Tag: spider-man

I was wondering – I’m a bit confused by the sheer amount of Objectivism in early superhero comics, largely because of how anti-altruism objectivism is. Logically, going out and fighting supervillains to no personal advantage and often at great personal cost would seem to go against these precepts, right? But the Objectivist roots of early comics go so deep and are such a big part of comics history, whatever my opinions on it as a philosophy may be,that I’m assuming there must be something there?

I mean, I don’t think it was quite as prevalent as you’re making it out to be, yes there’s Ditko but I wouldn’t describe Kirby or Lee or Marston or even Finger and Kane as Objectivists even slightly. And even with Ditko, there’s strong arguments to be made that while he was at Marvel, he hadn’t yet become a full-on Objectivist. 

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Spider-Man’s credo of “with great power comes great responsibility” and his origin story of selfish self-promoter shown the error of his ways by the death of his uncle Ben; the original Doctor Strange is so uncompromisingly committed to the Hippocratic Oath that he won’t even allow harm to befall even Baron Mordo. (Even in his full-on Objectivist phase, Ditko tended to be more about moral absolutism – absolute good vs. absolute evil – than the pro-selfishness stuff.)

Where I think confusion tends to set in is that people associate the heroic individualism that is in superhero comics DNA from Superman onwards – the idea of a costumed do-gooder who steps outside the law or at least the institutions of society to set right what is wrong – with Objectivism. As you suggest, anti-altruism is at the heart of what sets objectivism apart from bog-standard individualist liberalism, and the heroic part of super-heroism is all about helping others full stop.

Thoughts on J. Jonah Jameson as a character?

J. Jonah Jameson is a great character, who somehow is both absolutely classic – you could do a silhouette carictature of the toothbrush moustache, the flattop haircut, and the stogie and I think you could get most people on the street to guess his identity – but also incredibly mutable. He can be Spider-Man’s most enduring hater or his biggest ally; an amoral scandal-monger who cares about selling papers not the truth or a tough-but-fair newspaperman of the old school who won’t tolerate spin and who will back good investigative reporting to his last breath; the Mayor of New York City or a conspiracy theory podcaster. 

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Jameson’s original version of him is a Steve Ditko original, steeped in Ditko’s own brand of Objectivist philosophy, a tormented, small man hiding behind bluster and bravado, consumed by ressentiment towards those who stand above the crowd, who fans the flames of the mob’s hatred in order to salve his own ego. But somehow this jacket couldn’t quite stick; Jameson has too much roaring energy, too much snappy cigar-chewing banter, too rich of a Falstaffian mix of hypocritical humor and human frailty, to go down as a Randian cardboard cutout. 

https://youtu.be/mhDBWiTfNCU

So over the years, writers have looked for a deeper and more sympathetic motivation for Jameson, and his character changed as a result. I would call him Spider-Man’s Loyal Opposition, undoubtedly an irritant and an obstacle, but one whose constant pressure pushes Spider-Man to be a more selfless, more “responsible” hero, if only to get one over on the old man.