a thrilling lost world adventure
A classic bit of sociological insight into groups is the observations that there is frequently an official leader. The official leader can be the foreman of a house construction crew, an office manager or a clergyman in a church. Frequently there is also an unofficial leader. A person that doesn’t hold an official title, but whom the group admires and respects. In some cases that respect is higher then the group has for the official lead. Though it is not unusual for the official leader to possess both titles. Pretending for a moment that we’re assessing a group, unobserved and unaware who has what title, we notice that one group member tended to encourage group cooperation – team work, tended to step in and break up heated exchanges before they escalated, while also with genuine or false modesty shunned credit for their attempts to keep the group organized, directed and trying to keep the relationships amicable. How would we describe that person in terms of displaying qualities or tendencies that we might associate more with one gender then another. Or if we see them displayed by a man do they become fatherly or if by a woman, motherly. Invisible Girl’s Quest for Visibility: Early Second Wave Feminism and the Comic Book Superheroine
Sue Storm did for the Fantastic Four “family” what Friedan’s 1950s mother did for hers; she kept them “together,” admonished them for fighting, apologized for her own (insignificant) role, and reminded them of their moral duty. Indeed, the Fantastic Four is fashioned on the “family” image; Sue Storm and her brother Johnny are literally family, she marries Reed Richards solidifying him as legitimate family, and the Thing – the feisty, short-tempered, problem “child” – is the surrogate kid/uncle. Sue was the superhero equivalent of the suburban housewife, who, although a veritable CEO in the home, was uncompensated and unrecognized for her successes. Sue’s importance to her superfamily was clear; she was the morale-boosting beauty who was usually welcome to tag along for the ride, even if she could not be of any real use. During these early years, Invisible Girl’s power of invisibility rarely helps her family in times of trouble, and in fact she often finds herself weakened by her own superpower, or captured by the enemy. Comic artist, writer, and scholar Trina Robbins notes that “Sue Storm’s power and flaws were almost a caricature of Victorian notions of the feminine, an invisible woman who faints when she tries to exert herself” (114). Like Friedan’s subjects, Sue is unappreciated in a world of and for men.
The demographic for The Fantastic Four during the 1960s was largely college males (Robbins 125). While these readers seemed to enjoy the spectacle of Sue, they were ambivalent about her role as a superheroine. When Marvel began printing fan letters in The Fantastic Four comics during the early 1960s, a debate quickly emerged among fans about Sue’s “worth” to the series. In September 1962, the first anti-Sue letter was published, urging editors to get rid of her since “she never does anything”
[ ]…Early on, in 1962, Sue declares that “[o]ne Invisible Girl can sometimes accomplish more than a battalion” (17/6), but by the end of 1963 readers have little reason for confidence in this proclamation. Sometimes she hardly seems super at all, so entrenched is she in old habits. Invisible Girl’s power to render herself unseen merely allows her to sneak around to collect information. It does not make her invaluable, like Mr. Fantastic who can maneuver himself out of extremely tight jams, and contort his body into endless shapes and uses; or like the Torch who “Flames On!” and embodies all the power of a Supernova; or like the Thing, whose raw power and strength makes him the ultimate enforcer. During the first half of the decade, Invisible Girl lacks even the strength of villains and always relies on the intelligence of patriarch Reed Richards to outsmart the enemy. She is the mother figure, the calming influence, the eyes and ears of the family. Without her intervention, her hot-headed male counterparts would argue themselves out of cooperation with each other.
The reason I brought up the possibility that a person who performed the same super services as it were could be a fatherly figure is because what Storm did for the group could just as well been done by a male, yet it is doubtful that a man filling that role in the group would have been described by an Army General in the 60s as “Miss Storm, a pretty young lady can always be of help – just by keeping the men’s morale up!” There is an incredible irony in the underlying condensation of that statement. In the 60s an Army Sergeant would have, sans super powers, performed the very same functions for a unit.
Why money messes with your mind
“Money seems to have symbolic power as a social resource,” says Vohs. “It enables people to manipulate the social system to give them what they want, regardless of whether they are liked.” Put bluntly, it looks as if money is acting as a surrogate friend. Could that explain why some people focus on extrinsic aspirations at the expense of real social relationships?
Psychologists Stephen Lea at the University of Exeter, UK, and Paul Webley at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, have suggested another reason for unhealthy and obsessive attitudes to money. They believe that it acts on our minds rather like an addictive drug, giving it the power to drive some of us to compulsive gambling, overwork or obsessive spending (Behavioral and Brain Sciences, vol 29, p 161). “It is an interesting possibility that all these are manifestations of a broader addiction to money,” says Lea. Compulsion appears to be a problem for people with several money-related disorders which are increasingly being identified by psychologists (see “Money problems”).
Lea and Webley propose that money, like nicotine or cocaine, can activate the brain’s pleasure centres, the neurological pathways that make biologically beneficial activities such as sex feel so rewarding. Of course, money does not physically enter the brain but it might work in a similar way to pornographic text, argue Lea and Webley, which can cause arousal not by giving any biochemical or physiological stimuli, but by acting through the mind and emotions.
Some evidence for the notion of “addiction” to money comes from brain imaging studies. In one experiment, for example, a team led by Samuel McClure, a psychologist at Princeton University, asked volunteers to choose between receiving a voucher for Amazon.com right then, or a higher-value one a few weeks later. Those who chose the instant reward showed brain activity in the areas linked with emotion, especially the limbic system, which is known to be involved in much impulsive behaviour and drug addiction. Those choosing the delayed reward showed activity in areas such as the prefrontal cortex known to be involved in rational planning …
I’ll have to wait for a direct study, but in the mean time this attachment to money outside its practical use as a convenient way to exchange things of value – money for work, money to buy groceries and books, helps explain why so many people seem more upset over differences of opinion about the current economic crisis and the level of rescue funding then they did about Bush presenting a carefully crafted campaign of public manipulation to take the nation into a counter productive war. That is not to say that people were not upset as details started emerge that the country had been lied to, only that many of the same people that pretend to be outraged over the Recovery Act were comfortable with sending their fellow Americans off to die for reasons that were dubious at best.
