What Bush and Batman Have in Common
July 25, 2008
A cry for help goes out from a city beleaguered by violence and fear: A beam of light flashed into the night sky, the dark symbol of a bat projected onto the surface of the racing clouds . . .
Oh, wait a minute. That’s not a bat, actually. In fact, when you trace the outline with your finger, it looks kind of like . . . a “W.”
You need glasses, you delusional fuckwit.
There seems to me no question that the Batman film “The Dark Knight,” currently breaking every box office record in history, is at some level a paean of praise to the fortitude and moral courage that has been shown by George W. Bush in this time of terror and war.
You need a new brain, you delusional fuckwit.
Off your medication again, I see. Let's just take a moment to do some kicking with the spiked boots: Batman didn't ignore warnings that terrorists would strike in his city, stubborn stupidity and a habit of posing in flyboy outfits doesn't equal "fortitude" and "moral courage," and Batman fought strictly on the defense. He didn't go around starting wars against the wrong damned people and then proclaim himself a hero for it.
And I really don't think the Nolan brothers had Bush in mind when writing this film, except when they were writing the beating-information-out-of-people bits. I noticed they were a lot more thoughtful about the morality of that, now that Monkey Boy George has shown us exactly why such things as torture are banned by international treaty.
I see your insanity continues to spew forth. What now?
Like W, Batman is vilified and despised for confronting terrorists in the only terms they understand. Like W, Batman sometimes has to push the boundaries of civil rights to deal with an emergency, certain that he will re-establish those boundaries when the emergency is past.
Batman is villified and despised for being a dangerous, unknown quantity outside the law who also really fucks things up for the buggers getting rich off of other people's misery. Bush is villified because he's a raving fucktard who thinks he's entitled to do whatever he wants. Batman struggles with the morality of what he does and makes every attempt to put serious limits on his own actions. Bush uses other people's fear and uncertainty to grab as much power as he can, and you'd have to break his hands to pry it out of them. Batman ensures that the tools he has that could lead to people's rights being violated are used for uber-brief periods of time, in as limited a way as possible, and then immediately ensures their destruction, further adding a layer of security by placing the really noxious tools in the hands of a man guaranteed not to abuse them. Bush recognizes no limits in either time or scope, places the dangerous toys in the hands of completely evil fuckers, and uses every trick possible to permanently expand his toolbox. Is that enough, or should I go on?
And like W, Batman understands that there is no moral equivalence between a free society — in which people sometimes make the wrong choices — and a criminal sect bent on destruction. The former must be cherished even in its moments of folly; the latter must be hounded to the gates of Hell.
You just pulled that one out of your ass, buddy. It reeks of fresh bullshit.
Batman limits himself to one thing: making the dangerous people stop hurting the mostly innocent people. He won't kill a criminal. He won't use any more force than absolutely necessary. He hounds them only to the gates of Arkham, even when he knows there's a chance they'll break loose and wreak havoc again. You see, he has morals and a sense of proportion - neither of which your hero Georgie Boy possesses. He operates outside of the law, but he's not lawless. Bushie, on the other hand, uses the excuse of "criminal sects" redefine the law to his liking, to accrue power to himself, and to satiate his own thirst for war.
By the way, just so you're made aware of this, because I know it's not something you and your reality-challenged buddies consider very often, especially not when you're getting all hard over the latest round of torture and mayhem on 24, but: Batman operates in a fictional world. It's not real. Heroes in fiction and heroes in real life sometimes have points in common (although not in this case), but they're not the same. Fictional heroes, in fact, would quite often get their arses thrown in prison in this reality, no matter what kind of good they might be doing.
Things that work in fiction don't work in reality. If Bush and his cronies had understood that, we wouldn't have had government fucking officials citing Jack Bauer when trying to explain why torturing people is the right thing to do. The Jack Bauer Defense doesn't make torture right. Saying that Batman's feared and hated for the good he does doesn't mean that Bush is feared and hated for doing good - he's feared and hated because he's a power-mad little fucktard who's shat all over this country's laws, ideals, economy and identity. He's hated and feared because he deserves to be.
No amount of trying to equate him with Batman is going to change that. Get the fuck over it, Andrew. That big W on Georgie's chest doesn't stand for Wonderman, it stands for Whackjob.
Welcome to reality. Enjoy your brief stay.
1 comment:
Twenty years ago, A Fish Called Wanda put these guys in perspective:
Otto West: Apes don't read philosophy.
Wanda: Yes they do, Otto. They just don't understand it. Now let me correct you on a couple of things, OK? Aristotle was not Belgian. The central message of Buddhism is not "Every man for himself." And the London Underground is not a political movement. Those are all mistakes, Otto. I looked them up.
When you bother to look things up, you realize the confidence in their voices has nothing to do with them knowing what they're talking about. If anything, it's the opposite.
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