 2019 at 11:19 pm

    My daughters, 10 and 9, and I saw Captain Marvel today. We all loved it. Aside from the greatness of them seeing a female hero who — through her own stubbornness and refusal to be defined by others — kicks all kinds of ass… the movie was a fun ride with great action and genuine surprises.

    The tributes to Stan Lee were very moving.

  38. 38.

    Ohio Mom

    March 10, 2019 at 11:23 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I’ve long assumed that years ago, most of Israel’s left saw the future and emigrated. A sort of brain drain. Did I make that up or is it true?

    @eemom: It’s always been hard for me as an American Jew to reconcile the idea that we like America — America has been a real bright spot in world Jewish history — and what has mainly made America great for us is the separation of church and state, with the idea that we like Israel because it is Jewish, that is, because it has an official religion.

    It seems to me that the Two-State solution is a fig leaf, lots of people claim to be for it while doing things like supporting Likud. I can’t imagime how a One-State could evolve but that is my current ideal.

    That is, it’s my ideal when I’m not muttering about being forced to care about Israel more than I’d like to. I already belong to one mixed up country that is not living up to its potential, I have to have another?

  39. 39.

    Pogonip

    March 10, 2019 at 11:23 pm

    @Hob: I wonder how long the super-hero fad will continue? It’s already lasted longer than I expected, and here many super-heroes left. What do you think?

  40. 40.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    March 10, 2019 at 11:24 pm

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
    And to be clear, I don’t mean “regime change” in the Iraq War sense. I mean a peaceful, democratic transfer of power.

  41. 41.

    B.B.A.

    March 10, 2019 at 11:29 pm

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: There’s no way it can possibly happen. The two-state solution has been dead so long it doesn’t even smell anymore, and you can count the number of people in the Levant who want to live in a binational state on one hand.

  42. 42.

    Ohio Mom

    March 10, 2019 at 11:30 pm

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): In the olden days, we (American Jews) were taught that Israel had Arabs in the Knesset because we recognized they were Israelis too! And women were equal because they served in the army!

    Those myths were nice while they lasted.

  43. 43.

    Jay

    March 10, 2019 at 11:31 pm

    @eemom:

    It has shifted over time for a bunch of reasons.

    The biggest is Land for Peace. Many Israeli’s want both.

    As others have pointed out, the Two State Solution is dead, geographically because if the Settlements, Security Roads and Wall, politically because many Israeli’s want it all.

    The One State Solution is what is left, but it’s DOA. Israel isn’t a “Jewish” State anymore under the One State Solution and the current Apartheid cannot be maintained. As a result, Israeli’s will never accept the One State Solution.

    That leaves genocide and ethnic cleansing as the end game.

    The Jarvanka Peace Plan for the Middle East is to get Sawdi Arabia and the other Arab Countries to cut all support for Palestine, and accept and fund population transfers to depopulate Palestine and Israel of Arabs, Beduins and other minorities.

  44. 44.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:31 pm

    @NotMax: It’s confusing. One of my grandfathers just happened to be named Ganthet.

  45. 45.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:32 pm

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Withdraw all aid. The Israelis, especially Bibi, constantly claim that Israel is self sufficient. That it needs no one. That it can protect itself. That its economy can provide for itself. Fine, prove it.

  46. 46.

    waratah

    March 10, 2019 at 11:32 pm

    Well closer to home the republicans have declared war on Beto. They are so worried about him they have made a nasty video which includes everything they could find on him in the senate election. Beto has not announced but they are going to play this in Iowa this week.
    They are going to try and disrupt the democratic primary according to P9litico.

  47. 47.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    March 10, 2019 at 11:35 pm

    @Pogonip:
    You didn’t ask me, but I figure that superheroes will always be popular in some fashion. Like science-fiction, they often raise important questions that we can apply to real life. I like superheroes and other magic/fantasy elements. Oftentimes in these types of stories, the evil government is pursuing the good guys because they view them as threats.

    And honestly? The last few years, I’m actually somewhat sympathetic to that viewpoint. I mean, imagine some being with unimaginable powers showed up one day in our own world. Wouldn’t you fear it? Uncheckable power is terrifying to me. I’d vacillate between wanting it destroyed and wanting to believe it was truly good.

  48. 48.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:37 pm

    @eemom: Livni also isn’t really left of center. She was one of Sharon’s proteges after he reformed himself before his stroke. Her party was specifically centrist with some center right and some center left members. It wasn’t a reworking of the old Labour coalition. What happened in 2009 is that Livni’s party list one the larger plurality, which, by Israeli election law, meant she had the first shot at forming a government. Before the President of Israel (head of state), was able to certify the election and issue the instructions to Livni to form that coalition, Bibi simply formed his own right to extreme right coalition, declared that coalition the governing majority, declared himself prime minister, and took power. Basically, he executed a bloodless coup that illegally invalidated the 2009 Israeli election. No one did anything about it because no one was quite sure what to do about it, so he got away with it.

  49. 49.

    Steve in the ATL

    March 10, 2019 at 11:37 pm

    @Mike in NC:

    Gal Gadot would make an excellent PM for Israel.

    Is she eligible, having been born in Themyscira?

  50. 50.

    Ohio Mom

    March 10, 2019 at 11:39 pm

    I’ve long thought that American Judaism has diminished its future prospects with its laser focus on Israel.

    A lot of energy and effort that could have gone into creating observances that speak to us now, and into building ties that would strengthen our communities, instead has gone into cheerleading for Israel.

    I suspect it turns a lot of people away. It certainly has made me ambivalent about affiliating.

  51. 51.

    FEathers

    March 10, 2019 at 11:42 pm

    What worries me about all of this only anti-Semites criticize Israel is that way that it normalizes the extreme violence and ethnic cleansing currently being practiced in Israel. It would not surprise me at all that some of the bloodlust at our southern border is driven by anger that they cannot do what the Israelis do.

    And… I somehow missed this article from FTFNYT back in February:

    In the state of Israel’s early years, a number of parents in immigrant transit camps were told that their babies had died. Their families believe the babies were abducted by the Israeli authorities in the 1950s, and were illegally put up for adoption to childless Ashkenazi families, Jews of European descent. A younger generation is demanding answers.The Disappeared Children of Israel.

    . What a fucking horror show. When the Mizrahi Jews were expelled from the various Muslim countries where they had lived in relative peace for millennia, their children were stolen and given to Ashkenazi families to raise. This was a problem throughout the white world in the 1950s: nuns in Ireland and Spain took babies from unwed mothers and gave to “virtuous” childless married couples, as well as the US adoption mills where young mothers were not given the option to raise their children on their own. It is going on in international adoptions even today, this is what is driving the snatching of children at the US borders. Look at the way the discussion of the adoption of Russian children is used as an unimpeachable reason for the corrupt connections between the Trumps and the Russian oligarchs. Part of the reckoning that will need to follow after all this mess is a complete reconsideration of how we look at adoption. A child needing to be adopted from living parents should be seen as a failure by society. We just don’t seem to be able to do it without trafficking and baby stealing going on.

    Sorry if this was OT from the thread, it turned into more of a rant than it was in my head when I started.

    Edited to fix typo

  52. 52.

    NotMax

    March 10, 2019 at 11:42 pm

    @Adam L. Silverman

    Po-tay-to latkes, po-tah-to latkes.

    :)

  53. 53.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:43 pm

    @eemom: The majority really isn’t. Israelis are all over the map, but the left of center political parties have been, at best, moribund, since Ehud Barak was prime minister. So Israel has been functioning as if it was a one political coalition (read party for coalition) state for the better part of the past two decades. The right, whether religious or secular, is energized. The left is demoralized.

  54. 54.

    Ohio Mom

    March 10, 2019 at 11:45 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: “No one did anything about it because no one was quite sure what to do about it, so he got away with it.” This description of Israel’s 2009 election sounds a bit like our most recent presidential election.

  55. 55.

    Jay

    March 10, 2019 at 11:46 pm

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:

    In Trumpistan, escapist feel good Superhero movies resonate.

    Nobody wants a remake of Syrianna, Hurt Locker, The Kingdom or the Green Zone, starring Jarvanka and Eric Prince.

    During the Depression, plucky Rags to Riches or Other Escapism’s dominated the theatre.

  56. 56.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:46 pm

    @Ohio Mom: There has been a fairly large outflow of Israelis. Especially younger Israelis. Many have taken advantage of the citizenship rules throughout the EU to reclaim the citizenships that their grandparents or great grandparents walked away from because of the Holocaust. Interestingly the single largest destination state of these Israelis trying to get away from Israel is Germany.

  57. 57.

    Ladyraxterinok

    March 10, 2019 at 11:46 pm

    @john b: What does he mean by ‘other minorities’? Is he saying Jews are minorities in Israel?

  58. 58.

    Jay

    March 10, 2019 at 11:49 pm

    @FEathers:

    The 60’s Scoop.

  59. 59.

    Sab

    March 10, 2019 at 11:50 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Been a generation since I have been there, but my impression was that the right in Israel isn’t just energized. It’s actually murderous. They killed Rabin. They threaten everyone to the left of them, and Israel is such a small country that you can’t get away from them. If you are left and outspoken you will be in danger.

  60. 60.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    March 10, 2019 at 11:56 pm

    @Jay:
    Nobody wanted the Hurt Locker in the first place. I have a disagree with your assessment of superheroes as being Trumpist escapism. They’re often smarter than that.

  61. 61.

    NotMax

    March 10, 2019 at 11:57 pm

    @Pogonip

    As with any other more modern genre, eventually the plots will become fungible, the effects repetitive, the pace of churning out lookalike films degrade the quality, the return on investment drop, the number of box office disappointments increase and the number of titles relegated to direct-to-video go up.

    Then someone(s) will come along after a suitable span of time to “reinvent” the genre and the cycle will repeat.

  62. 62.

    Jay

    March 10, 2019 at 11:57 pm

    @Sab:

    SSDD

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_religious_terrorism

  63. 63.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 10, 2019 at 11:58 pm

    @Pogonip: Well you’ve got the entire Green Lantern Corps. That’s at least two Lanterns per space sector. And there’s 3600 sectors, so…

    Then you’ve got the Justice Society and the Justice League. Also Justice League International, Justice League Europe, Justice League Dark. The Teen Titans. Young Justice. And that’s just DC.

    On the Marvel side we’ve got the Avengers, but there’s also the West Coast Avengers and the Great Lakes Avengers (apparently the Witch of November requires a super hero response when she comes early!). You’ve got the X-Men, X-Force, X-Factor, the New Mutants, X-Caliber – something around 5,000 official mutant heroes all told. Then you’ve got the Fantastic Four. You’ve got several Hulks of various colors. You’ve got half a dozen spider powered people crawling around. You’ve got Wolverine, you’ve got Old Man Logan Wolverine. You’ve got the new Wolverine who is a female clone of Wolverine (X-23), then you’ve got her sisters, the only surviving one is code named Honey Badger. Then you’ve got the other mutants and mutates that came out of the Weapons X program.

    And that’s before we get to the other independent comic publishers.

  64. 64.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:00 am

    @FEathers: The Jewish Israelis have a serious racism issue that is not being dealt with. I did a front page post on this back in 2015.

  65. 65.

    Immanentize

    March 11, 2019 at 12:02 am

    Germany is the national state, not of all its citizens, but only of the Aryan people.

    Some German guy once upon….

  66. 66.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 12:02 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:

    Escaping from the Trump Era, in Trumpistan. For “normal” people who want hero’s and winning,( eventually) instead of day after day of this shit show.

    not soulfood for Gullibillies and Deplorables. Birth of a Nation on DVR and Youtube, along with QAnon and 4Chan fills their escapist need.

  67. 67.

    Peale

    March 11, 2019 at 12:02 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: the effects on our politics in a world with super heroes…meh. Would probably be the same. The GOP would use the destruction of the cities from time to time to gut fema relief and aid somehow. Richard Anderson would write a weekly column on various disaster triggered insurance policy proposals. Democratic Socialists would be arguing for extending the National Flood Insurance program, while many on this comment section would note that such an expansion, while polling well, would never be brought to a vote by Mitch McConnell.

  68. 68.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:02 am

    @Ohio Mom: Democracy and the rule of law are fragile things.

  69. 69.

    Feathers

    March 11, 2019 at 12:03 am

    And speaking of Captain Marvel… now remembering where I was going in the comment above.

    While the pre-game shitshow about Captain Marvel was that it was anti-male, the new shitshow is apparently that it is anti-Israel propaganda. The Skulls are falsely labeled as terrorists and hunted to extermination, when all they want is a homeland of their own. Funny how that situation brings the Palestinians to mind. A group of teens leaving the theater as I was going in was turning over these ideas in their discussion as I was walking in. Wished I could have heard it, but I’d already bought my ticket.

    There was a comment on an earlier thread (which I read on my phone and now don’t remember which one it was) which complained about AOC calling climate moderates naive for thinking that changes at the margin were still worth working for. The commenter saw this as disparaging people who had been putting in hard work for many years. The notion of “disruption” has been discredited because the monsters of Wall Street and Silicon Valley have used it as an excuse to wreck healthy businesses and steal everything not nailed down. However, the original sense of it is when a business or entity (like climate change fighters) have been working under a certain set of assumptions for years or decades, with a certain measure of success, only to find that the situation has changed and they do not have the flexibility (or perhaps capital) to pivot to using methods which will be successful in the new circumstances. Incrementalism did not work to fix the climate change problem. Whether it would have worked if Al Gore had been elected cannot be of any concern to anyone who cares about ending global warming. All that can matter is what will work today, now, with the currently available options. Acting butthurt over that fact is just getting in the way of what needs to be done. Israel is rapidly becoming a similar story.

  70. 70.

    NotMax

    March 11, 2019 at 12:03 am

    @Adam L. Silverman

    Not to mention the Legion of Super-Heroes, Legionnaires, the Legion of Substitute Heroes and the Legion of Super Pets.

  71. 71.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:04 am

    @Ladyraxterinok: He means Arabs and Druze. Christians and Muslims. And sub-Saharan African refugees, asylees, and immigrants.

  72. 72.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:05 am

    @Sab: Yep. They’ve been threatening one of the center left members of Knesset who has challenged the inclusion of the Kahanists on Bibi’s party list.

  73. 73.

    B.B.A.

    March 11, 2019 at 12:06 am

    Is it a BDS violation to watch a movie with Gal Gadot in it?

  74. 74.

    Ohio Mom

    March 11, 2019 at 12:07 am

    @FEathers: I also saw that article, and it is enraging and heartbreaking.

    The whole Ashkenazi supremacy thing was studiously ignored when I was a youngster and the “Israel is a land of equality” myth was going strong,

  75. 75.

    NotMax

    March 11, 2019 at 12:07 am

    @Adam L. Silverman

    something around 5,000 official mutant heroes all told

    Power Pack. Also too, X-Babies.

    The list goes on and on and on and on….

  76. 76.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:08 am

    @NotMax: Long live the Legion!

    And, by the Source!, the New Gods.

  77. 77.

    Immanentize

    March 11, 2019 at 12:08 am

    @Adam L Silverman: And the ever problematic Bedouins….

  78. 78.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:09 am

    @B.B.A.: Only if you enjoy it.//

  79. 79.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 11, 2019 at 12:10 am

    @NotMax: You forgot Poland.

  80. 80.

    Immanentize

    March 11, 2019 at 12:11 am

    @NotMax: I think you meant the Legion of Wonder Pets, not Super Pets.

  81. 81.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 11, 2019 at 12:12 am

    @Adam L Silverman: I don’t think he was saying BDSM. Not that there is anything wrong with it… Consenting adults and all that….

  82. 82.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 12:13 am

    @B.B.A.:

    No,

    But it may be a violation of anti-BDS Laws depending on what State you live in. You could lose your job, you could be subject to Civil Forfiture, you could go to jail, you could be forced into slave labour, you could be executed.

  83. 83.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 12:14 am

    @NotMax:

    Power Puff Girls,

  84. 84.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:14 am

    @NotMax: Nothing quite like the Adventures of Shadowcat and the X-Babies!
    https://www.xplainthexmen.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/12_MM.png
    http://arthuradamsart.com/sites/default/files/Screen%20Shot%202017-10-27%20at%201.57.32%20PM.png

    @Marvel #MCU once Disney/Marvel has full X-Men rights can someone please pitch an "Incredibles/Into the spiderverse/Minions style animated movie starring the Lil X-Men!! Please Kevin! #XBabies #XMen #Marvel pic.twitter.com/7KJZNJb2eW

    — Pseudo Giant (@razerp) October 22, 2018

  85. 85.

    B.B.A.

    March 11, 2019 at 12:18 am

    @Jay: Yeah, well, I’m a white dude, so if any of that happens I deserve it.

  86. 86.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    March 11, 2019 at 12:20 am

    @B.B.A.:
    What a strawman.

  87. 87.

    Feathers

    March 11, 2019 at 12:21 am

    @Adam L Silverman: @Adam L Silverman: Thanks, I’ll try to find it. I do consider myself pro-Israel, but am finding that more and more difficult to square with my other values. I don’t think Jewish friends I talk with realize the extent to which the rest of the world sees the Holocaust as a European issue, with the distinguishing characteristic involved being the Germans, not the Jews.

  88. 88.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 12:22 am

    @B.B.A.:

    Have you ever sought honorary minority and gender status?

    For example, while I am also a White Dude, I am also a “Cousin”, a “Sister” and a “Haughtti Woke Cis”.

  89. 89.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:25 am

    @NotMax:
    https://greenlantern.fandom.com/wiki/Guardians_of_the_Universe

    According to an article at Hadassah Magazine, artist Gil Kane based the appearance of the Guardians of the Universe on Prime Minister of Israel; David Ben-Gurion.

  90. 90.

    B.B.A.

    March 11, 2019 at 12:28 am

    @Jay: I’m a proudly self-loathing Jew, but I don’t think that’s worth anything.

  91. 91.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 12:31 am

    @B.B.A.:

    Trade it in for Honorary Muslim Status, or BLM Status,……

  92. 92.

    Mary G

    March 11, 2019 at 12:31 am

    I need brain bleach:

    In unearthed audio, Tucker Carlson makes numerous misogynistic and perverted comments https://t.co/g2xDnIk7N3 pic.twitter.com/TO3os8RjsM— Media Matters (@mmfa) March 10, 2019

    Seriously, trigger warning, I had to turn it off.

  93. 93.

    Sab

    March 11, 2019 at 12:35 am

    @B.B.A.: @B.B.A.: I am sorry to hear/read that.

  94. 94.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:35 am

    @Feathers: Here you go. This was before I was a full timer, so Cole posted it after I drafted it and emailed it to him.
    https://balloon-juice.com/2015/05/05/more-on-the-ethiopian-jewish-situation/

    Just an FYI: some of the hyperlinks are now dead/broken.

  95. 95.

    Ladyraxterinok

    March 11, 2019 at 12:38 am

    @FEathers: Thank you for posting this link. It’s horribly disheartening to learn over and over again that children are treated ss pawns in some grand plan.

  96. 96.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 12:42 am

    @Sab:

    B.B.A doesn’t loathe himself,

    He’s engaged in “reclaiming” a label.

    It’s a feminist/LGTBQ tactic to neuter attempts at shaming and insults.

  97. 97.

    Sab

    March 11, 2019 at 12:45 am

    @Jay: Now I feel better. My naivete bothers me, but I ‘ll get over that.

  98. 98.

    NotMax

    March 11, 2019 at 12:46 am

    @Adam L. Silverman

    Dollars to doughnuts there’s more than one Blue Beetle/Booster Gold movie script kicking around in La-la Land.

    (Although Booster would insist on top billing.)

  99. 99.

    B.B.A.

    March 11, 2019 at 12:47 am

    @Jay: I do actually loathe myself, but not for being Jewish.

    And I agree with all of Ilhan Omar’s “controversial” comments. If she’s an anti-Semite, so am I.

  100. 100.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:48 am

    @NotMax: That’s the Ted Kord Blue Beetle. If they do his successor, Jaime Reyes, then they get the entire Reach storyline. The Jaime Reyes Blue Beetle and Booster Gold actually appear in an episode of Smallville. And Ted Kord appears in at least one episode of Arrow.

  101. 101.

    Sab

    March 11, 2019 at 12:53 am

    @Adam L Silverman: That article was so dpepressing. And it pretty much aligns with what I saw in the early 1990s. Yemenis and Moroccans were dirt. They actually did DNA tests on Ethiopians as part of Operation Solomon, and discovered , to their horror, that the Ethiopians that they thought weren’ t even Jews were actually Cohens (i.e. part of the priestly caste) i.e. sort of more Jewish than everybody else.

    Think about it. DNA tests to prove they were Jews.

  102. 102.

    Ladyraxterinok

    March 11, 2019 at 12:56 am

    @Ohio Mom: Years ago while doing some research in German history I read that some of the rise in anti-semitism in Germany and Austria in the last part of the 19th century w as s the result of Jewsccoming into those countries who were escaping the pogroms. They were perceived as scary, strange, sickly, etc, etc,etc. Very different from the Jews who had been living in Austria and Germany for centuries. Many of the GermanJews allegedly looked down on the ‘foreign’ Jews from the east.

  103. 103.

    West of the Rockies

    March 11, 2019 at 12:57 am

    Silver Surfer hasn’t gotten much big-screen attention, so that could still happen.

    Why is SJW such a bad thing? It’s slung around like an insult. What the he’ll is wrong with social justice?

  104. 104.

    Sab

    March 11, 2019 at 12:58 am

    @B.B.A.: Everyone I know who is Jewish has spoken out in her defense. Very heartening.

  105. 105.

    NotMax

    March 11, 2019 at 12:58 am

    @Adam L. Silverman

    The free version of the DC Universe Online game is almost worth it solely for all the Booster Gold shameless self-promotional narration sprinkled throughout.

  106. 106.

    Bill Arnold

    March 11, 2019 at 12:58 am

    @RepubAnon:

    Liz Cheney

    I pretty much automatically assumed that she and the other resolution-opposing GOP congresspeople voted against it because they could not in evil good conscience block the full expression of their anti-Islam bigotry. Wish somebody in the press would be go there, though only after digging through the records of the GOP house members involved to find actual evidence of bigotry. And perhaps by asking them if they would vote for a resolution condemning anti-Islam bigotry.
    Why Did a Bunch of Republicans Vote Against a Bill Condemning Bigotry? – Refusing to vote against hate to own the libs (Ryan Bort March 8, 2019) I like this following bit :-)

    And so, on Thursday, 23 Republican lawmakers galaxy-brained themselves into botching what should have been the easiest vote of their careers in Congress. Now, they’re on record as opposing a seven-page resolution that didn’t do much more than declare that anti-Semitism, anti-Muslim discrimination and other forms of plain bigotry “are contrary to the values of aspirations of the United States.” On record supporting it is Rep. Omar.

    FWIW, I do wish she (Omar) would shut up for a few weeks and deep study the last 70 years of the complicated propaganda/rhetoric/language (arms race) related to Israel/Palestine. And work a bit on suppressing any actual anti-Jewish feelings. (It is not clear to me from videos that she hates, but there is some apparent bias.)

  107. 107.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 12:59 am

    @Sab: Wait till they test the Palestinians. And I’m not kidding. They have the same markers. Basically, they were Judaeans who didn’t go into exile under the Roman order and ultimately converted first to Christianity and then to Islam.

  108. 108.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 1:03 am

    @West of the Rockies: It makes Stephen Miller very, very, very cross.

  109. 109.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 1:05 am

    @Sab:

    The Yardzi’s of Yemen are genetically “jewish”. Unfortunately, they converted first to Christianity, then early Shiaism.

    Palistinian Arabs both Christian, Muslim and Druze are also genetically “jewish”.

  110. 110.

    Yutsano

    March 11, 2019 at 1:05 am

    @Adam L Silverman: Hawk and Dove movie or GTFO.

  111. 111.

    West of the Rockies

    March 11, 2019 at 1:10 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    But he’s such a charismatic hottie!//

  112. 112.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 1:10 am

    @Bill Arnold: Here you go:

    Cheney's group Keep America Safe launched a series of attacks against Obama that were so inflammatory and racist that she had it scrubbed from the internet before she ran for Congress. https://t.co/kjitl5xsiT https://t.co/fhz1x1Sd3C

    — Matt Duss (@mattduss) March 10, 2019

  113. 113.

    sukabi

    March 11, 2019 at 1:10 am

    @john b: that’s a non-subtle “Go back where you came from” if there ever was one.

  114. 114.

    NotMax

    March 11, 2019 at 1:12 am

    @West of the Rockies

    Silver Surfer

    Inevitably leading to a Golden Oldie movie and the subsequent implosion of the Mouse Empire.

    :)

    ;)

  115. 115.

    West of the Rockies

    March 11, 2019 at 1:12 am

    OT, but is there any reasonable chance that the UK could vote again on Brexit? Isn’t there evidence that Russia mucked about in that issue too prior to the vote?

  116. 116.

    Ninedragonspot

    March 11, 2019 at 1:14 am

    The Chicago Symphony goes on strike. Wish them the best, and hope the folks of Chicago give them their love and support.

  117. 117.

    Sab

    March 11, 2019 at 1:15 am

    @Adam L Silverman: That’s an interesting thought,

    I have an adopted step-daughter with a very Brit surname(Smith) who is actually genetically Syrian mostly and a bit Lebanese. She has found the post 9/11 American world very weird. She used to belong and now she isn’t sure. And her people have been here since her great-grandparents,

  118. 118.

    NotMax

    March 11, 2019 at 1:15 am

    @Yutsano

    They’re too far along in years now but would have been a near perfect vehicle for Affleck & Damon.

  119. 119.

    West of the Rockies

    March 11, 2019 at 1:16 am

    @NotMax:

    What the heck was that, a parody comic?!?

  120. 120.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 1:17 am

    @Yutsano: They did a great appearance in season one of DC’s streaming service’s Titans from what I understand.


  121. 121.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 1:18 am

    @Bill Arnold:

    Sadly, this is a Democratic Party member in the House:

    Rep. Juan Vargas
    @RepJuanVargas
    It is disturbing that Rep. Omar continues to perpetuate hurtful anti-Semitic stereotypes that misrepresent our Jewish community. Additionally, questioning support for the U.S.-Israel relationship is unacceptable. (1/2)
    10:27 AM · Mar 4, 2019 · Twitter Web Client
    3.5K
    Retweets
    11K
    Likes

    Note the last sentence.

    Even President Obama was accused of anti-semitism.

    It’s not a subject that can be discussed in US politics except amongst like minded friends.

  122. 122.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 1:21 am

    @West of the Rockies:

    Nope, clock runs out next Sunday and there is nothing in place, or even in motion.

  123. 123.

    smintheus

    March 11, 2019 at 1:21 am

    Bibi, like Trump, saying the silent parts out loud.

  124. 124.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 11, 2019 at 1:24 am

    @Sab: We lost our societal mind/composure after 9-11. And still haven’t gotten it back.

  125. 125.

    NotMax

    March 11, 2019 at 1:28 am

    @West of the Rockies

    Honest to goodness, if best forgotten, Marvel publication.

  126. 126.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 1:35 am

    Power Puff Girls get’s nothing?

    How far the Jackaltariate has fallen!

  127. 127.

    Sab

    March 11, 2019 at 1:35 am

    @Adam L Silverman: Yeah, but the Ethiopians professed to be Jews, and the genetic tests said yes. The Palestinians pretty much profess not jews. Otherwise they’d just be Sabras.?

  128. 128.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 1:43 am

    @Sab:

    As waves of conquest and conversion passed over the Jewish Kingdoms, some went into exile, some converted, some remained. The last Jewish Kingdoms were in Yemen, where the converted Jews of Yemen, the Yardzi’s now chant “death to the Jews”.

    Despite the practice of religion, Ethiopian Jews were denied their Judiasm with out confirming genetic tests.

    Is Judiasm an ethnicity?

    Is it a religion?

    For some people, it has to be both, but for a lot of people, ( Russian mobsters), a claim is good enough.

  129. 129.

    Sab

    March 11, 2019 at 1:45 am

    @Adam L Silverman: Yeah. My family has been here since before the Mayflower in Virginia, and since the Mayflower in Massachusetts, but I have nephews who are half Chinese, born in America of an American mother, and they aren’t sure they are welcome. Canada is calling to them. This irks me a lot.

    They are superbright and talented.

  130. 130.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 11, 2019 at 1:46 am

    Lovely day here in Tokyo. https://www.instagram.com/p/Bu2yfDsHswq/

  131. 131.

    Inventor

    March 11, 2019 at 1:48 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Great Lakes Avengers (apparently the Witch of November requires a super hero response when she comes early!)

    I’m pretty sure they were formed right after the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

  132. 132.

    Sab

    March 11, 2019 at 1:49 am

    @Jay: That is kind of my point. I thought it was what religion you professed, but then Israel made it genetic. And the Ethiopians passed both tests.

  133. 133.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 1:49 am

    @Sab:

    They should come on up, and not just because of the overt racism.

  134. 134.

    Jay

    March 11, 2019 at 1:54 am

    @Sab:

    If the Ethiopians were “less African”, the practice of Judiasm would have been enough,

    Had they been “white enough”, a claim that their Grandmother and Mother wereJewish, even though they were members of the Satanic Church, would be good enough.

  135. 135.

    joel hanes

    March 11, 2019 at 1:57 am

    @Sab:

    nephews who are half Chinese, born in America of an American mother, and they aren’t sure they are welcome.

    Send them to one of California’s coastal cities. We’ll welcome them.

  136. 136.

    Comrade Colette Collaboratrice

    March 11, 2019 at 2:12 am

    @FEathers:

    A child needing to be adopted from living parents should be seen as a failure by society.

    Would you mind describing what, exactly, you mean by this?

  137. 137.

    Aleta

    March 11, 2019 at 2:14 am

    Re: How To Hide An Empire , book by Northwestern University Professor Daniel Immerwahr

    Immerwahr posits that, for the vast majority of people living in the contiguous United States, our understanding of our own country is fundamentally flawed. This is for one central reason: We omit the millions of people and large territorial holdings outside of the mainland.
    …
    Immerwahr traces US expansion from the days of Daniel Boone to our modern network of military bases, showing how the United States has always and in a variety of ways been an empire. As early as the 1830s, the United States was taking control of uninhabited islands; by 1898, the United States was having public debates about the merits of imperial power; by the end of World War II, the United States held jurisdiction over more people overseas — 135 million — than on the mainland — 132 million.

    From an interview with Immerwahr

    … When you’re on the mainland it is a lot harder to hear the stories about other people who were interned and confined during World War II. That includes the declaration of martial law in Hawai’i and the maintenance of that state of martial law far beyond when it was militarily necessary.

    It wasn’t individual people being interned — the whole island was turned into a military prison with barbed wire around the perimeter. People were prohibited from moving at night, not showing up at work, changing jobs, using US currency — doing all kinds of things they might have done if they were free.

    If they violated these things, they were almost always convicted in courts presided over not by judges, but by military officers. There was something like a 99 percent conviction rate in the courts we know about.

    Another example is the internment in Alaska during World War II. A lot of people don’t remember that Japan … invaded and conquered the western tip of the Aleutian Island chain, and as a result the United States evacuated that entire island chain, including some other islands, and removed the native residents to southern Alaska where they were put in horrific camps where a great number of them died.

    The death rate was about ten percent, which is absolutely galling. Meanwhile the white residents of the island chain were allowed to stay.

    The most shocking, because I had not heard of it at all, was the discovery that at the same time or before even the US starts interning Japanese nationals and Japanese-Americans on the West coast, they were interning Japanese and Japanese-American nationals in the Philippines. It was right after Pearl Harbor, and it was enormous — it encompassed about 30,000 people.

    It was absolutely brutal. It was accompanied by extrajudicial killings, by rapes, by terroristic racial violence, and then by violent retribution once these internees were released as the Japanese invaded the Philippines. So this is an entire Japanese internment of thousands of people that simply does not come up in conversation when we talk about internment in US history. It is massive and it is brutal, but because it doesn’t happen on the mainland, it takes place outside of the view of most US historians.

    It’s not for lack of information. That’s what’s so frustrating about it. It’s a persistent view of the country that has one geography. …

    … Unfortunately, these issues are deeply relevant. Threats have encompassed four of the five inhabited territories of the United States. Hurricanes Irma and Maria struck Puerto Rico; Hurricane Irma struck the Virgin Islands; Guam was threatened by North Korea, which promised to create an enveloping fire around the island; and although it’s not much reported in the mainland, the worst storm in the United States since the 1930s hit the Marianas. It hit Saipan and Tinian, and laid waste to them, knocking out the power grid and ripping roofs off homes. What we see is a mainland and particularly a presidential administration that seems uninterested in engaging with the threats these places face, and in the case of the Trump administration, active hostility to parts of the United States that aren’t on the mainland.

    But I think beyond those individual episodes and artifacts, what you see is the importance of race in the history of the United States. We have long known and are very aware of the fact that race and racism has shaped the lives people have led in this country. Nevertheless, it’s also important to recognize that race and racism have shaped the actual country itself. The legal borders of the country, but also the borders of the heart. The sense of who counts as an American and who does not.

    [The chapter on medicine in Puerto Rico] is about the career of Doctor Cornelius Rhoads, who had experimented in completely unconscionable ways on Puerto Ricans. He had left diseases untreated in some patients, he tried to induce disease in other patients, he had referred to them to his colleagues as experimental animals. Then, shockingly, he wrote a letter in which he seemed to confess to having murdered eight of his patients. He says he was joking and he hadn’t actually done it. It’s kind of unclear what really happened. But this is the kind of guy who really should be fired. He was not.

    He just left San Juan and went to the mainland. He became the vice president of the New York Academy of Medicine, he became a pioneer of chemotherapy, he appeared on the cover of Time Magazine. He became a hero in the medical community and there was a major award for cancer researchers named after him.

    The idea that you can have this guy who on the mainland is such a hero, but in Puerto Rico is known as an unconscionable villain. The idea that you can have that informational segregation persist for decades — that is extraordinary.

    That is how you hide an empire.

    [The future of this relationship with US territories] is going to be a time of crisis, and the reason is that climate change is posing serious threats to the US territories, as well as some of the islands where the US stations its military bases. If you think about it geographically, these territories are at the outer periphery of the United States, and that puts them on the front lines of history. The fact that four of the five inhabited territories have endured existential threats in the last two years is a preview of what’s to come, so I think this is going to be a time of reckoning for the United States. Can it still maintain this peripheral zone where there are US nationals and citizens who are deprived of the full rights of US citizens on the mainland? I hope the answer is no, but I’m afraid it might be yes.

  138. 138.

    rikyrah

    March 11, 2019 at 2:30 am

    @Mary G:
    Disgusting??

  139. 139.

    rikyrah

    March 11, 2019 at 2:31 am

    @Major Major Major Major:
    gLad that you are having a good time?

  140. 140.

    Redshift

    March 11, 2019 at 2:33 am

    @West of the Rockies:

    Why is SJW such a bad thing? It’s slung around like an insult. What the he’ll is wrong with social justice?

    I find out pretty mystifying, too.

    As far as I can tell, wingnuts think you’re a sucker if you’re advocating for the good of anyone other than “your own kind” (gender, race/ethnicity, religion.) So SJW is an “insult” like “n*gger lover” or “race traitor,” and any of us should be proud to wear it.

  141. 141.

    Chetan Murthy

    March 11, 2019 at 2:54 am

    @joel hanes:

    Send them to one of California’s coastal cities. We’ll welcome them.

    Second that. They’ll fit right in with all the people from all over: geographically, ethnically, and sexually. I never knew what it was like to live in a majority non-white place, until coming here. It’s revelatory.

  142. 142.

    Brachiator

    March 11, 2019 at 2:58 am

    @Sab:

    but I have nephews who are half Chinese, born in America of an American mother, and they aren’t sure they are welcome. Canada is calling to them. This irks me a lot.

    Canada enacted a Chinese Exclusion Act in 1923, and things really did not change there until the 1960s. Life is obviously better now, but some countries sadly cycle through periods of bigotry. I am hoping that this fever breaks in America soon.

  143. 143.

    Blue mouser

    March 11, 2019 at 3:56 am

    @Major Major Major Major: long time lurker, rare commenter. Will you be going to the team lab borderless digital museum? From what I heard and the pictures I’ve seen it’s very beautiful

  144. 144.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    March 11, 2019 at 7:18 am

    Alternatively, if you are a movie studio that has a meh movie made to get those sweet Wonder Woman dollars, hiring a Russian troll farm to generate a controversy so viewing the movie becomes a political statement is a way to boost ticket sales. Not to suggest I disprove of gender reassigning established characters, like with Starbuck in Battlestar Galatica it can make for a more interesting character, but a lot of this with Captain Marvel seems to a bit contrived to me; Marvel was never that popular of a character and yet suddenly is supposed to be the one to who can take on the big boss baddie in their story line. You can almost see the staff meeting were they are saying we need our own Wonder Woman in the Marvel property and them saying well, no one gives a shit about Captain Marvel, we can just retcon the character to be one. And speaking of Trese Starbuck, she is also a willowy blonde fighter pilot who can fly anything and memory problems like Captain Marvel is now, huh uh.

  145. 145.

    Brachiator

    March 11, 2019 at 7:38 am

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: I think that Marvel has been female for a while.

    Also, Iron Man had not been a particularly popular character and became the heart of the movie franchise.

    Lastly, all iterations of Battlestar Galactica sucked. A weak Star Wars ripoff.

  146. 146.

    debbie

    March 11, 2019 at 8:20 am

    @Ladyraxterinok:

    I know you’re long gone, but your information is not correct. Pogroms have been a fact of life throughout the millennia. Any Jews already in Germany when the victims of 19th century pogroms showed up were themselves victims of earlier pogroms. Also, anti-Semitism dates back to before the Christian Era. Germany was no more anti-Semitic than any other European country (and by the 19th century, also the United States).

  147. 147.

    burnspbesq

    March 11, 2019 at 8:50 am

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.):

    O K., so I’m not Jewish, and maybe I just don’t get this because it’s a Jewish thing and I don’t understand, but how is it that Israel is only a country for some of its citizens? Doesn’t being a citizen mean it is your country? What does that even mean? I swear, I keep thinking this guy is going to trot out some “final solution to the Arab question” any day now.

    The ghost of P.W. Botha would like a word with you.

  148. 148.

    Eolirin

    March 11, 2019 at 10:26 am

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: There’s no serious retconing going on, just a smoothing out of the character’s progression. She has existed as Ms. Marvel since the 70s and had taken on the Captain Marvel title a while back.

  149. 149.

    Citizen Alan

    March 11, 2019 at 10:48 am

    @NotMax:

    To be fair, IIRC, it was explicitly part of an April Fools promotional gimmick. During that same month, they had an Avengers issue where the team went on Late Night with David Letterman, an issue of The Thing where the villain was someone named Baddie Two-Shoes with atomic sneakers, and an issue of Alpha Flight where Snowbird fought some kind of snow demon during a blizzard — 15 pages of panels that (other than thought bubbles) were completely blank.

  150. 150.

    Citizen Alan

    March 11, 2019 at 10:54 am

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:

    That argument breaks down if, like me, you don’t think the movie was “meh” at all but was in fact one of the better Marvel films. In fact, I would call it the best Marvel film intended to debut a new leading character. And that retcon you complain about happened back in 2012 when she officially became Capt. Marvel instead of Ms. Marvel and switched out of her prior stripperific costume into the one she wore in the movie.

  151. 151.

    Uncle Cosmo

    March 11, 2019 at 10:55 am

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): There are people who were born in Germany whose parents (& by now, I suppose, grandparents) were also born in Germany, & who speak perfect German, who are not German citizens. Some of them are the children (& by now, I suppose, grandchildren) of Turks who came to Germany as Gastarbeiters starting in the 1960s.

    Also, see #147 supra. Burnsie may not know esquat, but even a blind barrister finds a tort once in awhile.

    It appears that unrestricted jus soli (the guarantee of national citizenship to all those born within a nation’s geographical boundaries) is the practice in only ~35 countries, thus not the norm on the planet.

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