“Superman has gone woke! Superman represents the American way! Stop saying Superman is an immigrant!”
Superman is literally an undocumented alien refugee that was raised on another planet. He did farm work, and fought billionaires, fascists, and the klan.
Superman was written by two 1st generation Jewish-Americans, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, in the 30s. The whole “American way” wasn’t even added to his slogan until the 50s. Most earnest depictions of his character were meant to be allegories for immigrant experiences, specifically Jewish immigrants.
“Calling Superman Pro-Palestine is antisemitic!”
I often hear this argument from non-Jews who have never cared about Jews before the Palestinian genocide, which obviously screams of performative outrage and ragebait.
Antisemitism isn’t simply acts of prejudice against Jews, it is systemic. It is normalizing antisemitic language, like joking how Jews “run the world’s money.” It is denying the experience of Jews suffering from discrimination, ridicule, and hatred. It is denying the holocaust happened, or that certain marginalized groups of Jews existed during the holocaust. It is weaponizing the genocide of Palestinians to excuse hatred towards Jews.
Superman is a good person. It’s not antisemitic to say he would oppose a regime committing mass genocide, because he would. It’s not “woke” to say he is an immigrant who was written by Jewish immigrants to represent the immigrant experience, because he is.
“But Superman can’t be Jewish, he would support Palestine!”
Those two are not mutually exclusive. The very conception of Superman was in direct opposition of the Nazi’s “Übermensch” because the very idea of Supes is that a man of such incredible power is also a good man who wants to save lives.
Superman 2025’s story being essentially about a Jewish pro-Palestine superhero is perfectly in line with how the character was conceived and has always been interpreted because Superman does not represent the white American ideal.
Superman would never serve the government nor side with cops.
Superman does not and will never pledge allegiance to a single nation, especially any nation that commits genocide in the name of nationalism.
And it is antisemitic to assume Superman would not save Palestinians and/or support the Israeli government merely on the grounds of his Jewish origins as that conflates being Jewish with being pro-Israel.
Which isn’t true. Because Jewish people don’t support genocide.
