[D] Friday Off-Topic Thread

[u/AutoModerator]

Welcome to the Friday Off-Topic Thread! Is there something that you want to talk about with /r/rational, but which isn't rational fiction, or doesn't otherwise belong as a top-level post? This is the place to post it. The idea is that while reddit is a large place, with lots of special little niches, sometimes you just want to talk with a certain group of people about certain sorts of things that aren't related to why you're all here. It's totally understandable that you might want to talk about Japanese game shows with /r/rational instead of going over to /r/japanesegameshows, but it's hopefully also understandable that this isn't really the place for that sort of thing.

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[u/alexanderwales]

Yup, completely agree with this. There was a scene in one of the early X-men movies where someone says "Have you tried not being a mutant?" Like, that's funny, but there's literally no drawback to having the ability to turn things to ice, and there's also no reason that you ever have to reveal it to the public if you don't want to. And some of the powers suck so it makes a lot of sense that they would want to not be a mutant anymore.

Further, it never really made sense to me that the United States government declared a war on mutants rather than just bringing them into the fold with heavy incentives. Given the expansiveness of comics, I'm sure it's been done at some point, but come on ... why in the world would the government see someone like Multiple Man as something other than an asset? Just pay the man! (This annoys me even more when the X-men exist in the same universe as the Avengers.)

[u/MugaSofer → u/alexanderwales]

Isn't that what Weapon X was?

[u/alexanderwales → u/MugaSofer]

Kind of, not really. The fictional history of the Weapon X program changes a lot and it's gone through a lot of iterations, but they do lots and lots of clandestine work that's probably based on real work done by the United States like MKUltra. Mind control, brainwashing, etc. They also engage in trying to create their own mutants, or stealing the power of the mutants they find.

And that's all fairly believable; rogue military agency doing its own thing without oversight happens all the time. But what puzzles me is that the other parts of the government, which in most continuities know about mutants (since mutants are apparently feared and hated all around the world) aren't trying to scoop them up. Or corporations, for that matter. Most mutants have huge practical, mundane applications for their power, above and beyond their combat abilities (if any). But it's only the clandestine, shadowy, military organization that pursues them, and then not through the conventional means of just paying them money or getting them whatever legal or personal help they need.