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How Is Batman Bad

Decent Essays

The Good and the Bad of Batman (and Every Story Ever Written!)
It is [the story], therefore, obviously the product of adolescent male power fantasies and wish–fulfillment. It is also, in this day-and-age, a potentially dangerous narrative that can be easily exploited as propaganda that supports the excesses of American imperialism and global capitalism.
However, at its best, the Batman story is about justice, restraint, and the desire to take a stand against evil - to make society as a whole better for the effort. (DiPaolo, 68-69)
For diehard Batman fans, this statement that DiPaolo makes in his book War, Politics, and Superheroes is an outrage (49-69). How is Batman propaganda? How can Batman ever be called dangerous when he has a ‘no-kill’ code? For others, though, it is hard to think of Batman as having restraint, and that he makes Gotham a better place. How can the Batman story be about restraint when he goes around smacking those he wants all night? How does Batman’s actions make Gotham a better place when there is always a new villain lurking in the shadows? Both sides have their points, and both sides of the Batman story are valid. I agree wholly with DiPaolo’s statement above. Any piece of work can be seen as having its’ good side and its’ bad side. Batman is seen as a piece of propaganda just as equally as it is seen as a story of …show more content…

A feudal lord can be described as a person with authority, who bestows services or gifts on his/her subjects; this definition can also be used to describe Bruce Wayne. Wayne uses his tragic past (as well as his family’s heritage in Gotham) as a defense of the authority he has over Gotham as Batman and he sees that it is his duty to protect his subjects. This is similar to American imperialism, when America assumed it had authority to rule over other entitles and expanded. And these aspects of Batman can be seen as ‘the excesses of American

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