July 6, 2016

My Final Frame - Millennials and the Dialectic of the Superhero

This will be my last entry to this blog.  I’m not going anywhere, and nothing is wrong, but this medium has reached a rather evident end of effectiveness in an age dominated by streaming video and podcasts.  I’ve not posted for years now due in part to forces beyond my control, and I don’t anticipate being able to recreate a schedule that works to regularly update this space. But having said that, I’m unsatisfied that my previous de facto “final-entry” was so current events oriented and now serves as a dated reference to what feels like another era.  A lot has happened in the intervening years personally, professionally, and socio-culturally and I think I finally found something to say that will leave a better final mark than the old and tired debate over video-game violence.  It is my hope that what I present here will be a fitting finale to One Frame of Mind.

Before we begin, though, I need to hang one final disclaimer over the proceedings.  I am a self-identified Caucasian, heterosexual, cis-gendered, man.  I’ve referenced each of these in passing in previous posts, but for the matter I wish to discuss, I believe it’s important that I acknowledge that everything I say is unavoidably influenced by those perspectives.  I do not consider myself confined to these characteristics (as I’m sure would be true of most, if not all, of you), but I cannot deny that my experience of the circumstances discussed below may be a byproduct of them.  Having said all of that, I sincerely hope that what I offer here will resonate with you and maybe even help you understand your circumstances with greater clarity.  More after the jump.

Let us consider an old question from my youth and, likely, many of your childhoods as well: 
“If you could have any super power, what would it be?”