Why Everything you Think about Captain America is Wrong
An article by Joanna M. Richter
In the past month, I have seen more people claiming Captain America as a mouthpiece for causes he never would have approved of, much less endorsed, than I have seen my own face in a mirror. And considering that I have mirrors in five of the six rooms in my house, that's an accomplishment, though not one to be proud of. I was very much prepared to put down an essay of epic proportions to argue my point, but I know that the people who really needed to read it wouldn't get past my first paragraph, so I'll try to keep this from becoming a novel.
Before Steve Rogers was accepted into the government military program that would turn him into Captain America, he was a poor son of an Irish immigrant, living in a historically very gay neighbor hood in Brooklyn, raised by a single mother, who stood 5'4 and barely 100 lbs, and suffered from a laundry list of ailments that would have made an already difficult life even harder. It was reported by a number of sources in various interviews before and after his disappearance that before the serum, it was a common thing for him to pick fights over anything from talking in a movie theater, to manhandling a woman, to- hold your screams- insulting gays, even when he didn't have a chance of winning. And that's just the beginning- I plan to go over each of these in detail, and I'll probably throw in more information as I go because it feels relevant.
Shall I compare thee to a Medical Miracle? Let me count the ways; According to the Captain America Exhibit and a few pieces of information from several biographies and fact books from the local library, Steve Rogers had a list of ailments longer than he was tall. For starters, he had astigmatism, and colorblindness(this was listed under several types, but the most commonly listed was trichromatic colorblindness) which would have made his art considerably harder than someone with 20/20 vision. He had scoliosis- the malformation of the spine, which would have been noticeable in his stance and his walk. He was also partially deaf, which would have made just carrying a conversation a hassle- It's a bit impressive that he could hear all the people being offensive that he got into fights with. Oh, and life wasn't done with him at that- He had Arrhythmia, Heart Palpitations, Angina, and the mantle of 'generic heart problems' along with high blood pressure. Any one of these would have limited someone in this day and age to considerably less activity, especially unsupervised, but he had to handle it without the luxury of regular treatment or lazy days when everyone was perfectly fine with him not being up and about, and he carried on like a champion of devil-may-care Olympics. Continuing down the list, he at one point caught rheumatic fever, which was commonly lethal, and treated with aspirin, which, unfortunately for Little Steve Rogers, would have been very rough on his Chronic Stomach Ulcers, and at another point in his earlier childhood he went down with Scarlet Fever. Still not cringing with sympathy? How about the fact that he had Pernicious Anemia, which was at the time only treatable by eating Raw Liver, or drinking Raw Liver Juice. And no, not just a bite here and there- to make up for what his body wasn't making, he would have had to eat half a pound of raw liver every day, or alternately drink more than a pint of juice, both of which would have been expensive to keep up with for a boy/man that would have had trouble finding and keeping a job in the first place, so he probably wasn't getting his requirements, which by some miracle, also didn't kill him. Throw on top of all that that he had Sinusitis, Chronic Migraines, and Asthma(which by all means should have disqualified him from military service at all, and stopped him five times before Dr. Erskine came into the picture), even without the country-wide internalized eugenics that would have made him a huge target for violence and hatred, and I can promise you that anyone else wouldn't have made it to Eighteen.
To summarize, Steve Rogers had a very rough time of growing up, and he would not have discriminated against citizens because they were unhealthy, poor, or disabled. Or, as a number of rich white men who don't support government assistance programs refer to them, "People who Leech off the System." Because before he was the Captain, he was one of them.
"Captain America would have strongly disapproved of the Feminist Movement." Only, he actually would have approved, probably very strongly, because his single mother struggled to provide for him, and if he had been raised instead by a single father, their money problems would have been, while not solved, considerably diminished. "Captain America would have agreed that Women belong in the home, like they were in his day." Only, they weren't. During World War II, with all the men being shipped off to the war, it was those "housewives" who stepped up and took jobs in factories and on docks, who did all the hard labor to keep our country from collapsing, who built the guns, and bullets, and tanks, and mines, that our soldiers were using over seas. And it wasn't just a burden, 'oh the men told us to' job, they did well, and they enjoyed it. "Captain America was a good, Christian man, and he would have condemned your homosexual ways." Only he kind of never has- note the whole "historically gay neighborhood" and fighting people for insulting gays comments above. Steve Rogers knew people, and he fought to protect them from everyone who thought they could get away with mistreating them. One interview with Peggy Carter in 1952 is known to have her reciting a quote she'd heard from Mr. Rogers himself- "I don't like bullies, I don't care where they're from."
In short, Steve Rogers was a very open, very kind, very honest person, and he if he would have condemned anything, it would be the mistreatment and judgmental oppression of anyone society deemed abnormal. He never hated people for how they lived, unless the way they lived hurt people.
A common misconception about Captain America is that he is the embodiment of our country. Captain America is a symbol of what America aspires to be- The American Dream, where anyone can live the life they chose if they work for it. But Captain America isn't just a puppet, or some long-dead legend that can be retold to fit whatever dubious moral you want more support from. Captain America is Steve Rogers, a kid from Brooklyn, who doesn't like bullies, and doesn't believe in running away from a problem. That's Present Tense, because he is still here, and he can choose where to lend his voice, unlike the supposed legends of days past. Present Tense, because the Super-Soldier Serum didn't make him want to fight to protect our country, it only gave him the power to do what he's always done- Fight Bullies- and win.
I've had a lot of people tell me that I've invested too much in trying to change peoples minds about who Captain America really is. But the one thing none of them understand is that I know, I know, with every fiber of my being, that he would be leading the Human Rights Revolution. I know he would, because I look at him, and I see myself. I look at him, and I see the sickly kid who wouldn't let anything, not bullies, or a judgmental and hateful society, or his socioeconomic status, or even his own broken, battered body stop him from standing up for what's right. I look at him, and I see everything I have ever wanted to be, and everything I have ever wanted to see in this country.
From another sick, poor, immigrants-child Brooklyn kid, I think we need to stop looking for Captain America to take our side and prove us right, and start looking for Steve Rogers, underneath all that star-spangled propaganda that has buried him over the decades, and what He would really think about what we're doing to the country he was willing to die to save.
Joanna is a fictional character based off of a friend of mine. This is an article she wrote in the story she is featured in, and I wanted to post it somewhere in it's entirety because it only gets snippets in the story itself.