The X-Men and Marvel’s mutants exist as an allegory for bigotry and minorities. Mankind creates Sentinels and other tools to combat and oppress mutantkind, but…are they justified? Is humanity justified in opposing mutants? Are they justified in their fears that mutants will replace them as the dominant species on the planet?
This X-Men video essay dives into the complexities and nuances of humanity’s bigotries in the X-Men universe, including the comics, the X-Men movies, and X-Men ’97, and comes to the conclusion — well, watch the video to find out.
Chapters:
0:00 It Started with the Sentinels
1:36 Humanity’s Bigotry Guide X-Men ’97
3:43 Humanity Fears Replacement
5:50 The X-Men Movies and Human Bigotry
10:48 My X-Men Movie Hot Take
12:34 “Normal People Have it Hard Too!”
14:27 The Mechanics of Hatred
17:06 When Good Men Say Nothing (like Captain America)
20:00 “You’re in Vogue, Storm.”
22:52 A House Divided
25:09 The Excuses for Cruelty
27:22 Remember My Hot Take From Before?
31:24 Why X-Men ’97 Feels Oppressive
32:41 I Just Finished X-Men 97…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H32ejTaQHuI
https://youtu.be/iUqhnfTrZrw?si=Mb8obcG6Pelc5mgx
https://youtu.be/Gm3IbfNQCvE?si=4KQJoZ0XBVjVqsl0
https://youtu.be/vnBduzGRtHU?si=oY6Xe80fxv-Lxw5I
source
If Magneto was right then the nazis were too.
Both had very similar motivations.
Every time I see in X-men humans in comics say that mutants are wrong and yada yada all i think about is bruh y’all give birth to mutants if they kill every mutant they’re just killing their own kids and off spring especially when more people will become mutants. All of X-men is would you rather go extinct naturally or by your own hands
"Humanity is kind of the worst"!?
Where ever did you get an idea like THAT!? You've been reading those history books again,haven't you!?
Fear? People don't fear mutants. They're jealous of mutants. There's this saying "The nail that sticks out gets hammered down." Mutants have super strength, can fly, etc. Humans can't do that so, to humans, mutants shouldn't do that either. Its some kind of "exceptional equity" where the exceptional few aren't allowed to be exceptional because of a mediocre majority.
The problem is mutants are humanity's children. They're not two separate species. Mutants are what humans are turning into and any parent who gave birth to an exceptional child should know nothing but pride. Its fucked up that a parent would want to kill their child because they're scared of being replaced by their child. When you look at it that way, all the allegory falls apart.
0:01 Yes. I know it's short sighted to fear that which we don't understand but from the context of the comic books we've been getting for the last 40+ years, YES there is a legitimate reason to at least be afraid of the concept of Mutants and by extension the X-men. I barely trust humans in general and now you're giving them randomly assigned powers? Not only that individuals can even gain secondary mutation powers that allow them to do stuff like control people's minds? Overwrite reality itself? Not to mention half the team members of the x-men become evil at various times or create their own societies which have initiations that involve people needing to die in combat in order to be 'reborn' with powers (aka house of x) that's some Jonestown level stuff.
I hate to be the one to bring up current issues… but this really resonated with me.
In short, I’m Israeli.
Yes, that DOES mean I’m a Zionist.
No, that DOES NOT mean I believe in “Jewish supremacy” or wish to exterminate Palestinians. I’m actually a paramedic and have treated countless Palestinian patients.
Zionism is the belief that Jews deserve their own state, it’s NOTHING else (and if someone told you otherwise they were probably taught false information).
Watching this show…. Especially the Genosha episode, felt like seeing a precise allegory for what my people just went through. I know that world has moved on since October 7th and decided to only care about Gaza. But we haven’t. Thousands of families are still in mourning. My friends were shot dead while dancing in a festival.
Every day people keep dying of the missile barrages. I hate this war, and I just want it to stop, have everyone return home and to live peacefully.
The days after the attack, I kept feeling like the world would now see what we went through and support us. I felt like violence THAT extreme, could never be supported by anyone. I was wrong.
Just like the show, when they feared the mutant response to the Genosha massacre – Even BEFORE Israel went forward with any kind of retaliation, there were marches in the streets of Europe calling to exterminate us. To dismantle us. “Send us back to where we came from”.
Watching the show felt like seeing true event of my past few months unfold in animated superhero form.
Bastion is a product of his ancestors hatred. Human changed dna to inadvertently create a mutant to destroy all mutants. 🤦♂️
The ending of operation zero tolerance comic event is basically shield coming in and capturing bastion
I still want to see cap and wolverine team up. Also it might be cool to see beast join the avengers
Bro ppl dont want grown men going into the bathroom with their daughters. its rational.
Bastion: We are here to save you-
Civilian: Oh, thank God it's the sentinels.
Bastion: FROM YOURSELVES!
Civilians: Oh, God it's the sentinels.
yes but harming them isnt ok
In real life, non mutant people would instinctively fear mutants. I imagine the same way modern humans and Neanderthals must have had that gut instinct to be wary of each other – but here’s the thing – modern humans did breed and live with Neanderthals while others would’ve not been so friendly on principal. The story of humanity is complicated.
One thing about X-Men in current comics and this X-Men series: They never show the average human. It's always the extremes. And you are either with or against the mutants. Also, all mutants are not benevolent by birth or because they are 'oppressed'. Sabertooth is a straight up murderer, Magneto is a monster created by horrible events that CHOOSES to be a monster, Mystique is also vicious. I can go no with other characters like Shadow King's host, Sugar Man, Apocalypse, Fabian Cortez, Empath and a few others that are absolute nightmares. People have to fear mutants in the Marvel world as much as they do mad scientists and alien invasions which happen often in that matchstick universe. This was explained in of all places Gwenpool volume one.
Ewwww rogue sounds so bad
0:00 I just wanna know what you say lol. Like people have pointed out that X-Men isn’t the best allegory cuz a lot of mutants really can just do things like randomly appear in the Oval Office like the end of X2. But I feel like if you
Take away the cool powers it works AND it’s def how our current society would react if we found out there was a new Kind of human
5:10 what’s always so wild to me about them separating mutants and humans on biological levels is that biological majority of the mutants we see ARE humans. They have human DNA just with a bit of extra ✨ spice ✨ they’re born from humans, they inherit the necessary genes to become mutants from humans, etc
The answer is incredibly simple: yeah, duh.
Remember the line, "with great power comes great responsibility?" Thats the primary tenet that spider man follows. And he learned that the hard when his inaction led to his uncle dying.
This is the primary core of all superhumans, the one lesson that needs be taught to them: they have to be responsible for their own gifts, and that can mean using it for good or just controlling it and learning to live with it. Mutants are the perfect way to test this. Millions of individuals developing powers that can range from a disability to straight up being god. Do you think all of them would be so quick to learn this? No. In fact, the ones who do are probably in the minority. Because power has a habit of fucking with peoples brains.
Thats why xavier started the x men in the first place: to protect humans from evil mutants (straight from x men #1 by stan lee himself). But he also created the school for gifted children, to help mutants in another way. To teach them to control their powers so that they dont become a harm to themselves and any other.
As for some other reasons, like how people just exclusively fear mutants and not other superhumans, its a mix of both incompetent writing trying to keep to the status quo by having mutants remain as perpetual victims, and a very real reason.
Mutants are random as fuck. If we ignore mutants themselves having kids and what-not, the x gene is basically untraceable until it kicks in during puberty. So any random kid could just abruptly gain destructive powers. There are exceptions, of course, but theyre the usually the result of mutants having kids (nightcrawler and azazel). If compare mutants to inhumans, which are much more interesting imo, inhumans have a very real gene that can be traced. And their powers can only be activated by terrigen gas.
Theres also just mutants that have a superiority complex, like the hellfire club, and the ones that establish hierarchies of power like that. Its inevitable, really.
As for sentinels, i think theyre cool, but its kind of dumb that the US just uses them solely to put a boot down on some muties neck rather than… use them as a line of defense against alien invasions. Or super terrorist attacks. Or literally anything else. I get the whole master mold and trask and bastion and whatnot, but its still silly that no one has pointed out how useful a sentinel could be.
But again, mutants wont ever really be explored in manners like this because marvel took stan lees of making marvel be a reflection of the real world as "make sure everything never changes and try to add some real world allegory to it even if it completely fucks up the story, the world and its characters." Its why i prefer DC more, it handles its world building a bit better than marvel. And it also lets its metahumans be normal people in a world of the extraordinary.
Like come on, there should be psychics in the PD's, or shapeshifters making sex tapes as some celebrity, or construction sites with mutant workers minding their own business. Theres like 90 different other problems in the marvel universe, youd figure people would just get used to it.
I disagree with one part of this argument. The original show had Christian faith and values in it. Nightcrawler and Wolverine are Christian. This narrative of right wing = evil Christians (usually white men and women who founded the U.S and Canada,) are not the enemy to society as is implied all over the place and open segragation in some schools now for clubs or groups. The "patriarchy" is code for hate towards the traditional Christian nuclear for us Christians. God the Father is extremely important to our faith. "The only way to the Father is through the son" (Jesus Christ), who conquered death and gave us the only way to Redemption.
The replacement "theory " is a mathematical fact. Using the UK as an example, the traditional people aren't not having children, like Canada and the U.S. 1.5 per household. Other families from other nations usually have a minimum of 3. So, without getting into voting stuff and stuff like that, because that is not my point. My point is that we are commanded to love the sinner and hate sin. To pray for those who curse us and to even pray and feed our enemies! That was my point. Right leaning people are not evil. "Do to others as you would want done to you"
It is weird, though. In any other hero settings, regular humans mistrusting people with powers is portrayed as understandable, but in X-Men, it's just portrayed as prejudice.
Bashion didn't go back in time in the cartoon thats the comic this iteration Bashion is a mutant created from techno organic disease, Master Mold, and Nimrod. Who infected his father. So this creates a kind a variation on the mutant hate diconomy. A mutant who hates his own kind.
Captain America is one of those curious things because I think most of us couldn’t recall where he stood in this 90s universe but have imprinted on the MCU version which I will contend is probably the best version of the character. And he still had to have a disillusionment arc. It was called The Winter Soldier. Cap is part of the system but is loyal only to the dream of it. That’s why he constantly quit under Republican presidents 😉
Even if humanity's fear of superpowered beings in general is somewhat reasonable, what makes it unreasonable is that a lot of these mutants are just normal people who wouldn't think of hurting innocents with their powers. You know what would make them dangerous? Trying to lynch them and take away their rights while expecting them to not fight back.
If this truly was their concern, they should on paper be more lenient and even supportive of the X men and Charles Xavier, y'know, *
heroes with a school dedicated to helping mutants control their powers, and want more facilities made to help mutants. But no, they go straight to bigotry, lynching and killer robots that in other timelines have inevitably turned on humanity and doomed everyone.
31:20 so what's a taxi driver supposed to do when everybody can fly with your technology?😂
We should have had an X men film where the X men battle Mister Sinister to prevent him from conducting the experiments that led to the mutant extinction that happened in Logan.
It would basically be a "good ending" to contrast Logan.
"That is ILLOGICAL. MUTANTS ARE HUMAN!"'- Sentinel.
this has been a problem with Marvel comics for decades. you cant make Mutants a legit problem without making ever other hero a monster. Mutants can never be equal. they have to be hated and feared. even when they play by the rule. cap can't back them cause that would not fit the mutant story. but thats something all heroes deal with. you want to do a line wide event? X-en are doing something else. want to do a X-men line wide event? the avengers are off world. we kinda just accept that whatever is happening in a book is self contained
Please don't bring any homosexual agenda garbage crap to this show
Great video friend perfectly put
Good video, but doesn't address the central issue: what happens with a mutant goes boom? Doesn't humanity have a rational interest in some level of monitoring? Anti-black racism against school integration is one thing, but imagine if that young black girl could kill with a thought too. It's brought up in Logan as well. It was Xavier losing control that killed the XMen, right? The casino scene? BUT! In '97 this doesn't come up. Humans are either irredeemable bigots or irrational idiot cowards, every one. Mutants can be peacefully doing nothing, and a horde of giant killer robots blows them up, and the President doesn't even want to send help for the injured and dead after the fact. Capt America doesn't want to disturb the robot factory without paperwork first. Amazing.
On the other hand, mutants lash out too. That journalist, who I think was a good faith person the whole time, shows up in the aftermath. Filming, documenting the wreckage. Talks with Beast, respectfully turns the camera off. She expresses her condolences, Beast snarkily calls her a bigot and leaves. Truly no hope in that world lol.
if you label someone a bigot you yourself are bigotted against those whom you deme worthy of the title. its a sword that cuts both ways
I've always felt that, while Xavier is a dreamer, Magneto is a realist. And I don't think it's because Magneto is just too stuck in his ways; even throughout '97s run, he's willing to try things Xavier's way, dedicated to it with no ulterior motives in leading by Charles's example. But he's been shown the very worst of what humanity is capable of, and that was as a result of being Jewish during WW2, he wasn't even aware of his mutant abilities yet (I don't think? 🤔). N*zi propaganda already made it so that those of Jewish heritage were seen and treated as subhumans, and that was used to justify horrendous atrocities against them. That's the reality Errik Magnus Lenssher grew up in. Meanwhile, I'm sorry, but…. Charles Xavier growing up in a mansion, having an invisible mutation… Regardless of his own life struggles, and I'm not suggesting he didn't have his, they were not based in outright bigotry and hatred like Errik's. Charles has my respect for such vision, but his life has allowed for him to be capable of such a dream. A life of privilege is ill-suited to tell an entire species how to live and act in the face of adversity, particularly if he's only ever an observor to how they're being treated. To be fair, there's the Henry Gyrick incident… But there's a difference between being hurt in defense of your dream, much later in life, and having your entire existence shaped by fear and bigotry BEFORE it comes to light that you were, In, fact, not a normal human being. Magneto is right,but I don't believe that him being right completely annihilates Xavier's dream of a shared world. Magneto is justified in how he views the world, but Xavier's vision is still a goal that I believe to be attainable…. But not without acknowledging that Magneto IS right about the world as it currently exists.
This, paired with Kingdom of the Apes, puts a certain shine on humanity that doesn’t look all that good. Are we flawed or simply human…?
Calling the right wing evil because you disagree with them is missing the point Professor X entirely
Leave movies out of discussion. They do not represent what the real X-men are about. Thanks
Haven't even seen the video yet, but quick answer; no. Lmao what argument is that
Let's say an inhuman had the power to kill mutants with a sneeze and he accidently snooze on magneto, would mutants be scared.
How about 10% of inhumans, terragen misted or not, had the same power with mutants, gen X triggered or not.
I think the mutants would act civilized about it.
Dude, this is deep. And cool thumbnail, got me to click. Good job
It's just so wrong-headed to think that humanity needs to survive in its current form for all eternity. There are essentially only two options on a cosmic timescale: Either a species continues to evolve and adapt into new species, or it dies out completely when its environment changes too much. If you care about the survival of humanity, the continued survival of homo sapiens is only of any real concern if they're the only living hominids. It's perfectly natural, and some would say inevitable, that homo sapiens will eventually go extinct. Whether or not humanity survives that point will largely depend on how tolerant homo sapiens were with genetic divergence from their species.
I miss (maybe Marvel has done it but I haven't read it) an arc where a country welcomes mutants and grants them citizenship. Not because they want to use them but out of humanity. Like the poem in the Statue of Liberty ("give me your mutants…"). It could create a change in Marvel's universe, making some countries declare war on that country and some others siding with it.
::Laughs in African-American, then rolls on the floor in spanish:::
They sure as hell gonna tell you it was justified. Followed up with a few " Get over it" and a couple of " Mutants hunted mutants too", with a sprinkle of " Not all Humans hunted Mutants" and finally a dash of " there were Humans on Genosha too!!".
Look you in the eye and say "Chef's Kiss"🤏
I would also fear a new race of humanoid with the power to wipe out my race. Im not sure what's so hard to grasp about that. Xmen are there to prove there are "good ones," and Magneto is a genocidal maniac who happens to have a tragic backstory. Holy moly. If im a bigot because im not sure i trust the guy or gal who could kill me with a thought , then so be it.
Like the best lies, the bigotry in X-men has a kernel of truth at the center. A certain number of these powers can be genuinely dangerous, and just hoping and praying that the wielding them are virtuous or able to control themselves is a terrible idea.
Of course, the bigotry and hatred seen in the series isn’t the answer; mutants have an incredible capacity for good that should be nurtured, and ultimately they’re just people that happen to have special abilities.
Captain America in Xmen97 isnt Captain America, didnt act like he would at all.
Humanity is right to fear mutants like humanity is right to fear a human with unknown immense power and those that'd ally with them.
Mutants are an Extension of Humanity.
If you're afraid of the people around you, You're going to fear the people around you with super powers.
The government itself barely likes the fact that the founding fathers made the right to own a gun Self evident, when you have people who have powers that far exceede and rival a gun, the government is going to want to bring said people into California Complaince.
In the ruins universe, They took Scott Summer's eyes, They cut off quick silver's arms and legs, they held nearly every mutant in captivity and had made them Complaint.
I wouldn't be surprised if in that earth, they test people for recessive X-Genes and Covertly Sterilize them.
Mutants like the X-Men have been coming and have come since the times of apocalypse, men and women who hid their powers from the world, and passed on their legacy to their children.
Humans shouldn't fear mutants.
Yet humans are afraid of humans.
And Mutants are Human.
So there begets a bile filled cycle that will continue to turn.
Humans of today are the same as those from 3000 years ago.
Humans Steal, Hurt, Abuse, Conquer, Wreak havoc, and spread terror.
Humans also Love, Care, Nurture, provide, Teach, grow, and learn.
There will always be a mutant who thinks that he is better simply because he has powers.
There will then come someone who will stop at nothing, to see that no 8 year old boy looses his parents to some punk teenager who got lucky on the genetic jackpot.
Its like Uncle Ben Parker has said HOW MANY TIMES.
Say it with me.
With great power comes great responsibility.
A great responsibility to learn and to Teach Others what it means to use what has been given to you for the right things.
Yet if we can't trust our fellow humans, what makes anyone think that anyone will trust some 20-Something Private School kids with the fate of the next phase of human life on earth.
The worst thing about X-men as an allegory is it allows other groups to use the actual history of Black Americans to pretend we all have the same struggle. Every non black group in the US has participated in the oppression of Black Americans and that’s a completely one sided relationship.
I hate muties so much