I think they’re supposed to amusingly I think Moonshadow is the closest thing to what they’re trying to be done right admittedly the fact he isn’t interested in that kind of publicity is another reason he fits the bill better!
That saying by whichever wise sage about those who seek power the most deserve it the least and vice versa or somesuch comes to mind.
Amusingly enough, even the glory hounds amongst the kids automatically default to recognizing Moonshadow as their leader despite the fact that he doesn’t really want a part in all this stuff if he could somehow avoid it. Maybe they somehow subconsciously recognize true leadership potential?
I agree. Tyler has the potential to be a great leader. He doesn’t WANT to lead any one, but he recognizes when it’s time for some one to step up and take charge. He gets people to follow him, but in a way that doesn’t make them FEEL like their being told what to do. He may not have powers, but he sure seems more clever then the typical six year old kid. (In his first issue he was six. Not sure how old he is now.)
The wise sage was no doubt given automatic preference.
I’m not going to assume that someone seeking power doesn’t deserve it. After all, it’s that kind of thinking that leads to Sandy Hook and Columbine massacres. Some people will prove they have some measure of power, violently, if they believe are pushed or backed into a corner. Even if they strike out against innocent bystandars like a hobo with a shotgun.
If you treat someone like a second class citizen long enough, or if you treat them as if they are inferior, objectify, discriminate, or otherwise force the worthiness/ meritocracy/ socialism/ politics down their throats they will become corrupted and get their revenge rather spitefully once they become aware of the shine job that has kept them ignorant all this time.
I think that is the basic idea behind Marxism. And, for the record, I am a capitalist.
i seek power less than anyone i know of and should never ever be counted on to do anything important. the other half of the statement is still probably golden though
While I’m not so much of a fan of egale and star political heroes… I did love the “You can rest when this spaceship is a trophy of war!” As for the royality… He keeps lossing points in my villain meter/score. Atleast Forak can put two and two together.
The funny thing is that of the two patriotic hero students at PS238, American Eagle is the **DEMOCRATIC PARTY** hero. She’s obviously from the Woodrow Wilson, FDR, Harry Truman and John Fitzgerlad “Missle Gap with the Soviets” Kennedy wing of the party. 🙂
The Democratic party have never been shy about kicking as and chewing bubble gum when they felt it was warranted. Historically it been Republicans wanted a Big Military but never use it, and Democrats wanted a small military but send it everywhere.
@mrtt: Dillon and Jenny (aka Patriot Act and American Eagle) are not brainwashed, so much as indoctrinated. There’s a subtle difference; brainwashing involves breaking down the willpower and personality of the subject to make them a mindless drone, while indoctrination involves teaching the subject that a political ideal, religious doctrine or ideological philosophy is 100% correct and that believing in and promoting that ideal, doctrine or philosophy is a great way to meet new friends of your age group at sleepaway camps, regional get-togethers, church picnics, college fraternities and sororities, Shabbos Afternoon youth groups and the occaisional Shabbaton, and of course joining a youth oriented para-military organization dedicated to promoting tooth decay and weight gain for profit, like the Girl Scouts. The difference with Dillon and Jenny is that they have superpowers, and are being groomed to replace a Captain America expy when he retires. They haven’t been brainwashed, they really do believe in America and the Republican/Democratic Party doctrine they love to quote. They are also pretty effective super-heroes and spokesmen for their respective parties for a pair of nine year olds. 🙂
Indoctrination is a form of mind washing. Here’s why. Indoctrination as you say does not break down the will to replace what is there. The reason it doesn’t break down the will power and personality is because it is best used on children and those without strong convictions. Children are blank slates and thus are indoctrinated by parents, school, church and community. It still works on adults who are weak minded or through slow erosion by exposure. Brain washing as you’ve described it is more focused and time compressed but is effectively the same thing except it is hastened and usually done to people with a pre existing mindset. Indoctrination is mind washing that’s slow and easy. Brain washing as you’ve described is the bleach with scrubbing action version. Same job and nearly identical method. Only the targets current mindset is different. Blank slate vs. ground in grass stain. Jedi mind tricks work much the same way. You can gently swipe the weak minded to ignore droids or you can force choke some officer into submission (there’s probably a better heavy mind altering technique I’m not aware of). Both over ride the previous programming to an extent. Repeated applications solidify that new outlook as the persons own. If they act on some one else’s desires enough they will grow to accept those suggestions as their own thought patterns take on the new ideology. Thus who they become is different than who they were.
@DruidDriver: That’s not exactly how it works. Indoctrination occurs to all children, no matter what. It is a part of growing up and forming ideas, ideals and values. Unless you decide not to teach your children to speak (let alone read) they will get values somewhere, whether it is a public school, a comic book, a video game, a TV show, or their friends on the playground. The difference with Jenny and Dillon is that their indoctrination is being sponsered by the United States’ two ruling political parties, in hopes of replacing an aging patriotic superhero.
Basically, indoctrination is taking a blank sheet of paper and writing something, anything, on it. Brainwashing is taking an eraser and rubbing out whatever was written there and writing something new. If the original writing was in pencil, and you have a good eraser, you are left with a page of muddy, blotched brown and white; whatever you write on it will be legible, but you might be able to make out what was there before (not to mention that you have to have a good eraser and rub up and down all over the paper first). If the original writing was in pen, an eraser won’t cut it. You’d need to use white out, and it is obvious to whoever reads the new writing that something was there before and redacted. (Whiteout also crumbles over time, and can be removed with the right tools.) The best way to use whiteout is to use a little bit, removing only certain parts of the text. That’s basically how the best brainwashers function, only removing small parts of the subjects personality, lest they end up with an usuable vegetable. Either way, brainwashing is time consuming, and like the problems with the eraser and the whiteout, it is noticeable. By contrast, indoctrination goes on all the time. You get a blank page every time a child is born, but you can fill a blank page with a sonnet, a short story, a political slogan, a religious text, a comic strip, a portrait; you are limited by your imagination with a clean, fresh sheet of paper. When you erase or use whiteout you are very limited with what you can do.
Dillon is republican, Jenny is democrat. You can get a lot of info on the kids and there powers that’s not in the comic in the role playing game book. Some pretty good spoilers in there.
I love it that it’s the girls who are doing all the damage while the boys are just sort of loitering about, schmoosing…. Of course, Cecil’s power is informational, not offensive; and Moonshadow’s is…highly undefined, to date….
Although, you know, Cecil, you could be making good use of that shrink-ray on the various doohickeys and thingie-bobs.
I always get the parties she and Patriot Act are affiliated with mixed up. I suppose that’s to be expected when both parties are so alike (the top of the ‘horseshoe’ gives an unobstructed view).
That eagle-girl creeps me the *bleep* out…
So does her star-spangled counterpart.
I think they’re supposed to amusingly I think Moonshadow is the closest thing to what they’re trying to be done right admittedly the fact he isn’t interested in that kind of publicity is another reason he fits the bill better!
That saying by whichever wise sage about those who seek power the most deserve it the least and vice versa or somesuch comes to mind.
Amusingly enough, even the glory hounds amongst the kids automatically default to recognizing Moonshadow as their leader despite the fact that he doesn’t really want a part in all this stuff if he could somehow avoid it. Maybe they somehow subconsciously recognize true leadership potential?
I agree. Tyler has the potential to be a great leader. He doesn’t WANT to lead any one, but he recognizes when it’s time for some one to step up and take charge. He gets people to follow him, but in a way that doesn’t make them FEEL like their being told what to do. He may not have powers, but he sure seems more clever then the typical six year old kid. (In his first issue he was six. Not sure how old he is now.)
The wise sage was no doubt given automatic preference.
I’m not going to assume that someone seeking power doesn’t deserve it. After all, it’s that kind of thinking that leads to Sandy Hook and Columbine massacres. Some people will prove they have some measure of power, violently, if they believe are pushed or backed into a corner. Even if they strike out against innocent bystandars like a hobo with a shotgun.
If you treat someone like a second class citizen long enough, or if you treat them as if they are inferior, objectify, discriminate, or otherwise force the worthiness/ meritocracy/ socialism/ politics down their throats they will become corrupted and get their revenge rather spitefully once they become aware of the shine job that has kept them ignorant all this time.
I think that is the basic idea behind Marxism. And, for the record, I am a capitalist.
i seek power less than anyone i know of and should never ever be counted on to do anything important. the other half of the statement is still probably golden though
The dialog is the best part
@Rock: they are supposed to. They represent children brainwashed to represent one of two competing ideology without any deviation.
While I’m not so much of a fan of egale and star political heroes… I did love the “You can rest when this spaceship is a trophy of war!” As for the royality… He keeps lossing points in my villain meter/score. Atleast Forak can put two and two together.
The funny thing is that of the two patriotic hero students at PS238, American Eagle is the **DEMOCRATIC PARTY** hero. She’s obviously from the Woodrow Wilson, FDR, Harry Truman and John Fitzgerlad “Missle Gap with the Soviets” Kennedy wing of the party. 🙂
The Democratic party have never been shy about kicking as and chewing bubble gum when they felt it was warranted. Historically it been Republicans wanted a Big Military but never use it, and Democrats wanted a small military but send it everywhere.
@mrtt: Dillon and Jenny (aka Patriot Act and American Eagle) are not brainwashed, so much as indoctrinated. There’s a subtle difference; brainwashing involves breaking down the willpower and personality of the subject to make them a mindless drone, while indoctrination involves teaching the subject that a political ideal, religious doctrine or ideological philosophy is 100% correct and that believing in and promoting that ideal, doctrine or philosophy is a great way to meet new friends of your age group at sleepaway camps, regional get-togethers, church picnics, college fraternities and sororities, Shabbos Afternoon youth groups and the occaisional Shabbaton, and of course joining a youth oriented para-military organization dedicated to promoting tooth decay and weight gain for profit, like the Girl Scouts. The difference with Dillon and Jenny is that they have superpowers, and are being groomed to replace a Captain America expy when he retires. They haven’t been brainwashed, they really do believe in America and the Republican/Democratic Party doctrine they love to quote. They are also pretty effective super-heroes and spokesmen for their respective parties for a pair of nine year olds. 🙂
Indoctrination is a form of mind washing. Here’s why. Indoctrination as you say does not break down the will to replace what is there. The reason it doesn’t break down the will power and personality is because it is best used on children and those without strong convictions. Children are blank slates and thus are indoctrinated by parents, school, church and community. It still works on adults who are weak minded or through slow erosion by exposure. Brain washing as you’ve described it is more focused and time compressed but is effectively the same thing except it is hastened and usually done to people with a pre existing mindset. Indoctrination is mind washing that’s slow and easy. Brain washing as you’ve described is the bleach with scrubbing action version. Same job and nearly identical method. Only the targets current mindset is different. Blank slate vs. ground in grass stain. Jedi mind tricks work much the same way. You can gently swipe the weak minded to ignore droids or you can force choke some officer into submission (there’s probably a better heavy mind altering technique I’m not aware of). Both over ride the previous programming to an extent. Repeated applications solidify that new outlook as the persons own. If they act on some one else’s desires enough they will grow to accept those suggestions as their own thought patterns take on the new ideology. Thus who they become is different than who they were.
@DruidDriver: That’s not exactly how it works. Indoctrination occurs to all children, no matter what. It is a part of growing up and forming ideas, ideals and values. Unless you decide not to teach your children to speak (let alone read) they will get values somewhere, whether it is a public school, a comic book, a video game, a TV show, or their friends on the playground. The difference with Jenny and Dillon is that their indoctrination is being sponsered by the United States’ two ruling political parties, in hopes of replacing an aging patriotic superhero.
Basically, indoctrination is taking a blank sheet of paper and writing something, anything, on it. Brainwashing is taking an eraser and rubbing out whatever was written there and writing something new. If the original writing was in pencil, and you have a good eraser, you are left with a page of muddy, blotched brown and white; whatever you write on it will be legible, but you might be able to make out what was there before (not to mention that you have to have a good eraser and rub up and down all over the paper first). If the original writing was in pen, an eraser won’t cut it. You’d need to use white out, and it is obvious to whoever reads the new writing that something was there before and redacted. (Whiteout also crumbles over time, and can be removed with the right tools.) The best way to use whiteout is to use a little bit, removing only certain parts of the text. That’s basically how the best brainwashers function, only removing small parts of the subjects personality, lest they end up with an usuable vegetable. Either way, brainwashing is time consuming, and like the problems with the eraser and the whiteout, it is noticeable. By contrast, indoctrination goes on all the time. You get a blank page every time a child is born, but you can fill a blank page with a sonnet, a short story, a political slogan, a religious text, a comic strip, a portrait; you are limited by your imagination with a clean, fresh sheet of paper. When you erase or use whiteout you are very limited with what you can do.
Dillon is republican, Jenny is democrat. You can get a lot of info on the kids and there powers that’s not in the comic in the role playing game book. Some pretty good spoilers in there.
Except most of those spoilers have already been revealed.
Most. There’s a lot of back story concerning the teachers included. For instance, aroura’s back story. Remember her?
Also, things about praetorian academy our web-only followers won’t know yet….
Wait there’s a roleplaying game book out on this series?!!!
That first panel… Is Dax tired of getting sand kicked in his face? is Charles ATLAS going to make a man out of him? Hm, probably not.
ATLAS? Maybe. Charles? I think not ; )
Yep! I think you can buy it in the store.
It’s also available as a pdf from Drive Thru, and maybe in print from Noble Knight. Be advised it’s for the HERO system (HERO 5, I think).
I love it that it’s the girls who are doing all the damage while the boys are just sort of loitering about, schmoosing…. Of course, Cecil’s power is informational, not offensive; and Moonshadow’s is…highly undefined, to date….
Although, you know, Cecil, you could be making good use of that shrink-ray on the various doohickeys and thingie-bobs.
I always get the parties she and Patriot Act are affiliated with mixed up. I suppose that’s to be expected when both parties are so alike (the top of the ‘horseshoe’ gives an unobstructed view).