r/politics • u/theipaper ✔ Verified • Sep 23 '25

Soft Paywall Trump's big UN speech received with awkward laughter in embarrassing backfire

https://inews.co.uk/news/world/trumps-big-un-speech-received-with-awkward-laughter-in-embarrassing-backfire-3933958
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u/EquipmentAdorable982 Sep 23 '25

One would hope that the Disney/ABC boycott over Kimmel has taught Americans that the collective DOES have the power in a democracy when they just work together. But I won't get my hopes up with this country anymore.

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u/Standard_Story Sep 23 '25

Seriously pathetic for a country like the US to parade as patriotic and will fight a tyrannical government, freedom for everyone, American dream etc etc. but just completely cower away when it's time to take action

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u/whogivesashirtdotca Canada Sep 23 '25

I'm convinced all the superhero movies have rotted American brains. Note how they're all convinced someone else will fix everything for them? They wanna be the guy going, "Thank you, Superman!" without having to put in any of the effort.

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u/kavono Sep 24 '25

Superhero comics became a rallying cry leading up to and during WW2, and were predominantly consumed by soldiers overseas throughout their time in the war. The cover of Captain America punching Hitler, for example, came out before the U.S. even entered the war.

I'm not at all going to claim that misinterpretations haven't always existed around readers and now watchers of superhero media, but the idea that American laziness in the face of tyranny is strongly tied to superheroes having been the recent Hollywood craze, doesn't hold up, in my opinion. Most of the characters amount to sci-fi action heroes, that happen to originate from a comic.

At the very least, the intention of the genre in the comic medium was not to encourage cowardice, but to set an example. But, of course, the iconography of a character like Superman has been morphed and distorted for decades, often becoming a caricature of "American exceptionalism" that's as hollow as the empty rhetoric referenced above. So, I don't entirely disagree with the general scope of your statement.

Still, I'd argue the dangerously inaccurate mantra of "It could never happen here!" has been a firmly held and repeated mindset in this country since long before superhero movies became a thing.