fandomhigh | Lies Your Other Teachers Told You, January 12, 2018

There were two teachers at the head of the class today and one of them looked like he was ready for a fight. The other mostly looked like he needed more coffee.

No points for guessing which was which.

"Welcome back," Tony said. "Everyone say hello to your other teacher, Captain Rogers."

Steve gave a quick wave. "Hello. It's nice to see some familiar faces. Today we're going to talk about the dangers of talking around actual, definable problems with historical figures, both past and present. Heroification makes people over into heroes. Through this process, people turn flawed, flesh-and-blood individuals into pious, perfect creatures without conflicts, pain, credibility, or human interest." He smiled. "I read that last part in a book, but it's true."

Tony smiled and looked like he was trying not to laugh. "While they were crucial to the founding of this country, many of the Founders were also slave owners or soldiers who helped demolish the native populations that were here long before our country was even an idea. But today we hold them up to the gold standard of what we think the country should be."

"Washington, Jefferson, Madison all owned slaves," Steve said, nodding. "Christopher Columbus wasn't here to prove the world was round. Andrew Jackson was a violent racist. Does it affect how we view their contributions to world history? Yes, because it makes them people, not cartoons."

"Washington, the very first president of the country and famed military general for the revolution, didn't even think the constitution would last more than a few decades," Tony added. So, take jerkwads who used it to argue for bullshit. "Though, that may be due to the fact that in no way was the country a unified state, more a loose confederact of different states who barely tolerated each other."

But details, details.

"Sometimes they still barely tolerate each other," Steve muttered. "Okay. The topic discussion today: why is it so dangerous to turn these very real people into untouchable icons?"

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"Yeeeeeeeah," Tip said. "That's another one a lot of guys still haven't figured out."

"That is very and sadly true," Tony replied with a sigh. "Many people like to think that our culture is the beacon of morality when it's just this shiny veneer over rot."

"Or they think that it was great back then, but that people like me having personal freedoms is what's making it rot."

Tony wrinkled his nose at that. "Yeah, those people can shove it."

Maybe not the best teacher answer, though.

"Do you think we whitewash the past to absolve ourselves of it?"

"Yes." And by 'we', she specifically meant white people.

"Plus, back on the whole 'dehumanizing historical figures' thing, the less we think of them as real people, the easier it is to put whatever words we want into their mouths. Same thing we do with religious figures."

Yeah, that was fair.

"Very true. They can't refute anything we claim about them anymore," Tony said. "Or clarify what an offhand comment might mean in context. We can cherry-pick quotes to suit our argument much like people do with the Bible or the Koran."

"It's kind of creepy really," Tip mused. "How much people like to use each other as tools."

"Ask Captain Rogers about that one sometime," Tony replied. "His image was used as propaganda for decades while he was, ah, out of commission."

Edited 2018-01-12 20:28 (UTC)

Tip glanced over at Steve and nodded. "Yeah, celebrity culture is extra weird." That was one of the reasons why she didn't tell anyone that she'd been instrumental in ending the alien occupation of her earth.

Considering the doofus who'd ended up taking credit, she was still kind of torn over that decision.

"Not that non-humans are any better. On my friend's planet, they almost elected an actual, literal parrot."

The Boov made excellent metaphors.

Nooo comment on celebrity culture from him.

"That is refreshing," Tony replied with a teasing smile. "All the aliens I run into back home are either genocidal or giant trees."

"What, no genocidal trees? I always knew plants were better than people. . . ."

"The tree did pack a pretty mean punch if that helps."

And that wasn't even touching the talking raccoon or the chick with the super cool energy sword.

Energy swords were some of the best things aliens had brought to Earth. Tip was going to get to find that out first hand that afternoon in the park, even!

"In my world, we had frog-people with creepy space guns," she offered. "And then the Gorg. Who were literally all clones of one extra-violent dude named Gorg, who'd defeated everyone else from his already violent culture." A beat. "Their language was based on punching."

Her world wasn't subtle, no.

"...huh." Then again, he was a colorful superhero, so judgment wasn't for him to pass. "We had genocidal blue people, genocidal and shape-shifting green people, a sort of eldritch horror guy in purple armor who was there to eat the planet."

"Wait," Tip said, because all that would have sounded way weirder to her two years ago before she'd come to this island. "You guys aren't, like, from Fandom's actual home world or something, are you?"

She wasn't really sure Fandom had a homeworld, but that was enough weird invading forces to start sounding familiar.

"Believe it or not, I came here as a vacation from that," Tony said with a grin.

"Did it work?" Tip asked, amused. "Or is it just an exciting new blend of weird?"

She'd come as a break from her mom, so she couldn't really judge.

"The latter. But I've found I really like teaching, so that's been a plus."

It really shouldn't have been a shock that 20 year in the future him was mentoring half a dozen teen heroes, really.

Lies Your Other Teachers Told You, January 12, 2018

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