'As usual, Salon sucks': Amanda Marcotte decries 'douchey libertarian' Captain America

Sarah D. | 5:55 PM on May 06, 2016

SOUNDS LIKE YOU HATE AMERICA. https://t.co/6Qk8YVAcP9

— Julie Borowski (@JulieBorowski) May 6, 2016

Seriously. Is there anything Amanda Marcotte doesn’t hate?

Captain America’s a douchey libertarian now: Why did Marvel have to ruin Steve Rogers? https://t.co/5q9dKickLN

— Salon (@Salon) May 6, 2016

How could Marvel do this to Chris Evans?! https://t.co/5UVcDi50EV

— Salon (@Salon) May 6, 2016

Captain America’s a douchey libertarian now: Why did Marvel have to ruin Steve Rogers? https://t.co/BKGqn1CnYu

— Salon (@Salon) May 6, 2016

https://twitter.com/AmandaMarcotte/status/728607764910583809

Oh, by all means. Let’s hear more about Captain America’s betrayal:

Most corporate blockbuster movies would cave into the temptation to make the character some kind of generic, apolitical “patriot,” abandoning the comic tradition that has painted him as a New Deal Democrat standing up consistently for liberal values. Instead, in both the first movie and in “Captain America: Winter Soldier,” we get Steve the liberal: Anti-racist, anti-sexist, valuing transparency in government and his belief that we the people should hold power instead of some unaccountable tyrants who believe might makes right.

…

The demands being made by various governments and the United Nations in “Civil War” are more than reasonable. They want the Avengers to stop being a privately run paramilitary organization that answers to no one. They want them to sign a treaty agreeing to transparency and some government oversight. This is common sense and what we would expect the standard liberal position to be in a world where superheroes exist.

…

The worst part is that there was no need for any of this. The Sokovia Accords plot could have been lifted right out of the movie and it wouldn’t have changed the plot much, if at all. On the contrary, it would have simplified the plot a little, making it a story about Steve protecting a wrongly accused man from facing execution without trial (which is very much in line with the liberalism of the character). Instead, we have this distracting plot where Steve suddenly turns from a level-headed liberal to a Ayn Randian libertarian douchebag who throws tantrums because he has to do grown-up stuff like share power instead of make unilateral decisions for other people. It was a betrayal of the character and made the movie less fun than it should have been.