Jewish American Heritage Month

Posted By richards on June 9, 2017

Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman. (Photo: Warner Bros/Nino Munoz)

Though Im not by any means an expert oranything, I was a historical consultant for one of the better documentaries out there on Wonder Woman, released long before there was even the hint of any hope for a Wonder Woman filma role I began in 2008 for a film released in 2012. Thats not to validate the opinion that follows here, just to convey the fact that Ive been thinking about Wonder Woman for quite some time. In fact, even much longer than that. The first comic trade paperback I ever read was probably the first publication that could rightly be called suchGloria Steinems collected Golden Age Wonder Woman stories published in a bound volume of comic book-sized dimensions in the 1970s. Steinem considered the 40s to be the most feminist Wonder Woman iteration, when the comic was still authored by creator, William Moulton Marston.

Wonder Woman gracing her first cover on the January issue of Sensation Comics, 1942. (Photo: Dibner Library/NMAH, SI)

Marston was an unapologetic visionary quack of the period. He had an open marriage with two women who co-parented his children, he invented a version of the lie detector, he was a not-very-closeted bondage fan, he probably believed in Orgones. But Marston also wanted to create an antidote to violent, misogynist superheroes, and I think most people would think he was at least mildly successful in creating Wonder Woman, who used violence sparingly and brought a message of love and harmony to mans world. Yes, there was Etta Candy and questionable spankings, there was unfortunate objectification and stereotyping. But Marstons vision for Wonder Woman was wonderfully surreal, fun, and proto-feminist.

I remember being a nine-year-old boy at the library getting lost in Marstons absurdist larger than life narratives and villains, many of whom were misogynist archetypes put in Princess Dianas way for rhetorical slaying purposes [Dr. Psycho, being my favorite]. I loved Wonder Woman: the way she was drawn at that time, all sinew and modest star-spangled skirt and her just out of the salon coiffure of curly hair that reminded me of my sister. Her reasonable attitude that men were cool as long as they admitted she was their superior. Like many boys, I imagine, and girls, I enjoyed watching the extremely honky Steve Trevor being regularly humbled by her. My favorite Wonder Woman scene of all time, in fact, is the image of Steve Trevor happily breaking a magical device that had imbued him temporarily with superhuman strength surpassing even Dianas after she flatly told him they could never be together if he was physically stronger than her.

I could go on and on about Wonder Woman, and her many evolutions and devolutions, the loss of her powers and ambition, the permanent straightening of her curly coiffure. One day Im going to write the definitive argument that Nuyorican writer/artist George Perez is the only author since Marston who brought the character to life as a feminist icon and underdog witha personal life that revolved around other women, not just Steve Trevor and the sausage factory at the Justice League Satellite. And definitely, Perez knew like I knew that Wonder Woman was a person of color, no matter what Marston imagined. But thats not what the following piece is about, as you may have guessed.

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I was not one of the people excited to see Wonder Woman brought to the screen. By 2017, the film franchises have made a gross joke out of the superheroes they reify in film, so that my common reaction to almost any such announcement is discomfort and boredom. But I did look forward to a mildly entertaining film series. I also understood the cultural impact of having a female superhero burst through the celluloid ceiling after many years sucked into the maw of conventional wisdom about what kind of movies people [a term which for these purposes excludes women and people of color] will watch. Then Gal Gadot was cast in the role.

I have seen very little written about the casting of an avowed Zionist as Wonder Woman, until recently, and even now, theres precious little commentary about it. Im saddened to see a narrative franchise Ive loved from childhood sullied by direct immersion in anti-Palestinian bloodlust, yeah. But this isnt my first rodeo by a long shot. Ive lost track of how many times a narrative Ive enjoyed has found a way to needlessly insert Israel into the mix, and further trumpet the nations skill at subjugating Palestinian trolls and goblins. There is often very little narrative logic to including Israelis in a movie or text, it just seems to be something exotic and hyper-martial to add to a story when a writer is in a slump.

Fables comic, volume 8, references Israel. (Image: DC Comics/ComicPow.com)

The most memorable instance of this dynamic for me, the world-class championship winner of sticking in Israel when there is no conceivable plot necessity was in the comic Fables, about fairy tale characters come to life and living in Manhattan. The absurd way Israels excellence at killing Palestinians was woven into a substantive part of that narrative has always astounded me.

But lets be honest. That speaks more to the dominance of the Zionist narrative in American culture. Its a barometer of the good struggle, machismo, moral certitude and smarmy sentimentality. Israel as the Superman-like Solomon, dispensing unerring just terror from above, is part of the mainstream American ideology in this godforsaken nation of bigots, and I have given up fighting that on a day to day level for sanitys sake.

So, no, my problem really isnt just that Gadot is an Israeli, an IDF veteran and an enthusiastic cheerleader for Israels habit of cutting the grass in Palestine by murdering children and destroying entire cities with missiles. Just like the surprising number of all types of films and texts that portray killing Palestinians as a happy and wonderful thingthings that I often overlook in moviesmany of my favorite films are helmed by or star people with horrendous qualities and ideology. I dont mind Sylvester Stallone for example, or Mel Gibson, and I will literally watch any movie with Tom Cruise in it. The presence of Scarlet Johanson has never prevented me from watching, and being disappointed by, an Avengers movie.

Black Panther: A Nation Under Our Feet, Book 1, released September 13, 2016, by Ta-Nehisi Coates, illustrated by Brian Stelfreeze. (Photo: Marvel)

What has bothered me, however, is the uncritical acceptance of the person of Gadot as a feminist icon on the left. My Twitter timeline, for example, is awash in woke folks experiencing memetic orgasms over Gadot, photos of queer and women cosplay inspired by her characterization in the film, hilarity ensuing over fanboy backlash at womens only screenings. The almost unified left-wing disinterest in Gadots anti-Palestinian warmongering has been a source of frustration obviously. But its also been a continuation for me of a disappointing trend that began with the celebration of Ta-Nehisi Coates taking over the Black Panther comic.

Dont get me wrong, Im uncomfortable even suggesting that womenand especially Black women and menshould have to interrogate their heroes in those rare moments when a Black or female superhero makes it on to screen. I am not trying to establish a checklist that has to be satisfied before you can enjoy a race or gender champion brought to the silver screen. But I think a larger question centers around Zionisms compatibility with both feminism and Black empowerment. This is a question that is, unfortunately, much more frequently brought up by Zionists who also identify as leftists, who seek to marginalize Pro-Palestinian positions as the square peg in a discourse of liberation.

Recent controversies and articles around the anti-Trump womens march and the constant criticism of pro-Palestinian positions taken in the course of Black Lives Matters actions stand out as typical of this dynamic. Zionists go on the offensive, asking if its really okay to include Palestinians as members of the fraternity of the colonized and oppressed, since they are all, you know, awful. And, unfortunately, its the mainstream left that often leave the opposite argument unspoken, and Zionisms toxic ideology unexamined when it comes into play over Black and gender discourses and activism. Gadot and Coates are perfect examples in that latter group of Zionist support in the terrain of ideological heavy-lifting comic book characters.

Gal Gadot Facebook post during the 2014 Gaza war.

In both cases, Gadot and Coates have been unapologetic and open about their support of anti-Palestinian violence. During Operation Protective Edge, Gadot, just cast as Wonder Woman, used her new platform to defend direct attacks on civilians, including women and children. Gadot celebrated Israeli propaganda that every such casualty was Hamas fault for storing weapons close to them in the most densely populated open-air prison camp on earth. The most frustrating thing to me is how obviously this invalidates Gadot as a feminist icon, and Wonder Woman as well, when the character is brought to life by Gadot. If gender is shared by all racial groups, feminism cannot be Zionist, just as it cannot be neo-Nazifeminism that doesnt have an understanding of how it intersects with racial and ethnic oppression is simply a diversification of white supremacy.

Coates is perhaps even worse than Gadot, with a host of publicly expressed enthusiasms for Zionism. German reparations to Israel for the holocaustwhich were deliberately directed to Israels colonial project in Palestineare a central rubric of Coates proposed methodology for African-American reparations. Coates, in fact, introduced the idea co-jointly with his editor at the Atlantic Monthly, Jeffrey Goldberg. Goldberg, an Iraq war supporter and Islamophobe is also a rabid Zionist. Two decades ago, Goldberg traveled to Israel to live a vicarious life of bigotry and violence as an IDF guard in a prison for Palestinians arrested for violations of Israeli martial law. Coates made sure the world knew that his relationship with Goldberg was not just professional, that of an editor and journalist, or even colleagues who see eye to eye on a thing or two. Rather, Coates fondly recalls his regular family breakfasts with an unindicted war criminal in warm tones during an interview with Goldberg for the Atlantic a few years ago.

Gal Gadot poses for Maxim magazine, in a special Women of the Israeli Defense Forces feature, seen here in an event for Israels Ministry of Foreign Affairs. (Image: Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs)

Again, this is not a commentary on the value of the narrative behind Gadots Wonder Woman or Coates Black Panther, nor Gadots acting prowess, or the strength of Coates observations about the Black experience of U.S. oppression. Instead, its an open question about whether its possible to support Zionism while also proposing useful iterations of feminism and racial justice.

Is it possible to openly call for the death of women in a neighboring state, to support a political and economic regime that without a doubt contributes to their subjugation both at the hands of Israel, and in Palestinian society, and still be a feminist? And can one use the funding of European colonialism in historical Palestine as a viable blueprint for African-American reparations and not lose something inherent to racial justice in the process? This is more than just an issue of being ignorant to intersectionality because the left-wing audience I am talking about is comfortable and familiar with ideas around intersectionality. I guess Im asking if Palestinians even rate high enough on the scale of human beings to be seen as worthy of intersecting with. So far, from what Im seeing, I dont like the answer.

This article was originally published on Jaime Omar Yassins blog here, on June 3, 2017.

See more here:
Intersectional feminism: Wonder Woman, Palestinians, Wakanda and Zionism - Mondoweiss

Category: Zionism
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