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The Jews are a people - an ethnicity, more or less - in addition to a religious group. Not all ethnic Jews are religiously Jewish. It’s worth mentioning because

by rafram 4y ago

The Jews are a people - an ethnicity, more or less - in addition to a religious group. Not all ethnic Jews are religiously Jewish. It’s worth mentioning because the story of how second-generation Jewish immigrants essentially invented the superhero genre, maybe the most American of genres, is… cool. It’s unexpected and interesting. What do you have against telling that story?

throwaway8440 4y ago
Ougon Bat/The Golden Bat [1] predates Super-man by 8 years. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Golden_Bat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Golden_Bat
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  The article also mentions the book Gladiator, available from standard ebooks https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/philip-wylie/gladiator https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/philip-wylie/gladiator > Gladiator, first published in 1930, tells the story of Hugo Danner, who is given superhuman speed, endurance, strength, and intelligence by his father as an experiment in creating a better human. We follow Hugo throughout his life viewed from his perspective, from childhood, when Hugo first discovers he’s different from others, to adulthood, as Hugo tries to find a positive outlet for his abilities around the time of the first World War. > Gladiator has been made into a 1938 comedy movie, and is thought to be the inspiration for the Superman comic books—though this has not been confirmed.
rawTruthHurts 4y ago
Why should have anything against telling that story? Are we ok with this flavour of editorialization now? "XIX Catholic scientist invents pasteurization" - I truly fail to see the "coolness" of it.
- anonymouskimmer 4y ago
  The originator of the Big Bang concept is basically always described as a Catholic priest. The juxtaposition between faith and science, compared to the union of the two, makes people think. This is an interesting part of the story because of the marginalization of Jewish immigrants during that interwar period.
olivermarks 4y ago
@rafram I don't think there is any doubt people who are jewish have had an important cultural influence on US media - Robert Crumb, MAD magazine etc - and some of their cultural background plays a part in that...but the whole idea of the 'new world' USA was assimilation in that '30's era, not celebrating ethnicity and past backgrounds. 'Jewish immigrants essentially invented the superhero genre' is a real stretch in this context. There were plenty of other cultural influences, particularly Japanese, in book and comic form that predate and were major influences on the US golden age of comic book explosion in popularity.
- anonymouskimmer 4y ago
  > but the whole idea of the 'new world' USA was assimilation in that '30's era, not celebrating ethnicity and past backgrounds. Jews, along with Blacks, were seen as outsiders to be marginalized by large sections of the dominant US culture at the time. Not as Whites to be assimilated. This is what makes Superman becoming such a large part of pop culture interesting. And if you think the whole idea of the US at that time was about assimilation, not celebrating ethnicity, look up the "German American Bund" (I'd give you a link but have to restart Firefox).
  - davidf18 4y ago
    [dead]
  - olivermarks 4y ago
    'Jews, along with Blacks, were seen as outsiders to be marginalized by large sections of the dominant US culture at the time'. I know this is the popular broad stroke concept of between wars American culture but in reality it was a lot more varied. The 'United States' was anything but united in that era. Huge numbers of blacks where migrating north to Chicago to work in manufacturing, different states had very different relationships with ethnicities and religions. NYC was always a very Jewish city for example. Another example of rejecting assimilation and celebrating other cultures were the German American Bund as you note, with large rallies etc celebrating the German National Socialist movement by German immigrants.

by rafram 4y ago

throwaway8440 4y ago

Ougon Bat/The Golden Bat [1] predates Super-man by 8 years. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Golden_Bat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Golden_Bat

ZeroGravitas 4y ago
The article also mentions the book Gladiator, available from standard ebooks https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/philip-wylie/gladiator https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/philip-wylie/gladiator > Gladiator, first published in 1930, tells the story of Hugo Danner, who is given superhuman speed, endurance, strength, and intelligence by his father as an experiment in creating a better human. We follow Hugo throughout his life viewed from his perspective, from childhood, when Hugo first discovers he’s different from others, to adulthood, as Hugo tries to find a positive outlet for his abilities around the time of the first World War. > Gladiator has been made into a 1938 comedy movie, and is thought to be the inspiration for the Superman comic books—though this has not been confirmed.

rawTruthHurts 4y ago

Why should have anything against telling that story? Are we ok with this flavour of editorialization now? "XIX Catholic scientist invents pasteurization" - I truly fail to see the "coolness" of it.

anonymouskimmer 4y ago
The originator of the Big Bang concept is basically always described as a Catholic priest. The juxtaposition between faith and science, compared to the union of the two, makes people think. This is an interesting part of the story because of the marginalization of Jewish immigrants during that interwar period.

olivermarks 4y ago

@rafram I don't think there is any doubt people who are jewish have had an important cultural influence on US media - Robert Crumb, MAD magazine etc - and some of their cultural background plays a part in that...but the whole idea of the 'new world' USA was assimilation in that '30's era, not celebrating ethnicity and past backgrounds. 'Jewish immigrants essentially invented the superhero genre' is a real stretch in this context. There were plenty of other cultural influences, particularly Japanese, in book and comic form that predate and were major influences on the US golden age of comic book explosion in popularity.

anonymouskimmer 4y ago
> but the whole idea of the 'new world' USA was assimilation in that '30's era, not celebrating ethnicity and past backgrounds. Jews, along with Blacks, were seen as outsiders to be marginalized by large sections of the dominant US culture at the time. Not as Whites to be assimilated. This is what makes Superman becoming such a large part of pop culture interesting. And if you think the whole idea of the US at that time was about assimilation, not celebrating ethnicity, look up the "German American Bund" (I'd give you a link but have to restart Firefox).
- davidf18 4y ago
  [dead]
- olivermarks 4y ago
  'Jews, along with Blacks, were seen as outsiders to be marginalized by large sections of the dominant US culture at the time'. I know this is the popular broad stroke concept of between wars American culture but in reality it was a lot more varied. The 'United States' was anything but united in that era. Huge numbers of blacks where migrating north to Chicago to work in manufacturing, different states had very different relationships with ethnicities and religions. NYC was always a very Jewish city for example. Another example of rejecting assimilation and celebrating other cultures were the German American Bund as you note, with large rallies etc celebrating the German National Socialist movement by German immigrants.