Hatin' On My Hexaquarks

When I was still a tyke, Spiderman was my favorite superhero. I remember my mom buying me a Spiderman Halloween costume and long after that night of candy gathering had passed, I continued to wear that foam muscled suit around the house. In my eyes, Peter Parker was the perfect blend of morals, athleticism, and science. Younger than most, always loaded with a quip, a good heart, Spidey has been and still is an amazing hero and role model. He's just no longer my favorite.

My world changed the first time I watched Static Shock on WB Kids. Before I met Static, the heroes I loved the most resembled and represented me the least. I was too young to notice, but there was an imperceptible, yet powerful change that happened when I saw Virgil Hawkins.

A native to the fictional Dakota City, Virgil Hawkins (a good kid by all means) got caught up in some gang activity and was exposed to a gas that gave him his powers, along with others at the scene. Those who walked away became known as Bang Babies. Virgil attained electromagnetic powers and became the hero known as Static Shock to fight Bang Babies gone bad.

That show is so important to me because it changed the way I looked at myself, even when I was too young to understand. Whereas I pretended to be Spiderman, I dreamed of being Virgil. Virgil was funny, a geek, loved his family. When I looked at him, I saw me (I definitely look more like him with my hair longer). He wasn't a rich white grown man, he was a black inner city kid who was positively changing his city.

Yesterday, I bought my first comic, BLACK by Kwanza Osajyefo.

In many ways, the world of BLACK is very similar to the world we reside in: black bodies are taken, stolen, undervalued. But in this universe of superheroes, the only caped crusaders are people of color. The main character, Kareem, finds this out after taking a surplus of bullets that should have been the end of his story. But upon finding out that he isn't another black male executed by the cops, he learns that he is among a select few who has superpowers.

This was a world building chapter to me. We're introduced to the characters, the reason these powers are popping up (formation of quarks known as hexaquarks), the organization who's mission is to protect people like Kareem. I'm definitely excited to see where the series goes from here.

But the strength of BLACK lies in the representation. The same excitement I had watching Static Shock on TV is the same feeling I had when the cashier at Atomic Books handed me my copy. That feeling sprouts from knowing that when I flip through these pages, I'll be face to face with characters who look like me.

Superheroes were born out of the Great Depression. The saying goes that "Necessity is the mother of invention". In a time when America needed it, we were given new hope in the form of the super powered. But who is that "we"? It wasn't those with melanin, that's for sure. On top of economic struggles, blacks were still suffering from racism in profound ways. And we were told that our heroes to look up to were white men with chiseled jaws. But it's damaging to grow up with this idea that only predominantly white males can save us from our tribulations (some they were responsible for).

Fast forward to the 21st century, and though some would claim that we're living in a post-racial America, racism is still alive. The harassment black boys and girls go through, the housing/workplace/educational discrimination we experience, the executions and persecutions of brown bodies by the state are harrowing. Some of us have reached a point of numbness after continually hearing about our brothers and sisters being killed. So imagine as a PoC hearing about a comic where the main character is black, but bullets don't even phase him. Imagine seeing the cover of BLACK and seeing a boy in a hoodie (who could equally be Trayvon, me, you, or your loved one) at gunpoint by the cops ... and knowing he'll walk away. Method Man in Marvel's Luke Cage said it best:

We need BLACK. We need Luke Cage. We need Static. We need to know that when times are tough, in the face of adversity, our protector hasn't been bused in from the suburb. She visits the same corner store as you. He's faced microaggressions you have. I'm so happy that there will be kids who read BLACK, immediately feel the link, and have positivity and strength course through them.

I'll mention that not everyone's happy. This picture shows the top comment on CBR's Facebook page in response to BLACK:

@kwanzer @BLACKsuprpowrs hey it's taken from CBR's Facebook page. https://t.co/KAk1HqL3Z9 pic.twitter.com/dD1wt0YEnh

— Andy Haigh (@Wolverinesclaws) October 1, 2016

And I'll respond with words I heard from Crissle from The Read. At their London show, in response to finding out that in England, there was backlash against POC-only yoga studios and white people crying "Racism!", she said, "It's not racist to create a space for ourselves; it's racism that makes us need a space for ourselves". We need these types of comics, these types of heroes. Latin@s, blacks, Asians, Middle Easterners, we've all suffered for not being white. But somehow, it was whites who were given rescuers, and in their image no less. So I applaud the creators of BLACK for giving us the heroes we need, especially in the social climate we live in.

Hate on my hexaquarks all you want. But I'm black and I'm super. And though only a small percentage of our people have these abilities, all of us can take pride in BLACK.