X-Men: Engangered Species is All Wrong
I was so upset by how wrong X-Men: Endangered Species was that I was almost angry. Upset about how morally and philosophically divergent these X-Men are from the X-Men of the past 40-plus years. And then I was upset about how upset I was over a fictional reality and characters, but that part will wait.
This one-shot set the stage for what will be a crossover throughout the mutant Marvel Universe this summer and takes up the important task of addressing how the mutant world has changed since M-Day. A young mutant dies, and that event is so significant as to send ripples through “the community” to the point where complete strangers show up because one of their own has died. Tragic really, as something so rare dies so insignificantly, without fanfare. At least some mutants get to die saving the world. He was, completely unceremoniously, hit by a car.
To put it another way, he died like humans die.
This affects all the mutants because, as the title explains, they are now an endangered species. And it is in that classification where the problems begin.
Think back to what separated Charles Xavier and Magneto. Professor X wanted to help mutants live in human society, spreading the message the mutants are people too. He sought to protect mutantkind through education and assimilation. Magneto knew that humans would fear mutants and eventually threaten them. He latched onto mutant superiority and sought to protect mutantkind through force and oppression. Professor X’s philosophy was of inclusion; Magneto’s philosophy was of exclusion. To Professor X, mutants were not more than human or less than human – they were simply different humans.
But look at how Professor X and his mutant followers are reacting in this story. They are concerned about the extinction of mutants. They are concerned about their kind dying out, as if their kind is something better than human – something that needs preserved. This runs in complete opposition to what Professor X has always taught.
For years, X-Men have taught that you should love your child just as much if it’s a human or a mutant. But now they’re saying essentially that they’re going to fight to ensure that their children will continue to be mutants. They are quite explicitly not happy with the idea that people will only be giving birth to human babies.
If something were directly threatening a mutant’s life, yes, they would fight. If something were stripping a mutant of what made him or her special, yes, they would fight. But all that’s happening is that no more mutants are being born. Mutations are simply stopping. No one is being hurt and no one is having anything taken from them.
There is nothing wrong with that.
This fight to ensure that there will continue to be mutants is a fight against humanity. It’s a selfish fight for superiority over homo sapiens. Whether they acknowledge this philosophical violence or not, they have assumed Magneto’s role.
Marvel has mischaracterized the good guys and dismissed more than 40 years of philosophical struggles for this crossover.
These elitist jerks deserve to go extinct.
I have to say, this reading doesn’t make much sense to me. I don’t think extinction would be something that Xavier or the X-Men would simply accept passively. The fact that the extinction comes to pass from a lack of mutant births seems rather beside the point. Wanda essentially carried out the forced sterilization of the mutant population. That’s a form of genocide as surely as killing off mutants.
There are real-world parallels as well. Proponents of “deaf culture” oppose genetic screening, because they fear it would lead to a world in which genetically-deaf children would no longer be born. And you can be sure that if a scientist figured out a way in which no gay babies, or black babies could ever be born, to carry that plan out would be villainy. It’s not simply the taking of lives, but the ending of community.
In fact, many of the crimes classed under the international definition of genocide do not even involve the taking of life, but assault on community. China, for example, has been accused of genocide in Tibet because they ship Han Chinese into the region in order to overturn the demographics of the Tibetan nation.
The X-Community’s response to “No More Mutants” is the response of a community faced with extinction. That’s a real threat, not just elitism.
That’s really not a parallel, because it’s not like people are choosing to de-mutantize their babies. If that were the case, I’d agree with you completely. That’s something that the X-Men would definitely speak up on, because it’s making a value judgment on human versus mutant – or exactly what they’re doing now. They’re attempting to meddle with nature’s new course because they don’t like what’s going to happen with the babies of the future.
Wanda’s “no more mutants” comment was no different than the radioactive age that spawned the mutations. It’s an environmental factor that is simply a new reality. It’s not an ongoing purge.
If she’d have said “No more humans,” and made sure that everyone were a mutant, do you think a Pro-Human group that sought to genetically meddle with the future to ensure that some generations would be born without mutations would be treated so passively? Of course not. They’d be seen as elitist and exclusionary.
No, people aren’t choosing to de-mutantize their babies. Wanda made that choice. I don’t accept that her powers do not constitute an act, rather than a simple “course of nature.” And even if there were a new course of nature, I would still think that a condition in which no more black babies, or Asian babies, or white babies, or (insert-group) babies were being born would be greeted with resignation. It would be seen as a crisis of world-historical proportions. And, that’s how they seem to be viewing it.
On a related note, I’m not sure that the integrationist dream is really all that incompatible with a sense of group identity. After all, if Xavier really wanted integration without regard to mutation. he would not have built an isolated school. Why not just send Cyclops to public school?
Acknowledging there’s an obstacle to overcome doesn’t mean that you believe in separation. Special education classes have elements that are designed to help challenged students integrate themselves into society. Would you make the claim that special educations classes advocate separationism, or do you see that sometimes an isolated education is required to overcome said obstacles? And that in order for challenged students to really show that they aren’t separationists, they need to abandon any special needs education and be thrown in the same pool as the rest of the kids? I really doubt you’d make that claim.
I just don’t see how you think you can have it both ways. You think it’s bad to make a negative change, but you think it’s okay to make a positive change. Don’t you realize that for each person’s positive, that’s another person’s negative? Or is that okay because there’s more of them?
I recognize that any person’s positive is another person’s negative. But I also recognize that specific historical contexts matter. This is why I’m okay with the notion of “black power,” “women’s liberation,” and “gay pride,” but that I am a little more wary about “straight pride,” “men’s liberation,” or “white power.” On a level of platonic forms, these are equivalent propositions. But on the level of human history, the former groups have been oppressed, and the later groups have often been their oppressors. As such, the former propositions recognize shared communal experience even within an integrationist framework. Wanting equal access to a previously all-white or all-male institution as an equal individual does not mean one must surrender other group identities. Nor should it. Again, this is why women’s groups (for example) press for inclusion into the general society, even as they rally around the specific disadvantages under which they continue to labor. Likewise, gay activists did not sacrifice any egalitarian or integrationist credentials by mourning the murder of Matthew Shepherd as “one of their own.” Specificity does not necessarily undermine universalism.
I agree with everything you just wrote. And “black power,” “women’s liberation,” and “gay pride” do not seek to genetically tamper to make sure there will be more African-Americans, women or homosexuals. They fight for equality after birth.
Fair enough. I think though, that we may have to simply class this as one of those many topics upon which honorable men may differ.
I think the major difference here is that Wanda made a consious decision, and something like a force of nature is simply uncontrollable and unpredictible.
Taking it back to one of Simon’s examples, if a scientist came up with a pre-natal “gay cure” that would promise to 100% make a person straight should the parents desire, there would be an uprising of ridiculously huge proportions. In a way, whatever scientist came up with the “cure” is actually CIRCUMVENTING the natural order.
On the other hand, if people just STOPPED being born or becoming gay with no major human actions involved in the act, nobody would really notice for a while. It would be years before people started realizing “Hey, we’re not really seeing any gay people anymore.”
With the X-Men, we saw a consious action by a person and instant results. If mutation is meant to be the next form of evolution, then Wanda is, like the scientist, circumventing the natural state of things by saying, “I don’t like where this is headed, so I’M going to stop it.”
That seems, to me, like something the X-Men would be up for fighting or speaking out against.
As for the idea that the X-Men’s concern over this issue shows an inherent air of supieriority over homo sapien, I think I would disagree. Are we saying that a baby panda or bald eagle is superior to humanity by attempting to preserve the species?
Hm. Then again, the people trying to preserve these species are not the members of the species itself…but the question is – if they were capable, would they?
It’s an interesting philosophical debate, and I’m honestly not sure which side I’m on (take that, Marvel). I think I lean a bit towards Simon and his arguments, but I’m pretty much on the fence here.
-M
Wanda’s action has happened in the past and it’s done. It’s not continuing to happen. It’s not analogous to a choice that is made individually with each conception. In that way, it is much more analogous to an environmental factor, because it affects everyone equally and its origination with an individual’s willpower is essentially irrelevant.
Let’s say some mad scientist came along and said “I have just detonated a mad scientist bomb that will make no redheads ever be born again!” and then for a year or so, we had no record of any redheads being born.
How do you think the world would react if a group of redheads said “We as redheads are an endangered species – there are no more redheads being born. Therefore, we wish to meddle with the genetic structure of your infants to ensure that there will be redheads. You have a choice of either handing over your wombs voluntarily, or we might take action to blast the earth with some sort of redhead gene. We’re not really sure yet what the best way is to go. But rest assured, we will force redheadedness on all of you.”
Pardon the flippancy of the analogy, but I still don’t think people would jump on that bandwagon, particularly if the group behind this redheaded campaign had long sought to educate the world to the idea that redheads should not be viewed as different than any other hair-colored person, no better and no worse.
And regarding your baby panda or baby eagle analogy, if advocates of their survival were planning to infuse a mother’s fetus with panda or eagle DNA so that a panda or eagle would be born instead of a baby human, than 1) that would work as an analogy and 2) that would be making a value judgment of Panda & Eagle > Human.
Given that the main event is called Messiah “Complex”, and that has a negative connotation, perhaps this “speciest” view of the X-men will not have a positive result for them.
Jim–
I don’t see any evidence in the one-shot that the X-Men intend to force anyone to bear redheaded — I mean mutant children, or to experiment upon homo sapiens against their will. None. Beast talks about the X-gene being suppressed, and Madrox talks about fathering many x-babies. But I don’t see any sign of the kind of involuntary tampering you’re talking about.
If a group of red heads whose red-gene had been suppressed figured out a way to reactivate it, I don’t see any principled objection.
Well, call me naive, but I guess I don’t see how it would work any other way. “Reactivating” a dormant human gene is still genetic meddling (it’s choosing to direct the course of reproduction) and obviously the Madrox solution won’t work otherwise there wouldn’t be a problem. I’m assuming that children of mutants aren’t being born mutants, otherwise this “extinction” talk is alarmist and inaccurate. If mutant parents can still give birth to mutant babies, what’s the problem? It’s already been made clear that “The 198” was a symbolic number. That’s more than enough to repopulate the earth, so to speak.
And what’s the result of mutant incest anyway?
I’m with The Doctor. I think Jim Doom has a very valid point about this not being in line wiith the X-Men’s line of thinking, but I think that was intentional. I infer from “Messiah Complex” that someone is going to try to save everyone because they think they know what’s best. The story in Endangered Species seems like it could easily evolve into that.
I think I have to agree that we’ll just have to wait and see where this goes. Now I’m just sad that I missed out on such a cool discussion.
Ye Dooms Here Assembled–
I’ll just note that Wanda stripped millions of mutants of their X-Gene against their will. Beast’s dialogue with Maddrox is all about the fact that there aren’t enough distinct individuals with X-Genes to sustain the species through reproduction. I infer then, that beast intends to help de-xed mutants restore their x-genes, at least as carriers, if not as powered mutants.
You all may read the scene differently, but hopefully e can all look forward to a crossover that picks up on some of the interesting threads and hints from the one-shot.
No one’s denying what Wanda did. And if all that Beast intends to do is help restore the mutantness of depowered mutants, I have no problem.
Though I don’t see how there aren’t enough mutants to sustain them through reproduction, even if there were only 198.
Maybe Beast’s big suggestion will be a series of wild sex parties, with the aim of rapid reproduction. And he’ll turn into essentially a pimp, only to eventually realize that the amoral decadence has made him less of a human than ever.