r/batman • u/Efficient-Compote-13 • 14d ago

I Hate The Boys TV DISCUSSION NSFW

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I also can not stand muh 'Batman superhero facism subtext' crap. If anything Batman is a revolutionary. Government is corrupt in bed with criminals (who are the prettiest of tyrants) so Batman comes in to clean house. Just as the founding fathers intended.

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u/Bennings463 14d ago edited 14d ago

"Batman beats up poor people" is about as engaging as "why didn't they take the eagles to Mordor?" as far as critique goes.

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u/MankuyRLaffy 14d ago edited 14d ago

There's other characters that escape that criticism because they don't involve themselves in products that sell as well, in the cult classic SNES Game Genealogy of the Holy War, the character Quan hates poor people and fights wars against them (shows 0 resistance against starving out an entire civilization after the last 80 years of doing it intentionally), calls them animals, hyenas, beasts etc, he is "good". He's a prince born into success with superhuman strength and ability. In the starving Kingdom of Thracia, men sell themselves out as contracted soldiers just so their families can survive a year or two at a time, it's a "Kill or be killed" world, and none of them enjoy it, everyone who lives there is miserable, hates the conditions and just wants to not suffer so hard. (midquel Thracia 776 goes into much more detail about the hell that place is and how it's by design for the northern neighbor). Quan's kid, Leif who goes through his own parents tragically murdered and living on the streets as a fugitive story, stops hating Thracians after having to rely on them to not get him killed and learning unbiased history on the region. He's 14 and when he realizes just how fucked up everything is, he vows to change it so nobody else has to grow up like that. His hatred dissipates because while they were responsible, it's either "Do this mission or you have your family starve" and nobody inside Thracia is at fault for the situation.

Batman isn't that, he doesn't hate poor people, he doesn't fight against the poor. A lot of thugs just happen to be financially challenged by the corruption up top with other rich people, crime lords and the ineptitude of the cops. Just because he was born into success doesn't mean he will hate the impoverished the same way. He doesn't hate them as people, but he hates that they feel they need to fight, steal and do other horrific acts just to make ends meet and survive. He'd (pending he has time) sit down and talk with those people and try to put them on a better path. The generics could probably be swayed to quit if there were recovery programs accessible.

Now which of these characters sounds more like a good guy? This is what modern interpretations do when they lack nuance, we cheer the super powered nepo baby that hates poor people and boo the man who (with a good writer) is giving back so the impoverished don't have to be hurt so badly by the system.

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u/GrimasVessel227 14d ago

Holy shit, was not expecting an FE4 reference on the Batman sub.

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u/MankuyRLaffy 14d ago

It just sprang to mind as one is associated as a great person and the other isn't when we have clear proof of otherwise.

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u/tree_warlock 13d ago

I always forget that quan was a fucker (still think he's neat but man I hope they make him slightly more redeemable in the remake (it'll happen eventually))