Okay, you're really going to hate this post…
You probably already know about this story of a mentally retarded McDonald's fry-cook who had a sizable part of his Superman collection stolen by some douchebag coworker. Well said douche got caught robbing someone else, and the property may possibly be recovered. (I say possibly because it wasn't mentioned in the story.)
This much, I'm in agreement with y'all that it's good news, and I'm pleased by the number of people who came out to show support to this one man. But–and I really feel like a shit for bringing this up–as I read the rest of the story about people who have volunteered to donate replacements and other gifts, I stated thinking, "This is a bit much."
Not the replacement items themselves. I like that too. But then there's other stuff that people are organizing, so that not only will this robbed guy get back everything taken, he's gonna get Superman him-fucking-self delivering more goodies.
Folks, as much as I'm proud of you for this, I can't help but point out, "This is a white man whose house was robbed." People are stopping short of a ticker tape parade, but for the love of God, he got robbed. Not raped, not physically assaulted, not verbally abused. On any given day, lots of people with mental illnesses are robbed, and the world doesn't go "awww" like this. I had my whole music collection stolen, and the most I could get from fellow music fans online was, "Sorry, man, that's rough." So why does this one guy deserve all of your undivided social energy? I'm not complaining that you noticed his plight. Good on you for that. I'm complaining about the amount of energy that's gone into making up for the robbery of one comic book fan. Christ, if you people showed this much energy for civil rights, we really would have conquered prejudice in a month or two. Okay, three or four in the more ignorant pockets of resistance, but still!
Did Superman fucking guilt trip you into doing the right thing? Maybe you looked at that first story of the robbery, and you saw the giant statue of Superman staring you down, going "What are you going to do about this?" So you asked, "What would Supes do?" And you know Supes. He's an awesome fucking guy. So he wouldn't just catch the robber. He'd find replacement comics and add a little something something to make the whole thing better.
And, you guys totally did that…for a comic book fan who got robbed. I'm proud of the energy you expended, but maybe you could take that superhero sense of justice and apply the same energy to victims of worse crimes? Or does this sort of reaction come only because the victim is retarded, and then everyone feels bad for them being taken advantage of? This too, I can understand, because it did stuck in my gut that the thief took advantage of his victim's mental handicap.
Or, in the worst case scenario, did you only do it because he was a comic book fan, and you other fans can only devote this kind of social justice for one of your own? That really would be the worst, because then it suggests that you'll never have the same level of empathy for people who suffer much worse crimes and who don't have this amazing level of support. In fact, lots of victims have no support at all.
People, there's a lot of other victims who get taken advantage of. Bravo, you've all done a swell job of making this one crime better for this one man. But now that you've expended all that energy, I hope you don't feel so self-satisfied with your goodness that you don't notice the other 99.999% of crimes still left unaddressed.
The world needs y'all to keep going with this good energy and helping others just because it's the right thing to do. It's what Supes would do. So how about you?
