WHO IS BATMAN?
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Poster: ZincBadger Who is Batman? Is he an athlete? He can do incredible stuff. |
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Poster: Batmand00d I don't think we should be asking who Batman is. |
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Poster: ZincBadger It's a fair question. |
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Poster: OdeToJoy Batmand00d is right, I think. Batman is better mysterious. |
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Poster: buttercookies I want to know what gym he goes to |
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Poster: Tadarida Batman is a symbol. If we don't know who he is, then his power is greater. We live in a world where what we buy and what we see shapes who we are. Research shows that in cultures where there are large social divisions-divisions in wealth and divisions in culture like different religions and languages-have much larger problems with crime than more homogeneous societies. Batman exists in that chasm. He is no society and no culture. His choice of a costume makes him 'not us' since no culture or religion has ever dressed like him. His decision to take on animal aspects makes him even more mysterious and taps into very profound and mostly unconscious reactions from us, the same reactions that were evoked by the Shaman of Trois Freres, whose very human eyes look out at us from the mask of a stag. We are programmed to respond to Batman's us/not us status in powerful ways-with fear. If you expose the man behind the mask, the power of the marginal status disappears and the man becomes just a guy in a weird suit. |
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Poster: batmand00d Yeah what he said |
