It’s worth noting that it certainly wasn’t always like this. In fact, the reason why so many early comic creators were Jewish Americans is that, like the film industry before it, Jews couldn’t get jobs in traditional media fields with established gatekeepers.

And, wouldn’t you know it, early superheroes fought more than just “crime” back then.

For example, when Superman flew to Europe to pick up Hitler and Stalin and take them to the League of Nations.

(Before our tankie friends come barreling in talking about “centrist both-sides bullshit”, this comic was made in 1940, so Stalin and Hitler were at that time close allies invading neighbors like Finland, France, and even splitting Poland between them.)

The point is, Killmonger was right; Magneto was right; and today, most superhero comic books function as a form of propaganda where “villains” who want good things also are just faking it for money or want to blow people up for no reason, and “criminals” have to be stopped, but in the way that cops and The Punisher see criminals: a species of violent, dangerous lawbreaker that must be brought to heel.

But to repeat some head-canon: the reason why Metropolis is so nice and Gotham is not is that Superman’s secret identity is an award-winning investigative reporter, presumably because super-hearing, X-ray vision, super speed, and so on, help you get some real scoops and write them on deadline. Meanwhile, Batman’s secret identity is… a billionaire.

So fuck the police, including the ones who run around in panels and cinematic universes punching poor people and drug dealers but not their landlords or pharmaceutical companies, and who bust up “gangs” but turn them over to the most violent, well-funded gangs of all.