An early Superman comic
James Gunn’s Superman film has upset the Make America Great Again right. Gunn believes that “Superman is the story of America”.
“An immigrant that came from other places” who stands for “basic human kindness”. Gunn also insists his film is “about morality and politics”.
Part of the film depicts Superman intervening to defend the imaginary country of Jarhanpur from imperialist aggression by the fictitious Boravia.
The depiction of besieged refugee camps in the film have led some to see a parallel with Israel’s genocide in Gaza insisting the film is “pro-Palestinian”.
Others have seen it as a thinly disguised reference to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
A film about a undocumented migrant from the planet Krypton who helps the oppressed has, predictably, enraged numerous pundits on Fox News. They ridiculed the film as “Superwoke”.
And the far right Republican representative Burgess Owens took to social media to say, “Read the room—the United States is fed up with arrogance, indoctrination, and anti-US propaganda.”
All of which proves the US far right have never read a Superman comic.
The character has been a social justice warrior since 1938. Superman’s creators, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, were both children of Jewish migrants to the US and Canada from Lithuania and Ukraine.
They grew up during the Great Depression as left wing radicals who were against racism, fascism, poverty and US’s complacent political elite. Siegel would later say, “I had the great urge to help the downtrodden masses, somehow.
“How could I help them when I could barely help myself? Superman was the answer.” There’s a lot of truth in the claim by historian Paul S Hirsch that Siegel and Shuster’s Superman was “essentially a violent socialist”.
He took on corrupt politicians, capitalists, war-mongers and slum landlords.
In February 1940 a story featured Superman taking on Hitler and Stalin led to Das Scharze Korps, the weekly paper of the SS, denouncing Superman. It said his creators were spreading “hate, suspicion, evil, laziness, and criminality” among US children.
This is the tradition that those condemning “Superwokery” stand in.
The MAGA right have a saying, “Go woke, go broke.”
It’s a lie. James Gunn’s Superman cost over £170 million to make. It took over £190 million in just five days.
Read the room MAGA-supporters and billionaires —the US is fed up with your arrogance, indoctrination and anti-migrant propaganda.
Sasha Simic
A visual archive of working class struggles
Steve McQueen’s exhibition Resistance presents a powerful visual archive of political activism spanning over a century.
It brings together works by a range of photographers who have in common their documentation of working class struggles and movements for justice, unity and liberation.
The exhibition is curated partly in chronological order and partly according to key social and political movements.
Many of the photographs on display feel urgently current. Without context, they could be mistaken for images taken today.
Their timelessness speaks to the enduring nature of the fight against injustice.
The exhibition opens with the suffragette movement, captured at a time when photography was still an emerging medium.
A striking section of the exhibition focuses on anti-racism. One photograph on display is from the Battle of Lewisham in 1977, taken by an unknown photographer.
It shows members of the far right National Front surrounded by a sea of Union Jacks and heavily guarded by police.
The photographs take us on a journey many of us have already been on, or recognise, but that doesn’t make them any less important or impactful.
Instead it reflects the persistent resistance of working class people against the capitalist system.
Olive Whigham
- At the National Galleries of Scotland until Sunday 4 January 2026
