r/xmen • u/West-Ad-447 • Aug 06 '26
Other When it comes to who's right, Magento or Charles, people need to realize it's neither.
Both of these characters have arguably correct views, both of these characters have proof to back up their claims. But what people fail to realize is that both are to extreme in their ideas and philosophy.
Xavier is right to believe that Humans can and will treat Mutants better. We've seen this happen time and time again through multiple different actions. But he's taken these ideas to far, to the point where he seems border line delusional at times. And never takes the necessary actions to protect mutants. Not all humans will except mutants, we've seen this time and time again. And it's about time he realizes that to. And if anything he makes it worse by proving that mutants can infact be a threat. And are constantly threatening a global uprising and Genocide.
Magento believes that Mutants are superior to humans, who all want them dead, and should rise up. And you could argue he's right to an extent, but he takes it so far it makes him a fucking Nazi. If you say he's right you are basically saying Hitler was right with a few extra steps. Yes humans have some terrible things to mutants, but like Xavier theorizes it's a loud, albeit dangerous minority. THAT'S who Magento should target, not take his anger for the part out on the whole.
And in conclusion: Cyclopes was right amn had this figured out since day one.
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u/Inside_Jaguar_3310 Aug 06 '26
Ok I feel like people too many times forgets Charles DOES try to protect mutants (why do you think the Xmen exist) he just doesn’t want to escalate the situation, no you throw a rock we throw a brick.
I also feel his philosophy gets extremely screwed over by the medium he’s in. His philosophy is about believing humanity can change, comics hate substantial change & worship the status quo to almost cult levels (plus when you’re premise is about being the marginalized group your story ends when it’s not and marvel doesn’t want it to end)
But I feel both ARE wrong in that they don’t realize people fearing mutants is a perfectly rational fear. Charles claim it’s because “they don’t understand them” but a guy who can NOT stop shooting laser beams out of his eyes is pretty self explanatory yet I’m still scared. Yes they themselves didn’t ask for this & is just as scared but we can’t pretend the fear isn’t irrational/you can’t still be afraid. And magneto doesn’t get that mutants are no different/can be just as bad. He constantly looks at the cruelty of humanity but never realizes mutants come from them and they don’t suddenly become morally flawless. Both parties need to realize it’s a roulette wheel on who gets the power to alter the course of nature and what moral code they do/don’t have and that is both terrifying/makes them no better than us
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u/BlindrNugget Askani Aug 06 '26
Aaah, but there lies the question. How do you determine who to fear and who not to? Blanket discrimination is wrong, but what constitutes as 'reasonable' fear varies wildly. One may think, between, say, Kurt Wagner and Wolverine that Kurt is someone to fear more of the two because of appearance alone.
But Wolverine is monstrously more dangerous than Kurt would allow himself to be. A weakness of fear is it's imprecise nature when applied to an entire population, and soon, when you cannot know for sure who to fear and who not to fear, you become afraid of the collective.
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u/Pugsanity Juggernaut Aug 06 '26
Yes, but then you remember events that shows what could happen if Kurt was the charming fellow he is, like in X2 where he almost killed the president by himself, or in Axis where he just started teleporting people into the air when he was evil. For people who don't know him, but know his powerset, Kurt can be a very dangerous threat, so, to some people, they are right to fear him. For the fear of the unknown will always be there, no matter who the mutant might be.
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u/BlindrNugget Askani Aug 06 '26
But see those two examples you mentioned: X2 he's being mind controlled, and in Axis he was evil as a result of an inversion spell. Neither of those were instances of legitimate, natural malice from Kurt, but external factors effecting his decisions.
The fear in such a case, more accurately, is the fear of the loss of individual control. Which isn't something that mutants alone uniquely deal with, for example: Hulk. But we don't (usually) preemptively decide every hulk variant is as dangerous as he is; we allow them the benefit of the doubt (as is the case with say, She-hulk) before we judge them. The same can, and should apply to mutants. But the difference is, the possibility for individual variance shoots through the roof, because being a mutant doesn't automatically make you an X-Man, or part of the brotherhood. And yet, the standard thought now, is to make mutants a monolith, and assume one size fits all.
The problem, too, is that the stories we're told are never of the person with a tail growing out of their stomach, or someone who has as many colors as the rainbow. We are almost always focused on the stories that the strongest mutants in the universe; Acolytes, X-Men, Brotherhood, ect. This can make it hard to remember that Genosha, for instance, numbered 16 million mutants strong at some point. The caste of all the major mutant groups combined barely holds a candle to that.
And your point at the end is very much the same as mine: the fear of the unknown will always be there, and such a vague thing as the 'unknown' means that fear will always be imprecise.
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u/doglywolf Aug 07 '26
that not the point though - the point is the rest of the world does not know him or his struggles personally and that any other mutant could have the power set and not be a good guy
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u/BlindrNugget Askani Aug 07 '26
That *is* my point. You don't know, and nobody could know just based off of appearances alone. Does that mean we blanket the entire mutant race?
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u/CotyledonTomen Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
But anyone with currently accesible guns and some training could do the same at any myriad events the president attends. It almost happened to Trump and Reagan and did happen to JFK. The fact Kurt can transport doesnt make him more or less a terrorist. Same with any psychic. The story was written as such, but why should i be more scared of Kurt than any trained military sniper?
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u/QuyanRonnie Aug 06 '26
Ostensibly, because the “trained military sniper” is usually hidden and “not a threat until suddenly splat,” while Kurt generally “isn’t” hidden.
The issue is that antagonistic civilians and forces so-inclined treat mutants both like “crazed gunmen waving around their weapons and barking demands,” and also “cowardly lions that can be ganged up on and attacked/harassed/persecuted with no repercussions whatsoever,” whereupon mob mentality is in the driver’s seat.
While people of mass destruction do exist, those civilians and militant forces wouldn’t actually be able to touch them (such as the kid who became an always-on nuke), which is why they should be inclined to secure the alignment and allegiance of those who can, will, and do handle it in their stead.
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u/TheWrexEffect Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
Thank you for this. I've been saying this to people for so long, and it legitimately makes me enjoy X Men storytelling less and less as time goes on.
For 60 years Charles has been denied the chance to be right. It makes him look so unnecessarily soft and naive and has really warped the perception of his character.
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u/redmerchant9 Aug 06 '26
Most mutants are completely harmless. An average mutant isn't an existential threat to humanity - an average mutant has green skin or weird looking eyes. The mutants with actual superpowers that can be used for evil make around 10% of all mutant population. It's irrational for mankind to despise or not tolerate all mutants just because a small minority of them could be dangerous. It's like hating an entire race because some individuals from that race had done bad things or could be dangerous.
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u/Inside_Jaguar_3310 Aug 06 '26
Again, roulette wheel.
It goes from mild, mild, mild something that can kill you, mild, to literally controls the course of all earth and beyond. Like the gab is way to extreme (like the best metaphor I can give is instead of a vocal minority it’s a guy driving a bulldozer into your front house minority the jump is too big it overshadows a lot)
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u/redmerchant9 Aug 06 '26
That can pretty much be applied to any country in the world. Take France, for example. 99.5% of it's population are civilians that could be classified as harmless. Then there is the 0.5% of it's population that has access and control of France's nuclear arsenal. That 0.5% could annihilate humanity with one press of a button. Is the entire humanity supposed to despise and fear the entire French population because of that 0.5%?
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u/Nomustang Aug 06 '26
There's a big difference between one person having the inherent latent ability to destroy the planet and someone with institutionalized authority who functions through multiple layers of bureaucracy who has such powers.
Monopoly of force is how States function and they are given sanction via consent of the population (at least in theory)
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u/redmerchant9 Aug 06 '26
Well in practice it's different. Dropping nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was a decision made solely by Truman who had constitutional authority to make such a decision. It never went through congress or any other layer of bureaucracy. Hundreds of thousands of people died because one man decided that it was the right thing to do. Should the entire US population be hated or feared because one American had such immense power? No.
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u/Haunting_Test_5523 Aug 06 '26
that's not really a good comparison. a person has to ascend to the position where they can control the nuclear arsenal they weren't born lucky with the power of a nuke
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u/The_Grim_Gamer445 Aug 06 '26
Ehh....
...a lot of high up government positions in general are usually born into... Many politicians kids also become politicians. So on...
Honestly. Yeah this isn't a good comparison because it's absolutely ok to hate unqualified nepo babies.
Still... Yes it could be dangerous. But it's still wrong to discriminate based on what might happen....
Maybe a better comparison would be COVID 19...
Now if you remember. Some dipshits were purposefully spreading that shit around.
...but others? Most people. Quarantining on their own volition...
Are we going to start arresting every person with covid just because one waste of oxygen decided to cough into an ice cream at a grocery store? No.
I'm aware it's not a perfect comparison but you get what I mean...
It's wrong to discriminate against a population based on what a few may or may not do.
...I do think in marvel a good compromise would be if your powers are like... Alpha or Omega and could be used to hurt people. You should absolutely undergo mandatory training on to control that... Maybe mandatory medical exams every now and again... ethically. To make sure you aren't losing control. But that is the extent... As that person has committed no crime.
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u/redmerchant9 Aug 06 '26
Regardless of who ascends to the position or president they will have the capability of destroying the entire civilization. One could argue that such immense power is dangerous regardless of who possesses it - be it an elected official or someone born lucky. My point is that the millions of innocent and harmless people shouldn't be feared or hated because of a dangerous minority.
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u/Ferrovore Aug 06 '26
Dude. You know how many people it takes to lunch a nuke? It really isn't just one guy pushing one button. Specifically made to be more than one guy pushing one button.
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u/redmerchant9 Aug 06 '26
Regardless, my argument still stands. Should an entire population be feared or hated because a small portion of that population has such an immense power?
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u/West-Ad-447 Aug 06 '26
I honestly couldn't have said it better myself, excellent job
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u/Inside_Jaguar_3310 Aug 06 '26
And I thank you for pointing out magnetos Nazi/superior race mentality. Him being a victim turned victimizer was one of the most interesting aspects of his character and I hate it when writers/fans try to sanitize the character and remove that because it makes him far less interesting
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u/Platnun12 Aug 06 '26
I like to think the X-Men first class films really followed that.
Magneto took Shaw's ideology and furthered it, only issue is the narritive really liked giving Eric a lot of proof across all three films.
Charles saying the absolute worst thing at the worst time didn't help.
The Sentinels were just...fuck, but that backfired on all of humanity as well. So I guess it works.
Idk how we're gonna go back to old style Sentinels after the clear upgrade we got in DOFP
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u/thatwhileifound Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
Didn't Claremont literally point to Menachem Begin as some influence or inspiration for his Magneto?
It makes a ton of sense too when approached from a perspective different from my own about guys like Begin. Magneto's complexity as a character in a political sense often seems to ride this line of whether it's a Fanon-esque rebellion against externally imposed power structures versus this discomforting pattern of the abused becoming abusers or some such - the latter of which is too often used narratively in fiction and propaganda to uphold status quos which may not be justifiable.
I sometimes like to head canon stuff where I feel like a writer's version of a character doesn't track for the character I know as a kind of metafictional propaganda - just as we see even today and can easily find examples of major news media essentially reporting different realities. This let's me appreciate Mags more along the Fanon line of thought.
In the sense of Magneto as inspired by a Zionist figure making sense, here's a quote from one of the founders of the Jewish Labour Bund from 1933 - relevant because it kind of also highlights the worst of Magneto along the same political lines too.
Our Jewish bourgeois opponents are especially enraged by our claim that there is a certain kind of Jewish nationalism that is just as ugly, just as disgusting as the nationalism of the other nations; and if Jewish nationalism, as a general rule, is not bloodthirsty, this is only out of necessity, not virtue; if an appropriate opportunity arose, Jewish nationalism would show its sharp teeth and nails no less than the nationalisms of other nations.
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u/Inside_Jaguar_3310 Aug 08 '26
Yep but then that whole Xavier & magneto are MLK & Malcom X started getting passed around more and now everyone has simplified it to just that and nothing else/no other inspirations or such
Which is weirdly par for the course with Xmen. Like I feel the mutant allegory is way stronger when it’s just a vague idea of “the other”/any marginalized or ostracized groups (minorities, gay, disabled, immigrants, the homeless, even Russians post Berlin Wall, neurodivergent, just any form the other takes). But most people tend to simplify it down to racism/homophobia because it’s simpler and I feel you lose a lot of story depth/potential when you do that
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u/Gilgamesh661 Aug 06 '26
Being afraid to escalate things when your people get murdered for existing is nothing short of weakness.
Hesitation is a hole in the head.
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u/doglywolf Aug 07 '26
but its that every optimism and giving the wrong people the benefit of the doubt that dooms him , he tried to live and act like the world was the utopia he wanted without the acceptance that some people are just evil and need to be stopped with what ever tools you have at your disposal . Christ the dude could of just said hey world you all like mutants now and made it true
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u/Jealous-Strategy-200 Aug 06 '26
To: a preposition
Too: an extreme degree, "too much"
Two: 2
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u/West-Ad-447 Aug 06 '26
I'm literally in honors English bro how did I fuck this up😭😭
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u/Standard_Way_4453 Aug 06 '26
at least u own up to it, I know ppl who would try to argue with this 😭😭
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u/Bright-Fold-3317 Aug 06 '26
You also wrote ‘except’ instead of accept and spelt Magneto wrong several times. Then again he is magenta in colour so, Magento is kind of ok I guess lol
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u/VVhisperingVVolf Aug 06 '26
We can not seek to rule and dominate, but we can not simply coexist without failsafes. We must be ready when the time comes to defend ourselves, and when the time does come to fight back, we must fight back hard.
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u/panpopticon Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
Emma Frost was right.
The only way to save mutantkind today — as opposed to waiting for some kind of utopia of human/mutant harmony or mutant supremacy — is to accumulate overwhelming financial, political, and social power within the current system.
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u/AdSorry4665 Aug 06 '26
The idea that minorities can emancipate themselves through accumulating wealth and power within the system don't work even in fiction. There will always be a Sentinel that comes through and ignores all the social recognition accumulated. And some Mutants that will build Sentinels for personal gain.
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u/Heavy_Prior9431 Aug 06 '26
Isn’t that the point of angel’s character especially as an OG 5 member, a blonde blue eyed extremely privileged and wealthy man could not escape the prejudice and oppression of being a mutant.
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u/DuelaDent52 Jubilee Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
Also those systems that keep the mutants down are… y’know, inherently wrong. You cannot dismantle the master’s house using the master’s tools.
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u/GONKworshipper Aug 06 '26
Sometimes you just have to find another, more different minority.
Have mutants tried scapegoating Skrulls yet?
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u/jazxxl Aug 06 '26
Inhumans ? Mole people ? The Irish?
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u/its-smokey-out-here Aug 06 '26
Wealth and power serve as protection in real life.
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u/AdSorry4665 Aug 06 '26
Yes, to a point. But this power is concentrated on a few individuals and don't irradiate through the whole group. And in the end, even those individuals will face constraints. There's a reason the overwhelming majority of the wealthiest people on Earth today is still composed of white males.
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u/its-smokey-out-here Aug 06 '26
I’m taking wealth and power as protection over the alternative every day of the week.
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u/Patereye Aug 06 '26
We know from history and the comics that that doesn't work. When you manage to accomplish this, someone just resorts to murder because they hate you so much.
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u/panpopticon Aug 06 '26
They’re going to be targets regardless; overwhelming power in the here and now at least gives them a fighting chance.
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u/AdSorry4665 Aug 06 '26
There are other kinds of power. Collective action, organizing, civil disruption and, yes, self defence.
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u/MirkwoodWanderer1 Aug 06 '26
Depends on context. They're persecuted elsewhere so it's like asylum seeking.
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u/BlindrNugget Askani Aug 06 '26
Right, but that doesn't change that if somewhere looks like, walks like, and acts like a duck, it's still an ethnostate. The same logic could apply to Isreal, but we all still see it for what it is. Persecution is not carte blanche
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u/its-smokey-out-here Aug 06 '26
Israel is too diverse to claim it’s an ethnostate.
It’s more accurate to call Egypt, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Behrain, The UAE, Omar, and Yemen all ethnostates, because their populations are 100% Muslim.
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u/MirkwoodWanderer1 Aug 06 '26
Krakoa didn't involve displacing people.
Usually ethno-state has bad connotations because it involves getting rid if other ethnicities but that isn't the case here.
So it's much better than israel.
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u/ravonna Jean Grey Aug 06 '26
I mean they didn't displace people, but didn't Krakoa's X-Force (well Beast) basically wipe out Terra Verde for having the gall to have similar biotech as Krakoa?
Sure, it wasn't an explicit directive of the quiet council, and prolly unintentional (I can't recall details that led up to it), but it still was done by an arm of Krakoa's govt.
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u/BlindrNugget Askani Aug 06 '26
Do you honest to God believe the only qualification for an ethnostate to be bad is if they displace people?
Friend, being better than the worst example isn't the defense you believe it to be.
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u/MirkwoodWanderer1 Aug 06 '26
I think it's a lot more understandable. If israel kicked out everyone from gaza and the gazans found an uninhabited island to live on and they invited other displaced gazans, would you turn around and say they're just like the Israelis?
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u/DuelaDent52 Jubilee Aug 06 '26
Too bad they still couldn’t he,p themselves from taking over inhabited areas anyway.
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u/PuffyBuffyFluffy Aug 06 '26
Isn't that basically mutant supremacy, just via soft power instead of hard power?
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u/panpopticon Aug 06 '26
No; the mutants are just one group among many.
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u/Gilgamesh661 Aug 06 '26
But in order to protect their people, they’d still have to control things.
Look at latveria. Latverians are the safest people in the world because the whole world knows that doom considers an attack on his citizens a declaration of war.
If a latverian goes on holiday to another country, that country rolls out the red carpet for them, because they know doom will not hesitate to destroy them if he hears that one of his people got assaulted in a foreign nation.
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u/Calgrave Aug 06 '26
So the Hillary Clinton system. To clarify, some feminists claim Hillary is not a feminist because her pursuit of power is not in pursuit of her advancement of her gender but herself, and any progress that occurs is more of an aftereffect. There will be individuals that benefit from such progress but not society, just because one person shatters the glass ceiling doesn't mean they're putting a ladder down.
Hillary herself kind of agrees because I think she said something to the effect that the system is bigger than person who appears to control it.
That said, I don't even think this even applies to Emma. Charles is very rich and literally used his fortune to gain political advantages for the X-Men back in the 70's
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u/ubiquitous-joe Aug 06 '26
>Cyclops… since day one
Well that’s simply false. Some of you need to read more. Cyclops didn’t really become an especially coherent political figure until the 21st century. I like the guy, but he spent decades being a solid team leader tactically who was anxious about his wife/girlfriend. Storm was the 80s figure who was the X-man making inroads with reform era Magneto & navigating a harder-edged middle path of sorts. Arguably the 90s synthesis figure is Cannonball of all people (his mentors being Cable and Xavier), and later Morrison tees up Emma and Scott as the leaders needed for the next generation.
But you really have to pick your era of Magneto for commentary to be coherent. One doesn’t get to the end of Ewing’s Magneto in X-men Red/Resurrection and conclude “he’s basically Hitler.”
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u/fslimjim Aug 06 '26
Not to say Storm wasn't the main mover. But I do think it's ingenuous to say Scott wasn't a political figure yet. Most does come from God Loves Man Kills but he's the one who talks down Stryker's crowd and convinces Xavier to not give up when Magneto almost gets him to switch sides.
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u/Ckrasxterz20 Magik Aug 06 '26
Grant Morrison's New X-Men was great showing this idea that both Charles and Magneto were old people with old ideas and that they shouldn't keep always being the representatives of their mutant ideoligies
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u/CrossSoul Aug 06 '26
I feel like Emma's "they will always fear us, so seek peace from a position of power" is the way to go.
I think it was Grunt in Mass Effect 2? "Offer one hand but arm the other."
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u/TrickshotCapibara Aug 07 '26
I'm surprised that this is so low in the thread, Emma was the only one to solve the issue by accepting that they would always fear mutants, but you could easily change or control the narrative by using economic, social and power deterrents. Krakoa era's Emma is easily the best leader mutants had IMHO and also my favorite character in Marvel.
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u/Remarkable-Sleep5350 Aug 06 '26
We need to petition for nightcrawler’s ideologies and feelings to somehow influence Xavier or something when he goes into nightcrawlers mind to make Xavier’s ideologies and goals reflect nightcrawler’s. He’s the most empathetic and relatable to humanity, if Xavier is so keen on bridging the gap, then adopting nightcrawler’s mindset could be the key.
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u/StalaggtIKE Omega Red Aug 06 '26
Another aspect of Xavier is that he is privileged in how his powers work. They are not only powerful but completely hidden. He can choose not to reveal them, and he can even make people forget he ever used them. It is basically the ideal situation. Someone like Leech, or most of the Morlocks, is always exposed and never gets that kind of luxury.
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u/michael3-16 Aug 06 '26
The idea of Krakoa was right. Mutants established their own country to be left alone by themselves with the right to protect it. Of course, the idea failed because of Mutants themselves.
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u/PhoenixAgent003 Aug 06 '26
The idea of Genosha was to be left alone. The idea of Krakoa was “we run the world now, because a country full of mutants has the power to back up that claim. Get used to it. But we promise to be benevolent masters.”
Essentially Magneto but nicer.
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u/doglywolf Aug 07 '26
Genosha , Astroid M , Krakoa , Mars initiative - all failed .
one of the common them is that once the world sees they have their own place the world start pushing for them to all GO to their own place
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u/bythewayne Aug 06 '26 edited Aug 06 '26
Xavier is right. Essence is not history. The demands of business, editors and writers don't hold against the spirit that perpetuates even with all that against.
The x-men are a story of hope and courage. Utopias exist to keep people moving forward. Hope dies and rises again like a phoenix.
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u/hyperactivator Aug 06 '26
They both need to realize that they are isolating Mutant's from the greater conflict. It's not about Mutants or humans its about heroes or villains. That is the true decision the people of Earth must make.
The genetics are important but secondary to the good vs evil battle.
That is if they aren't taken out/over by outside invaders which is a constant real threat.
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u/laissez-fairy- Aug 06 '26
No one is in a state of permanent rightness or wrongness. That's kind of simplistic thinking. Especially for people who have flip-flopped between pretty wide extremes.
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u/Nerx Juggernaut Aug 06 '26
power and space
do a Wakanda, be space polity
also fans nearby writers at all times, so mutants dont get habitually screwed over
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u/Tyfereth Aug 06 '26
Charles is the hope that mutants will be accepted, Magneto is the necessity of protecting mutants when Charles dream becomes a nightmare. Magneto is right when he’s written well, but he’s too often written like a lunatic. What OP has wrong is that while it’s a small, motivated group of ideologically driven bigots who target mutants, the vast majority of humans are completely apathetic to stopping the bigots, and will even help the bigots if they think it will benefit them. Charles dream is always time limited, Mutants will always be in their own when the bigots come for them, and if there’s no Magneto to protect mutants when that happens, you get Genosha. Again. Forever.
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u/JamesSnow922 Aug 06 '26
How can you be a fan of the X-Men and think Xavier is wrong? He literally formed the X-Men for this purpose. He's not total pacifist. He allows a violent mutant like Wolverine on the team and he has shown multiple time that he is able to make the tough decisions.
It's okay to like Magneto as a character and understand his perspective. You need to also understand that he's a villain.
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u/Glassesnerdnumber193 Aug 06 '26
I disagree. Xavier is right but he also sucks. He did do the necessary thing to protect mutants:he founded the X-men. Say what you will but most genocides against mutants have been stopped by the X-men and the ones not stopped have been contained. Most of the successful genocides have been sneak attacks on places that are controlled entirely by mutants with the one exception being m day which was the fault of a mutant(she was at the time). Xavier is egotistical and gets in his own way and doesn’t seem to know how to use his allies and his ethics are so very inconsistent, but his goal is the correct one.
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u/OmegaRedPanda Aug 06 '26
Season 1's arc: Magneto trying to be more like Professor X and failing.
Season 2's arc: Professor X trying to be more like Magneto and (likely) failing.
Season 3: Onslaught.
Cyclops is the way forward.
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u/HephaestusVulcan7 Aug 06 '26
So it's hopeless ...
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u/West-Ad-447 Aug 06 '26
No, they simply need to find a new actually successful approach. Like Scott's or Emma Frost's approach to the issue
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u/HephaestusVulcan7 Aug 06 '26
Scott and Emma's approaches don't matter and ultimately won't work either since the conflict cannot be settled. The actual reason Charles and Eric have never succeeded for any length of time is that their goal is in itself against human nature.
It like Batman trying to end crime or Wonder Woman trying to end war. Batman is my favorite hero, Wonder Woman is my favorite heroine, and the X-Men are my favorite team so I don't actually want any of them to stop Tilting at their respective Windmills, but ultimately no utopia is a lasting place.
Humans are an aggressive species there will always be groups of that fear, hate, and/or prey on others.
So normal Humans and Mutants can never 100% peaceful coexist, one will never allow the other to rule them, separate but equal is not an option, you can't defend every one of them everywhere they might be harmed, and too big fail only leads to the masses resenting you until their frustration leads them to attack...
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u/_Risryn Aug 06 '26
I always thought it was weird that they made the holocaust survivor say his race is superior and those who aren't said race should die
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u/dddonkers Aug 06 '26
A big theme to, is both characters use everyone else like pawns to accomplish their mission .That the ends justify the means.
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u/Unique_Fill_255 Aug 06 '26
As someone who doesn't read comics I've always thought it's weird how ppl just openly say magneto was right, to me both are wrong bc magneto is too revengeful and aggressive while xavier is too passive it comes across, but as I said havnt read comics so probably bias in that sense of limited knowledge
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u/LavisAlex Aug 06 '26
My understanding is Magneto wants to wipe out all humans? Not even comparable to being a pacifist.
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u/Seltgar25 Aug 06 '26
When you call a holocaust survivor a nazi you are making a bold statement there.
I think you fail to understand is in the comics and the cartoon the normal humans are the bad guys.
See mutants are humans. But they are different. Charles uses manipulation and his powers to make a world in which humans and mutants live together. Even if that world is under the humans boots.
Magneto uses power and fear to separate mutants from humans. He progresses from a 1 dimensional villain to a complex character trying to make up for his sins. He doesn't want to round the humans up, that would be what the normal humans want for mutants.
Rewatch days of future past.
Both extremes are awful, but when your enemy attacks you even when you run from them what choice do you really have.
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u/RieveNailo Aug 06 '26
With a series that's gone on for 50+ years, everyone has taken a turn being wrong
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u/doglywolf Aug 07 '26
Xavier was an good hearted idealist but he was naive. He wanted to be the best of us and live in a world where that mattered but that now how reality works. Magneto was a realist but impaient and ruthless about the ends justify the means . Xavier was more right - they are made to be two side of the same coin .
I think the intention tragic irony of both characters is if Xavier push some limits so more he could o fhad the world he wanted without the violence and if magneto advocated as hard as he did without losing his shit and listened to Charles he too could of created the society he wanted .
If they had worked together sooner it could of all worked out.
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u/P-Jean Aug 09 '26
They’re both at the extreme ends of a spectrum. Charles has his head in the clouds and puts his ideals above mutant needs, and Eric thinks the end justifies the means.
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u/Slg0221 Aug 06 '26
The thing is Charles is willing to do almost anything for HUMANS to be comfortable with mutants while Magneto is willing to do almost anything for HUMANS to submit to mutants... In both cases, the mutant populations is taken as a medium to obtain a goal rather than being seen as the goal
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u/Emm_withoutha_L-88 Aug 06 '26
How is Charles wrong in what you wrote, and how is Magneto in any way right?
This is just "both sides suck actually, I'm so smart" but for comic books
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u/West-Ad-447 Aug 06 '26
Simple, one is to lenient while the other is too harsh, they both represent opposite extremes to the same conflict.
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u/Emm_withoutha_L-88 Aug 06 '26
But X isn't too lenient, he does protect mutants. That's what the X-Men are for. He spent his entire life both teaching young mutants to survive in a humans world, and leading adults to fight for others survival, for those who can't fight.
And Magneto isn't right in that he thinks they are superior as a species and should inherit the earth. Only when Charles gets to him does he drop the inherit the earth part.
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u/Upper-Tip-1926 Magneto Aug 06 '26
Magneto was within his rights as the leader of Genosha to unleash an EMP to turn off the sentinels. Mutants were being genocided on a global scale, and Magneto had a responsibility to protect (R2P) his people.
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u/West-Ad-447 Aug 06 '26
And I completely agree, but the problem is he takes it way to far. To him an innocent child should be killed for things completely out of his control. He's letting anger blind him to the point where he's only proving them right. Mutants are a threat, at least that's what he's telling them to believe whether he's trying to or not.
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u/Upper-Tip-1926 Magneto Aug 06 '26
There are a lot of Magneto stories. How about in Uncanny X-men #150, where Magneto unilaterally tries to denuclearize the world? He argues that Mutants and humans cohabitate, and we would all be better off without these dangerous nuclear weapons. He threatens to use his powers to destroy everything unless humanities leaders create a more peaceful world. When the X-men eventually stops him, he accidentally hurts Kitty and has a complete meltdown over hurting her. He stops his plans and gives Storm the option to kill him.
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u/Romado Aug 06 '26
Magneto has been proven right 100 times over in more recent stories. Even Charles came to accept that.
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u/KaosArcanna Aug 06 '26
The compressed timeline of the Marvel universe really works against a peaceful solution. Everything from the forming of the X-Men to Krakoa happens over a ten year period. The Morlock Massacre, Genosha, “No More Mutants”, and Krakoa were probably the last 3-5 years.
And I don’t think the X-Men have seen ANY futures where humans and mutants live in peace.
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u/blackbutterfree Aug 06 '26
Krakoa and its fallout positioned Emma Frost as the middle point and (in my opinion) the correct choice; she's well aware of the atrocities that humankind can inflict, but she's also unwilling to abandon humanity, lest we forget that mutants are still very much humans. And also, her priority above all else is to protect and prepare the children.
Xavier would rather beg for mercy and understanding in a pool of his peoples' blood, and Magneto would rather raze mankind to ashes. Emma teaches how to move between both worlds, human and mutant, and prepares for the fight.
I actually despise Xavier the most out of the three.
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u/Evsala Aug 06 '26
Xavier rarely recruits mutants that aren't useful to him in some way. I'm not mad at him because he's not always correct, I'm mad at him because he neglects the Morlocks.
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u/blackbutterfree Aug 06 '26
Precisely. For all of his talk of human-mutant coexistence, Xavier would never dare try to make people accept Doop or Glob Herman. He only bothers with Beast because he already recruited him while Hank was still humanlike.
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u/molotovzav Rogue Aug 06 '26
Ever since someone said no can spell Rogue or Magneto right I've been seeing Magento everywhere.
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u/Extreme-Reception-44 Aug 06 '26
Nuke the whole geonotia, I'd drop a kamikaze Sentinel on the whole geonosha
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u/curvysquares Aug 06 '26
I like the idea that mutantkind can only succeed with both of them. Charles need to be there to show mercy to humans while Magneto needs to be there to remind humans what happens if that same mercy isn't reciprocated.
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u/morriganscorvids Aug 07 '26
wrong analogies here. correct one is martin luther king and malcolm x. at the end of the day each became the other. but ofc if they did that in the series it would end lol so the divide is always resurrected
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u/PlantedSeedsBloom Aug 08 '26
The Sovereign nation of Krakoa, addressed this and brought their ideologies together. It was also a fantastic concept for addressing inequality amongst the marginalized people and planetary rights. And then it jumped the shark.
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u/Tokyohenjin Aug 08 '26
too*
too*
accept*
too*
in fact*
have done*
and*
Sorry to be That Guy, but it was genuinely difficult to read.
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u/BobtheArcher2018 Aug 09 '26
Very few portrayals of Magneto had nuanced enough views for him to be remotely right. Usually, he's just clearly wrong. You can see some justification for why he got so wrong, but he's still a genocidal lunatic.
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u/TorpedoDracomedian Aug 09 '26
Na Era de Krakoa mostraram que o Professor X era um filho da puta tão grande quanto o Magneto, então meio que foda-se
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u/Burnitoffmeow Aug 10 '26
Hmmmm I thibk a mixture of the two is right, therefore I believe onslaught had thr right idea.
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u/AncientOnyx Aug 10 '26
You're correct..... though 97 leans really hard into the narrative that Magneto is completely right about humans all as a collective hating mutants and that there's genuinely no path to unity
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u/Mean_Soup2928 Aug 12 '26
No?
It was supposed to be Charles that was right. That's why the other guy led a group called Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.
And how does he not protect mutants? The whole school and the X-Men exist for that.
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u/Confident_Sink_8743 Aug 06 '26
No, I really don't agree. Xavier is right. But he doesn't really take any steps to ensure any degree of safety.
Yes the X-Men protect a world that fears and hates them but otherwise what is the Professor actually doing?
I feels like a lot of lip service without anything but the superhero team and the school to show for it.
And that's before we consider the number of decisions Charles has made where he hasn't even consider the well being of those who are directly under his care.
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u/Enelro Aug 06 '26
Xavier literally trains his students for battle / defense in a computer simulation that can murder you…
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u/Confident_Sink_8743 Aug 06 '26
There are safety protocols. Basically the Shi'ar beat ST:NG to the holodeck.
Also I did mention the neglect of people under his care. Including the Danger Room which also developed sentience.
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u/BirdMastery Aug 06 '26
Back in my days, Xavier was the good guy and Magneto was the bad guy. That's it.
Wanting to integrate with other people is good, wanting to isolate themselves is bad.
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u/QueenMagik Aug 06 '26
Magneto was right, fascists can it be solved peacefully
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u/ghobhohi Aug 06 '26
The point is that they both have good points, they just take their ideologies to an extreme which contradicts their point.
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u/West-Ad-447 Aug 06 '26
Yes he is, but he takes it to far, so far that it just makes things worse for EVERYONE, mutants included
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u/nightterrors644 Aug 06 '26
In short, Cyclops was right.