Workin' Überzeit
Workin' Überzeit
On the intersection of heroic symbols & political economies
One of last month’s slices profiled Collective Action Comics’ season-long critique of Mark Millar’s The Ultimates (2002–’04). In that season’s final episode, host Nat Yonce addresses the question of collective action, advocating for mass resistance and sustained momentum against oppressive forces. That dispatch’s conclusion intertwined this call to action with my own argument affirming the cultural value of superhero narratives, and with the broad entreaty to creators, embedded within that argument, that they embrace the responsibility of authentic storytelling to inspire positive change and social awareness, and that they therefore ensure their stories accurately represent the complexities of the real world and the forces shaping it.
Accordingly, I think it would behoove me to explore those complexities a little further. But, still, before that, a little more recap: one of Yonce’s central points is that Millar misunderstands the inseparable relationship between liberal imperialism and fascist authoritarianism in capitalist republics.
Certainly, Collective Action Comics spends some time (and Radio Free Pizza has spent some too) covering the connections between Anglo-American banking and Nazi Germany. But for me—and, it seems, for Yonce as well—the relationship between liberalism and fascism is close to an identity. Such an understanding proceeds from the communist analysis contemporary to the interwar period, exemplified in that of R. Palme Dutt.
In his Fascism and Social Revolution (1936), Dutt defines fascism as “the characteristic instrument of finance-capital which can be brought into play in the most highly developed industrial countries when the stage of the crisis and of the class struggle requires it” (p. 154). Because the “‘democratic freedoms’ of Western imperialism have [only] been built on the foundation of colonial slavery” without resolving any of the class tensions in the imperial core, its democratic institutions are “increasingly undermined by the crisis of capitalism”—and so, “bourgeois policy begins to turn away from the exhausted and discredited parliamentarism towards open dictatorship, towards Fascism” (p. 155).
In 1930, Dutt described the “crisis of capitalism” to which he refers here as “the culminating stage of imperialism [...] when [...] antagonisms of the imperialist system of production have reached an extreme point, with the ever greater growth of monopolies [...] and bourgeois rule can only be maintained increasingly by extraordinary means” (p. 735)—such as, of course, fascism.
However, because Dutt writes from within a historical context, it’s important to note now that a communist analysis finds every capitalist economy generating similar crises, which capitalist republics must address with similarly extraordinary means. These crises result inevitably from the overproduction of consumer goods on the market beyond what wage-earners can purchase, along with the rate of profit’s tendency to fall, resulting from the greater investment of capital into production constants (materials, machinery, etc.) than into the variable cost of paid wages. Together, these attributes of the capitalist economy guarantee periodic downturn, and, thus, that—so long as capitalist republics endure—more fascist oppression remains ahead of us.
For that reason, Yonce’s analysis of The Ultimates took numerous pot-shots at progressive liberals who campaign for social justice but who offer no critique of capitalism. They seek to treat the symptoms, as it were, while leaving the disease unaddressed, and accordingly their acts only ensure that the body-politic suffers further illnesses as the capitalist republic’s liberal democracy decays into fascism.
In this sense—that of being co-opted into supporting fascism—progressive liberals find themselves with an unlikely bedfellow: the 19th-century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.
The Nazis themselves co-opted Nietzsche’s philosophy to serve their ideological agenda, particularly through the appropriation of the concept of the Übermensch, or “superman,” which Nietzsche introduces in Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883) as an archetype of a future humanity that has transcended conventional morality and societal norms to create their own values, emphasizing personal will and autonomy. However, the Nazis distorted Nietzsche’s ideas to align with their vision of Aryan supremacy and racial purity. They associated the Übermensch with their idealized Aryan “master race,” portraying it as the embodiment of physical and intellectual superiority. This appropriation facilitated the Nazis’ propagation of a pseudo-philosophical foundation for their racist and authoritarian doctrines, exploiting Nietzsche’s work to legitimize their oppressive ideologies and practices. Despite Nietzsche’s disapproval of antisemitism and his rejection of rigid racial categories, the Nazis selectively interpreted and manipulated his ideas to suit their nefarious objectives during the Third Reich.
…You caught that, right? “Superman”?
Of course: returning customers know where this is going. But I’m hardly the first commentator to explore the connection between Nietzsche’s Übermensch (better translated, in fact, as “Overman”) and Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster’s Superman.
Investigating the same idea, Emlyn Roberts-Harry’s 2014 “Four-colour philosophy: Superman and Nietzsche” delves into Nietzsche’s philosophy, introducing the Übermensch as a figure “beyond good and evil,” someone who transcends societal morality. While Roberts-Harry emphasizes that the Übermensch is deliberately amoral but not necessarily evil, she also acknowledges the dark connotations attached to the term due to its appropriation by the Nazis, who linked it to their ideology of a superior Aryan race.
This allows her to pivot to Siegel and Shuster, the Jewish creators of Superman, and to their role in redefining the term “superman”: in the face of Nazi ideology, the duo transformed it into one connoting morality and altruism. Meanwhile, as KC Carlson notes for Westfield Comics—and correcting my false statements about Action Comics #1 on The Hrvoje Morić Show last year (at ~30:33 in the linked clip)—they honored their own Jewish heritage in crafting their hero’s origins with a nod to those of Moses in the Book of Exodus.
Contradicting Nietzsche’s idea of the Übermensch as one beyond morality, Siegel and Shuster’s Superman stands instead as beacon of compassion and heroism who, despite his god-like powers, consistently upholds moral principles and rejects the temptation to dominate humanity. Roberts-Harry argues that Siegel and Shuster’s reimagining of Superman serves as a powerful rebuttal to Nazi ideology, and presents the character’s enduring legacy—far outlasting the Nazi regime—as a testament to the triumph of compassion and morality over oppressive ideologies. She concludes by suggesting that Superman’s legacy, shaped by his creators, will persist as a symbol of unshakeable morality for generations to come.
Similarly, Roy Schwartz’s 2022 “Men of Steel: Superman vs Übermensch” explores the historical comparisons and philosophical implications associated with Superman and Nietzsche's Übermensch. Schwartz delves into the historical context of Superman's creation, highlighting that his inception in the 1930s was influenced by a mix of cultural elements, including Biblical heroes, legends, and societal concerns such as rising antisemitism and the threat of Nazism. Accordingly, Schwartz argues that Siegel and Shuster conceived the character as a reaction to the societal anxieties of the time, a wish-fulfillment character rooted in the Jewish immigrant experience, and one which therefore rejected the injustice of oppression.
In distinguishing further between the Übermensch and Superman, he points out that the former’s pursuit of individual greatness contrasts against the latter’s more altruistic values, serving the collective good rather than pursuing personal power. The article highlights that Superman’s commitment to truth, justice, and the American way is not a Nietzschean pursuit of personal will but a dedication to altruistic ideals—and, besides that, I suspect many scholars of Nietzsche would find it laughably mistaken if someone argued that the Übermensch represents dedication to truth.
Schwartz carefully explores Nietzsche’s philosophy, emphasizing that Nietzsche himself was not an antisemite but explaining that he critiqued moral values, including those associated with Judaism. Accordingly, the Übermensch would reject such impositions and instead pursue subjective morality. However, Schwarz argues persuasively that alternate-universe storylines reimagining Superman as a despot emphasize the canonical character’s fundamental opposition to tyranny, including the Nazi regime that had co-opted the Übermensch. Thus, for Schwartz, the archetypal superhero embodies a collectivist and altruistic ethos, standing in stark contrast to the Nietzschean Übermensch and the Nazi distortion of the concept. The superhero, in Schwartz’s analysis, therefore becomes a symbol of virtue emerging from an egalitarian view of humanity, countering the solipsistic moral nihilism frequently (and inaccurately) attributed to Nietzsche.
I agree with Roberts-Harry and with Schwartz in their shared position on the overall incompatibility between the moral theories symbolized in Nietzsche’s Übermensch and Siegel and Shuster’s Superman. Nonetheless, the parallels between them still remain, as they do between Nietzsche’s philosophy and superheroes more broadly.
The Übermensch seeks personal greatness and self-realization, challenging the standards of the ordinary and striving instead for excellence: in that sense, Superman’s own origin story—overcoming the lonely circumstances of being an orphan and instead embracing the destiny of being endowed with such phenomenal ability, transcending human mundanity to address some the world’s most dire threats—carries something of the Übermensch’s spirit. The significant distinction, I think, comes from Superman making sacrifices for the greater good, but (as we shall see) that arises due more to Nietzsche’s particular definition of “the greater good” than to any animosity for humanity on the part of the philosopher, who might well argue that Superman’s purpose “to save mankind from itself, its awful ugly self” (as Helene Stapinski and Bonnie Siegler put it) is functionally the same as that of the Übermensch.
Comparing the Übermensch and Nietzsche’s broader philosophy to superhero stories in general reveals other fruitful parallels. Both the Übermensch and superheroes emphasize the importance of individualism and self-creation, with the latter often undergoing personal transformations and/or acquiring unique powers or skills upon taking up their masked alter-egos, and redefining their identities based on their own principles in doing so. For Nietzsche, the Übermensch functions as a symbol of continuous self-improvement and striving for perfection, representing the best of humanity. This mirrors the superhero’s journey of constant growth, honing their skills, and evolving to confront ever more significant challenges.
Most significantly, I think, Nietzsche’s concept of eternal recurrence—the thought experiment that asks us to consider how we would live our lives and think about our actions and experiences if our lives, with all their joys and all their sorrows, repeated endlessly on an infinite loop—resonates with the recurring themes in superhero comics wherein characters face similar challenges in different iterations or universes. More to the point, it resonates with one of the superhero genre’s trademark conventions: that superheroes never stay dead. Meanwhile, of course, nothing would thrill Nietzsche’s Übermensch more than to be fated with a life of eternal recurrence.
On the whole, Nietzsche would likely approve of the superhero’s tendency to operate outside the boundaries of conventional laws and norms, guided by their own moral compass, regardless of how the philosopher might quibble with that compass’ orientation toward virtues like justice and equality—or (maybe more accurately), regardless of how the philosopher might quibble with how the superhero defines these virtues.
While Nietzsche’s Übermensch was a philosophical concept, and superheroes are fictional characters within popular culture, the shared themes emphasize the enduring human aspiration for self-transcendence, the rejection of imposed values, and the pursuit of individual greatness. In some ways, then, the superhero embodies Nietzsche’s vision of a figure who rises above societal norms to shape their destiny and contribute to a higher form of existence.
…But, “higher” than what? Or, to put it another way: more advanced than what stage?
The symbolism of “overcoming” embedded in Nietzsche’s Übermensch—both of overcoming oneself, and of overcoming what limiting beliefs and behaviors a retrograde society imposes and obliges—allows the adherents of almost any ideology to superficially graft the symbol over their own beliefs and say it articulates their vision of progress, as in the case of Nazism. Followers of Ayn Rand’s objectivism—emphasizing rational self-interest, individual rights, and laissez-faire capitalism—seem to have done similarly, identifying the Übermensch with the Randian hero and thus aligning Nietzsche’s philosophy not with fascism but its liberal predecessor.
(Amusingly, the preceding link covers comics-industry hand-wringing that Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel [2013] portrays Superman in a Randian mold.)
While both concepts celebrate individual strength and independence, Nietzsche’s Übermensch is more rooted in a existential self-actualization that transcends even the reason that Western philosophy has traditionally privileged, whereas the Randian hero is founded on rational egoism and the pursuit of one's own happiness through personal achievement within the capitalist mode of production.
So, tough luck for the objectivists who, in their efforts to co-opt Nietzsche, tried what the Nazis tried, and failed just the same.
Still, given how doggedly this dispatch (and previous ones) have problematized the relationship between superhero comics and political economies, I think it would serve our analysis well to examine the latter as understood in Nietzsche’s philosophy. With that aim in mind, let’s turn now to a triplet of episodes from Keegan Kjeldsen’s The Nietzsche Podcast: “Nietzsche Contra Capitalism”, “Nietzsche Contra Socialism”, and “Nietzsche Contra Fascism”.
In “Nietzsche Contra Capitalism”, Kjeldsen draws heavily from Human, All Too Human (1878) and The Wanderer and His Shadow (1880) to discusses Nietzsche’s critique of capitalism, which the philosopher views as enabling the pursuit of pleasure and desire, corrupting morals, and weakening society, as evidenced in how the most successful capitalists exhibit vulgarity, deceit and hedonism. While liberal democracy has set Europe on a path of tremendous economic growth, allowing the creation of great works of art and culture, he sees unrestrained capitalism as threatening this progress. (Maybe we’d say he laid the groundwork for our theory of cultural austerity.)
From Nietzsche’s perspective, market capitalism does not actually reward hard work and merit because labor has value based only on utilitarian calculations that don’t account the effort or skill involved, leading to mediocre quality as capitalism meanwhile encourages quantity and automation. Moreover, he argues that capitalism’s sole focus on satisfying human desires corrupts cultural values and weakens the health of society overall. Overall, Nietzsche sees capitalism as a flawed system that, because of its corrupt values, doesn’t create an admirable hierarchy or select virtuous leaders.
On this subject, Kjeldsen offers an interesting digression (at ~34:53–39:14) on elite overproduction, inspired by Nietzsche’s observation that the rich feel satisfaction with how their wealth distinguishes them from the poor:
[T]his is a pattern that we see evidence for as economic inequality accelerates in a given system and especially as elite overproduction occurs […] in every society there are a limited number of elite positions. They always have to be limited because their exclusivity is what makes them elite positions […] As inequality continues to increase, more people are pushed down into the proletariat, but also more people ascend upwards into the patriciate. There’s that truism or aphorism, “a rising tide lifts all boats,” which is true, but that doesn’t actually smooth the inequality, it heightens it: if you’re already at a higher level, you get lifted even faster […] As the patriciate expands, eventually you hit a point where there are more aspirant elites jockeying for a position than there are open positions within the elite […] the total amount of wealth in society is expanding, but the elite is always trying to limit the number of people who can get in. And so more and more aspirant elites don’t make it, and they become what’s called counter-elites.
Recalling the Marxist identification (mentioned above) of the roots of economic crises under capitalism in consumer-good overproduction and the tendency of the rate of profit to fall—together ensuring that, whether in times of feast or famine, the working class will not ever earn enough in wages to purchase all available goods on the market while private businesses remain profitable—the phenomenon of elite overproduction that Kjledsen describes here offers a useful contribution to our framework. The temporary expansion of the bourgeois patriciate and, simultaneously, the accelerating concentration of society’s wealth within that class, leads eventually to a social crisis, with capitalism’s incentives eroding morals and creating conditions ripe for socialist revolution—an impulse building at the time in Europe which, Kjeldsen tells us, Nietzsche himself saw as inevitable, since the bourgeoisie’s greed and poor morals breed resentment among the masses.
To prevent the rise of socialism, the philosopher advises the bourgeoisie to live moderately and avoid provoking envy—counsels them to progressive reformism, in other words. In addition, Nietzsche advocates limiting suffrage for both the wealthy and the destitute, as both classes threatened democratic institutions within a capitalist republic, and he suggests nationalizing some economic sectors to prevent the accumulation of massive fortunes: an interesting parallel to the “AmericaNOC” discussed in our last dispatch. Altogether, Nietzsche seeks an alternative political economy that can harness capitalism while promoting cultural greatness.
For Nietzsche, though, the socialism of the 19th century didn’t fit the bill.
In “Nietzsche Contra Socialism”, Kjeldsen explains how the philosopher views socialism as driven by the same underlying impulses as capitalism: by, that is, utilitarianism, and the view of man as Homo economicus. Though the philosopher didn’t believe that socialism solved the problem of man having become an economic animal, but in fact worsened it by spreading ennui to more people, he (like Marx) nonetheless saw it as the necessary end of capitalism. However, Nietzsche warns that socialism’s promise of universal freedom can’t be realized because, in his view, people are too atomized for a socialist society. Under socialism, the philosopher holds, people would need to sacrifice their individuality, with the conversion of society into a giant production line leaving the state as the sole outlet for the Nietzschean will to power—the driving force within individuals and all living things, representing an inherent desire for self-expression, self-enhancement, and the pursuit of one’s potential to overcome challenges and achieve dominance over one’s environment—and with society and culture stagnating as a result.
Interestingly, Kjeldsen’s discussion gives us (at ~21:19–24:18), while delineating Nietzsche’s critique of the value system underlying both capitalism and socialism, a potential comparison between the Übermensch and the “New Soviet Man” that emerged as an element of Soviet ideology in the early USSR:
By basing your entire system on painlessness as a means of measuring well-being, you’ll also minimize man’s pleasure in life[:] pleasure and displeasure are not opposites, but they’re required for one another […] notice Nietzsche says that science could be used toward either ends, which brings about a deeper issue, this view that science can answer moral problems […] someone with a Nietzschean framework might take serious issue with the elimination of suffering as the goal of our social system. I should point out that Nietzsche’s criticism here, it’s not really attacking a straw man because such moral theories have always been prominent […] I’ve mentioned people like Sam Harris and Stephen Pinker who basically offer nothing beyond what Jeremy Bentham said hundreds of years before them […] Pinker especially seems hostile to any goal for mankind that might involve transformation or exceeding the limits of humanity: he rails against both Nietzsche’s Overman and against the Soviet Union’s New Soviet Man, which he alleges was somewhat inspired by Nietzsche’s Übermensch.
As an aside, the New Soviet Man was envisioned as an idealized communist citizen who embodied qualities such as selflessness, discipline, and an unwavering commitment to the socialist cause. This vision aimed at transcending the selfish individualism associated with capitalism and instead working diligently for the collective good and contributing to the construction of a classless, communist society. The concept played a significant role in Soviet ideological propaganda as an effort at fostering a new collective consciousness and moral character.
So, again, a comparison with the Übermensch is a mixed bag: the New Soviet Man’s emphasis on overcoming the corrupt values of capitalist society fits well, but surrendering individuality, not so much. But, perhaps this accounts for some of the folklore I’ve encountered suggesting that Siegel and Shuster called their character “the Man of Steel” as a reference to Joseph Stalin, for which (to my understanding) no evidence has ever appeared.
In any case, Harris and Pinker would mostly be called defenders of capitalism. So you might wonder, how does this criticism apply and become irrelevant to Nietzsche’s understanding of socialism? […] we might first of all notice that Nietzsche argues in the passage that we read from that, in fact, there’s nothing greater that the socialists could promise their adherents but a more painless society. And so, again, it’s an issue of the value underneath the ideology, right? Not the surface-level ideological disagreements. Nietzsche sees that this is yet another attempt to more perfectly tune our political and economic system to fall into line with our utilitarian quest for well-being. And so, the socialist goal of a property-less society is based on the exact same set of values that Harris and Pinker put forward: it’s simply that the socialists point out all the limitations of the laissez-faire system, that the capitalist system has all these faults in achieving this ideal.
Once again, Kjeldsen tells us, Nietzsche advocates escaping the capitalist/socialist dialectic by seeking challenge on new frontiers rather than through political idealism. However, insofar as historic examples of fascist ideology represent idealist articulations justifying authoritarianism and political oppression, we find also that Kjledsen’s reading of Nietzsche agrees with those of Roberts-Harry and of Schwartz, as described above: he rejects the premises underpinning Nazism and, for that matter, those of fascist ideologies more broadly.
Kjeldsen’s “Nietzsche Contra Fascism” provides an in-depth review of Nietzsche’s critiques of nationalism, antisemitism, racism, and the idolization of the state, which together (in the popular understanding of capitalist republics, at least) form the core principles of fascism that the philosopher’s critics have accused him of supporting.
I ought to note here that, for his understanding of fascism, Kjeldsen draws strongly (at ~4:52–5:54) not on the work of R. Palme Dutt or any other communist thinker, but instead on that—more familiar—of Umberto Eco:
Under fascism, […] the state […] invests its institutions with control over its citizens that would have been unthinkable in past ages. And the state becomes the be-all-end-all of the whole movement […] Fascism appeals, as Umberto Eco argues in his Ur-Fascism (1995) […] to the middle classes, to the people who feel most precarious, who feel humiliated and threatened by pressure from the lower classes […] it thrives, above all, on feelings of national identity, which imparts an identity to the person who otherwise has none, nothing distinguishing or special about him which he may celebrate or take pride in. Fascism therefore addresses this by allowing him to celebrate his greatness as part of a nation or an ethnicity.
That understanding both contrasts and complements those theories of fascism’s definition and origins presented above and in past dispatches. In an effort to synthesize the two, we might say that, during a capitalist crisis, fascism arises when a liberal democratic government shifts its economic, military, and domestic law enforcement policies so that private interests receive increased investment from state coffers while social welfare budgets and labor movements get kneecapped, and shifts its propaganda to institute a program of cultural austerity persuading the (unrepresented) middle and lower classes to accept their diminished political and economic standing in exchange for the cultivated identity of membership in the nationalist project.
Interestingly, Kjeldsen reports (at ~23:53–25:33) that Nietzsche’s adherence to Lamarckianism, the same early theory of evolution mentioned in Google’s “The Selfish Ledger” (2016), put the philosopher in opposition to theories of racial supremacy that frequently characterize fascist ideologies:
Nietzsche’s reasons for wanting a mixing of races, it's somewhat fascinating, it’s because he held to a now kind of obscure theory of evolution […] Nietzsche believed in the theories of Jean Baptiste Lamarck […] in Human, All Too Human, Section 592, Nietzsche echoes the hypothesis of Lamarck that a human being could be somehow endowed through their genetics with a certain set of skills or attributes inherited from one’s ancestors. So, Nietzsche writes, “It is reasonable to develop further the talent that one’s father or grandfather worked hard at and not switch to something entirely new. Otherwise one is depriving himself of the chance to attain perfection in some one craft” […] Lamarckianism has basically been rejected by the scientific community today, but it’s worth noting that Nietzsche’s intuitions may have been at least partially correct, insofar as the study of epigenetics has suggested that certain traits or skills might be brought out by an individual’s environment or upbringing.
One wonders if Nietzsche could have ever imagined the same evolutionary theory inspiring the design of a fascist mechanism for subverting personal sovereignty, as it has with Google. Because, of course, he rejects the founding premises of known fascist ideologies. Kjeldsen goes into staggering detail about Nietzsche’s antipathy for antisemitism as a resentful belief not based on rational analysis, and explains further (at ~1:16:52–1:18:31) why the philosopher’s opposition to fascists extends beyond Nazis:
Perhaps nowhere is Nietzsche’s far more negative view of the state put forward in starker terms than in that well known chapter of Thus Spoke Zarathustra entitled “The New Idol”. And here Nietzsche writes of everything he sees in the modern state that seems to be inevitably pushing toward a fascistic worship of state power as the new idol of mankind. I’ll read from it here in abridged form[:] “A state? What is that? Well, open now your ears unto me, for now I will say unto you my word concerning the death of peoples. A state is called the coldest of all cold monsters, coldly lieth it also, and this lie creepeth from its mouth: ‘I, the state, am the people.’ It is a lie […] The state, where the slow suicide of all is called ‘life.’ Towards the throne they all strive. It is their madness, as if happiness sat on the throne” […] So the Nietzschean argument applies just as much to any form of authoritarian fascism as it does to the Nazis, that the reification of the state into the highest value is the slow suicide of life.
Accordingly, while Nietzsche’s differences with Mussolini (and with other fascists less interested in racial supremacy) may be harder to distinguish than those he has with Hitler, the philosopher would nonetheless oppose a system like Mussolini’s—or any system merging state and corporate power over the population and the economy—for diminishing the range and quality of life experiences available to its people through the mandated idolization of the state and the false consecration of membership in the nationalist project.
Kjeldsen goes on (at ~1:19:42–1:21:41) to articulate further why the philosopher sees fascism—and, indeed, other statist political and economic systems—as diminishing the quality of cultural life for those living under it:
what he’s saying here is that the state will naturally become the receptacle for this struggle for power and for the control of the moral ideas of the majority […] this is particularly true in the democratic era […] where the political order no longer represents this divinely sanctioned hierarchy, this unquestionable distribution of power, but this battleground in contest for the acquisition of power […] with the will of the greatest majority as the driving force. And as the state therefore swells in power, as politics infects every aspect of human life and makes itself synonymous with the people itself […] the entire purpose of the state, which is to allow mankind’s cultural life to flourish and develop—which is its value to mankind—that ultimately becomes null and void at this point, because at the point when the state begins to smother culture and stifle its further development, when it begins to make all questions settled, when it makes revolution and reform unthinkable, when it begins to restrict artistic expression within certain parameters of acceptability, when it begins to make itself the enemy of culture […] aligning [itself] against culture, against the production of great individuals, against art and individuality as such.
With Nietzsche’s opposition to seeing such limits imposed on the individual, I feel even more confident now in Roberts-Harry and Schwartz assessments of Superman as a response and rebuttal to the Nazi’s corrupted ideological Overman. But beyond that, I’m even beginning to wonder: had Siegel and Shuster known of Nietzsche’s emphasis on the individual over the state, might they have considered his Übermensch more palatable as an influence on their champion of (formerly) “Truth, Justice, and the American Way”?
As I’ve tried demonstrating a few times now, exploring the intricate web of political ideologies, philosophical underpinnings, and their manifestation in popular culture, provides a nuanced understanding of the complexities inherent in societal structures, particularly through the lens of superhero narratives. The relationship between superhero narratives and political ideologies is rich and multi-faceted. Superheroes—in this manner, embodying Nietzschean ideals of self-overcoming—challenge societal norms and offer a symbolic representation of the human aspiration for greatness. However, the co-opting of Nietzsche’s philosophy by different political ideologies, whether fascist or capitalist, raises questions about the malleability of philosophical concepts to serve varied agendas.
That, I believe, further underscores the the responsibility of storytellers to authentically represent the complexities of the real world, with an emphasis on the importance of critically engaging with narratives, and of recognizing their potential to shape perspectives on political and societal structures. The interplay between philosophy, politics, and popular culture remains a fascinating area of exploration, urging individuals to navigate the nuanced terrain of ideas and their impact on collective consciousness. The efforts of Siegel and Shuster—to craft Superman in a such manner as to subvert and repurpose the oppressive figure of a fascist supremacist styled (unfaithfully) after Nietzsche’s Übermensch to convey instead a message of morality, compassion, and heroism—go a long way toward demonstrating the potential an audience has for rearranging the elements of what political and philosophical frameworks operate in our world through the narratives that the members of this audience create on their own.
Perhaps, then, we might find in the work Siegel and Shuster a model for (some of) what Nietzsche hoped to symbolize in the Übermensch: for overcoming the constraints imposed on us through society’s traditional and popular narratives.