Nouspique

Writings, Reviews, Cultural Criticism

Menu
  • 2020: Journal of a Plague Year
  • 2021: Year of the Jab
  • Cream & Sugar
  • Nouspique: 10 Years a Blog
  • Sex With Dead People
  • The Land
  • The Virgin’s Nose
  • About
  • Contact
Menu

We All Are Superman

Posted on April 1, 2020October 16, 2022 by David Barker
Crossing College Street, Toronto

I was photographing people at a busy intersection when I heard an exchange a bit to my left and behind me. It was an exchange between a homeless man and a middle-aged pedestrian waiting for the light to change.

Homeless Man: Got any change?
Middle-Aged Man: No.
Homeless Man: Fuck you!
Middle-Aged Man: Pardon me?
Homeless Man: I said Fuck you!
Middle-Aged Man: You asked if I have any change. I don’t. So I said no.
Homeless Man: Oh. Well. Fuck you, anyways!

A standard question during a psychiatric intake interview is: Do you ever feel that the people around you can read your mind? I wonder if our cultural habits have rendered this question obsolete. The question assumes that (normal) people have a private life they hold apart from their public life. That private/public dualism is part of the enduring appeal of the superhero genre. We like Superman because, most of the time, he’s an ordinary schmuck like the rest of us. We identify with him because we, too, have a secret identity and it is a source of strength: If only you knew who I really am …

I wonder if this private/public dualism is eroding. More and more, I encounter people who say what they think and hold nothing back. Does social media encourage this? Does a shameless world leader give people tacit permission to bare everything? I suppose certain categories of people have always behaved this way—sainted fools and sociopaths. But I wonder if more and more ordinary people—the sort of people who enjoy the Superman story—have decided to ditch the glasses and self-deprecating manner and, instead, have chosen to wear the cape all the time and to hell with what anybody else thinks of them.

Search

Categories

  • Elbow
  • Hands
  • Head
  • Heart
  • Spleen

Tags

Advertising (26) America (38) Black & White (129) Books (329) Canada (43) CanLit (80) Covid-19 (63) Cultural Criticism (50) Death (27) Fiction (77) Graffiti (40) Homeless (26) Humour (51) Justice (27) Media (26) Mental Health (29) Movies (27) Night Photography (27) Non-fiction (43) Novels (118) Ontario (39) People (51) Philosophy (26) Photography (53) Poems (87) Poetry (131) Politics (63) Pop Culture (50) Protest (28) Publishing (24) Reading (26) Reflection (27) Religion (111) Review (221) Satire (52) Scotland (28) Story (89) Street Art (30) Street Photography (170) Suburbia (27) Technology (54) Toronto (228) Travel (42) Urban (62) Writing (43)

Recent Comments

  • Ross Macdonald on Percy Saltzman Dies, Leaves Questionable Blog
  • Eric Allen Montgomery on William Gibson’s Jackpot Trilogy: The Peripheral
  • David Barker on AI Generated Poetry: My Love Sonnet to Donald Trump
  • David Barker on So What’s the Skinny on Ozempic?
  • Lydia Burton on So What’s the Skinny on Ozempic?
©2025 Nouspique