If We Are Superheroes, Who Are The Villains?

I’ve touched on the rhetoric of superpowers before in ‘The Need For Neutrality’. Today I want to go deeper into this concept.

I encounter many neurodivergent folx describing their mindbody features as superpowers. There are a number of reasons this is unhelpful: It is used as a tool to encourage people to employ us, problematic because we are already worthy of employment and financial security without having to be ‘exceptional’. It aligns with the dehumanising rhetoric used around Black people’s strength and resilience - glamourising coping mechanisms used to survive being oppressed while not allowing for the very human traits of vulnerability and softness. Connected to this, it feeds into a superiority complex akin to white supremacy that leads to things like Aspie Supremacy - the belief by some Autistics that they are better than, smarter than, superior to ‘neurotypicals’.

If the concept doesn’t serve us within neurodiversity discourse, can the superhero concept be helpful in other contexts? I think not.

Many superheroes are depicted as white saviours - superman anyone? And in typical white-washing fashion, a being from another planet is somehow a white, cis, heterosexual man who ends up being raised in the land colonised as the United States of America… Sure. Specific (ridiculous) plot points and superheroes aside, the idea of an all powerful, benevolent being who saves us from ‘bad guys’ underpins individualism and turns us away from collective and community power. It solidifies the belief that the world is full of problems and only exceptional people can do anything about it, when the truth is that no progressive change in history has happened due to individuals, but only due to communities, movements, collectives forging change.

We call key workers superheroes. During the height of the initial COVID wave in 2020, our NHS workers were hailed as heroes, in the UK we stood on doorsteps and hung out of windows every Monday evening to clap for them… while the government kept their wages frozen at unliveable rates. The papers emblazoned the word ‘hero’ all over their front pages above photos of nurses with exhausted eyes and bruises from PPE. It was quite the propaganda campaign, and it worked. We clapped, we splashed NHS rainbows all over everything, while they navigated poverty and the catastrophic health issues brought on by inhuman hours, inadequate equipment and the life-changing nature of being continually exposed to the coronavirus.

Coming back to neurodiversity movement advocacy - if we look to the main movers and shakers in the space it’s very easy to idolise them and put them on pedestals, telling ourselves that they are exceptional and we are not, and that’s why they are successful and famous and have millions of followers on Linstatok. The main reason is actually that the majority of them are white and attractive by western beauty standards - not a superpower, but an unearned advantage created by our colonially created, societal obsession with whiteness. In addition, barely any of them, maybe none of them, are trying to dismantle white supremacy, colonialism or capitalism - so the system will allow them to succeed because they do not pose a threat to it’s existence.

If being neurodivergent makes me a superhero, who is a villain? Those pesky neurotypicals, that’s who! This is the trap. The superhero idea not only infers a villain, it requires one. The concept of good guys and bad guys, of violence as a framework, is foundational to white supremacy. If we wish to advocate for a world where we our needs are met and our mindbody features are met with neutrality and support, we must let go of all of the colonial metaphors and binary ways of thinking that keep us in the trap of inferiority and superiority.

‘Superpower’ is defined as: ‘an exceptional or extraordinary power or ability.’ Perhaps the problem is that our ideas of what is exceptional and extraordinary have been framed by colonialism and capitalism, so let me offer some alternative lenses. The incredibly rare and unlikely event of being alive is extraordinary. The gift and responsibility of being guardians of this planet, is extraordinary. The privilege of witnessing the growth and joy of ourselves and others, is exceptional. The strength, resilience and power of community, collectivism, togetherness, is exceptional.

We have never needed superheroes to save us.

We have only ever needed each other.

— AJ

Today’s Neuro-Embodiment Prompts:

Suggestions and questions to help you engage with mindbody decolonisation:

• Do you ever think of yourself as having superpowers? What are they? How can you reframe these as human traits? What fears do you have around this? How can you tend to whatever sits underneath this need?

• Where do you witness superhero discourse in your life? Who does it serve? What narrative does it reinforce? How can you interrupt and reframe it?

• Do you apply superhero/strength/resilience/gifted rhetoric to others? How can you change the language you are using? How can you shift the way you think about this person/these people to re-humanise them?

• What conversations would you like to start having with the children in your life around the concept of superheroes in popular culture? How can you help them to analyse their own relationships with these ideas?