Yesterday, EcoGeek addressed one of the pressing issues of our times: inconsistent application of Superman's powers. More needs to be said.
The 'Geek points out that Superman himself is solar powered (as those who have seen Superman Returns know), but has failed to help humanity figure out how he converts sunlight to power -- which might be a handy trick for us.
This is but one instance of a broader point: With Superman's abilities -- and his Fortress of Solitude, which contains all the knowledge of the 28 known galaxies -- it's simply unconscionable that he wastes so much time.
In the movie, he goes up into space, uses his super-hearing to locate some trouble, and then shoots down to earth to ... prevent a bank robbery.
Dude. Think a little bigger, would you? How about helping humanity find a clean, unlimited source of power? How about speeding around India and China, delivering simple solar cookers to peasants so they can stop burning wood and charcoal? How about sucking some CO2 out of the atmosphere? How about building fast, clean, high-speed rail infrastructure for every country on the planet? How about rounding up and destroying all the world's nuclear weapons?
Given Superman's power and knowledge, the fact that he spends his time foiling petty crimes -- and shows favoritism to one country, and particularly one woman (Lois Lane) -- means that he is, in practice, incredibly evil. Having the capacity to prevent so much suffering and failing to use it is as much a crime as causing suffering. (Of course, moral philosophers will disagree on this point.)
Superman's tale is not one of heroism. It's one of serial sins of omission.
Damn you, Superman. Damn you.
(The theologically inclined will notice the parallels between this discussion and many similar discussions of God's alleged omnipotence and omniscience, particularly around the problem of evil. Superman, like God, is an expression of humanity's desire to escape the limitations and ambiguities of earthly life -- and, like God, a demonstration of the inherent logical inconsistencies of that undertaking. Perfection quite literally makes no sense.)
Comments
View as Flat
Shmool Posted 9:02 am
17 Jul 2006
He is thrice -- THRICE! -- admonished by his father: "It is forbidden for you to interfere with human history." There also follows a seldom-quoted corollary: "Rather, let your leadership stir others to do good." In other words, he is not here to clean up our mess.
Sure, he'll rescue the odd cat or plummeting journalist, and he'll do what he can to keep those who do evil in check. Perhaps he could look into finding space in the Phantom Zone for Cheney (if he hadn't already shattered it and set free the evil Kryptonian Secretary of Defense ... a real nice bit of work that was).
And remember what happened when he exceeded his mandate and took it upon himself to personally disarm every nuclear power on the planet? He ended up creating the evil Nuclear Man and the worst sequel in human history. That's what we get when Superman decides to start thinking big.
Besides, what do you really expect from the first man to build his personal summer home in the ANWR?
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db Posted 10:06 am
17 Jul 2006
Yes, they will indeed. The Rev. Dr. Mark D. Roberts writes in his article, Happy Time (http://www.markdroberts.com/htmfiles/resources/happytime.htm) that the gospel of grace "is centered in God's coming as a human being to suffer and die for the sake of humanity."
Friday, July 7, 2006
Superman As Super Savior
A quiz...
By David Buckna
Special to ASSIST News Service
http://www.assistnews.net/Stories/s06070029.htm
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caniscandida Posted 8:22 pm
19 Jul 2006
Very sorry to have missed this old thread earlier. I am happy to say my good friend David is entirely correct, both in what he finds wanting in Superman, and in acknowledging that some moralists out there would strangely disagree.
(The Wikipedia article on the "problem of evil" is rather disappointing, though. It is a good undergraduate paper, but it is far too simple.)
The God of the Bible is utterly exasperating, in whichever of the three chief forms we find him: Yahweh, God the Father, Jesus Christ. Yahweh is all-powerful, but not clearly all-knowing, and certainly not benevolent.
God the Father, who is apparently what Yahweh turns into in the New Testament, seems to demand, according to Jesus, that we love one another, and take care of the "least of our brothers": excellent moral teaching; but suppose we do not get around to doing that, does God step in and take care of all those people?
Jesus, who is sort of Supermannish in some ways, has as his principal function not to perform life-saving miracles forever and ever, but to suffer and die to bring us to salvation, and to challenge us to believe in him. Well, OK, that is a very beautiful story. Meanwhile, though, we are left wondering what to do with all this time on our hands, till the Second Coming comes.
The character of Superman may have one or more divine qualities, but he is basically a highly endowed human being. So he most certainly can be charged with sins of omission, even as we reasonably criticize any human being who is capable of doing great good, including saving lives globally, and yet refuses to do so. If he is a truly responsible moral agent, he may not abandon us to the consequences of our ignorance and powerlessness.
Presumably he represents a typical, "mainstream" attitude of American society in the first half of the 20th century (and not just then!): Society works just fine, and we will all do great, if only the occasional bad guy can be neutralized. There is utter confidence in the basic goodness and health of society-as-it-is, the status quo, save for its vulnerability to bad guys who seek to mess things up; there is no suspicion that society may in fact be radically messed up already, and that we contribute to the mess by quietly going about our society-approved business.
In fact, just as the biblical Israelites would ignore Yahweh so long as things were going fine, but then would start praying to him to help them when they got into trouble, so Americans in the world of Superman generally can afford to ignore him, so long as things are chugging along normally, but want him to save them when the anomalous problem arises.
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