If SuperHeroes With Superpower and Abilities Existed Why Would They Necessarily be Selfless and on the Side of Right ?

[BAYLOR]

You have a bunch of powerful superheroes with the amazing abilities the average human does not possess . If such beings existed, would they necessarily be on our side? They could in theory leverage their powers for enrichment personal gain and absolute political power and in effect rule the world . Why would we make the assumption that they would by necessity be good guys?

" power corrupts and absolute power corrupt absolutely "
Lord John Acton

Do you think Lord John Acton's quote applies here?

Thoughts?

 

[Keldaris]

Some would abuse their powers some wouldn't. In real life some people become Cops, some become criminals, and some become both. In the world of comics we see this all the time, Super Heroes and Super Villains.

We also see characters that use their hero status for personal gain, Booster Gold is a prime example. He stole a power suit and a time travel device to travel to modern day from the future. Sure he fights against alongside the good guys but he does it for wealth and fame. Doing commercials, Sponsorships,Talk shows etc.

You would likely see a similar distribution between good/neutral/evil as you would with non powered people.
some people would become heroes,some would become villiains, some would profit, and others would just go about their lives. Most people would fall into that last category, Maybe a better job where your talents can be put to some use, maybe impress that cute girl/guy, maybe just be a bit more arrogant/cocky/dickish,

Now if you're interested in what a world where superheroes all abuse their powers, check out Garth Ennis' comic The Boys. It's full of drugs,sex, and debauchery. It's well written and has several surprising twists. I highly recommend it.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

They're not -- there are more supervillains than there are superheroes. But the ones called heroes are the good ones, regardless.

 

[Anthoney]

there are more supervillains than there are superheroes

The superpowers tempt more than would normally turn out to be bad. That's also why so many police of various flavors are jerks. Not all but a higher than average number. Of course there will be those that are grey rather than good or bad.

 

[farntfar]

It can just a question of boredom.

Once you've become incredibly rich and powerful, and you control all the baddies in the neighbourhood, there's not much else to do except sit in a spherical chair and stroke you cat, or else move to Eddor and wait for the next galactic collision.
So some turn to being good for something to do.

The Spider, in the Lion comic in the 60s is a case in point. He began as a super villain and became a super hero when he got bored with villainy because it was too easy.

Of course for some it's just a problem of their name. Superman and Wonderwoman just don't work as villainous names, and Bicycle Repairman is right out. Similarly, though, Zod would be a dreadful name for a super hero, so he just ran with what he'd got. (I blame the parents!)

 

[EdLincoln]

No. That kind of the plot of Brandon Sanderson's "Steelheart".

Even in the "Standard Model" comic universe, there are more super villains then superheroes...it's just that the superheroes are the viewpoint characters. Also they always tend to win in the end. (Perhaps the biggest implausibility)

 

[tinkerdan]

I would think a bigger issue would be with those who don't do anything with the talents that they have.

They just try to live normal lives and use their powers to show up on time, bring in donuts, make the coffee, and become a living compendium of everything esoteric within the company and perhaps even the history of the entire company and pretty much know where everything is or should be so that other people can get their job done.


Alright: maybe they do some awesome things but they aren't out there stopping crime.

 

[Robert Zwilling]

I guess this is a comic book world we are talking about. On this planet, in this day and age, a reasonable argument based on morals would define a good guy as some one who is so deprived of everything that no matter what they do they can't be held responsible for what happens to anyone else. Above that level the grayness starts in, starts with simple things, like how a person can be spending money they legally earned that can be traced back to a dictators bank account who spent the money to get more frequent flying miles points. Pushing the ill gotten gains through the system making it nice and clean. As you rise up the view gets darker as you amass more power than comes from a common pool that is bigger than anyone can imagine.

Ancient gods style.
You always need enough good guys to keep existence in existence. Once there are too many bad guys, they run out of things to plunder outside of their own realms, so they start to plunder each other. That leads to wholesale destruction because of the massive powers that are leveraged to win no matter what the consequences may lead to which of course leads to an empty existence until life starts over again.

On a mechanical level
After the last star is eaten by a black hole there is only one way that can turn out. The stars have to be created faster than the black holes can eat them.

 

[BAYLOR]

The movie Brightburn comes to mind .

 

[Anthoney]

The Boys does a great job with this subject.

 

[Foxbat]

Power would definitely corrupt me. If I had the power to rid the universe of everybody I considered to be dicks then I'd definitely be a supervillain. No doubt about it.

 

[Venusian Broon]

Power would definitely corrupt me. If I had the power to rid the universe of everybody I considered to be dicks then I'd definitely be a supervillain. No doubt about it.

Yeah but if the people you got rid of were generally bad, you'd sort of be a superhero, right?

Talking about moral quandries and superheros: Darth Vader.

So he throws a warlock, admittedly very evil and powerful down a shaft and is redeemed by the good side instantly, yet he personally killed thousands of good people, and was a major factor in the deaths of millions, enslavement, etc.

No purgatory even? Just instantly becomes a (younger!) force ghost!

Smacks, of course, of Catholic confession etc. But I've never understood that either.

 

[Foxbat]

Yeah but if the people you got rid of were generally bad, you'd sort of be a superhero, right?

Dagnabbit! I never thought of that! I'm a goodie twoshoes after all