Take off your cape and step away from the spandex

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a superhero. I realize that this is a fairly common dream for children. After all, what eight-year-old child doesn’t want to be able to shoot laser beams from their eyes, bend steel with their bare hands, and bring evil to its knees with the force of sheer awesomeness? But, like Paul* said, when I became a man, I put away childish things.

As a grown man, I still want to be a superhero. Those of you who’ve been paying attention will probably notice that I just got done saying that I put away childish things. And you’re right. I told you I put away childish things, but I didn’t say I no longer want to be a superhero. What I no longer want to do is bend steel with my bare hands or shoot laser beams out of my eyes. I want to be a new kind of superhero.

I want to be able to make people happy.

Bending steel, flying, and burning holes in things at great distances just by looking at them makes for good comic books, but it makes for crappy real life. After all, if I’m saving people from the clutches of evil, that means that people have to actually be in the clutches of evil first. There has to be a steady stream of evildoers doing evil to otherwise gainfully occupied people. Without the evildoers, a dude with laser beam eyes isn’t really good for much.**

So I’m done with that kid's superhero stuff. I’ve upgraded to adult superhero stuff. This new breed of happy-making superhero doesn’t need a cape, spandex, or evildoers. All that I need to fulfill my superhero-ly duties (provided that I attain the superpower in question) is everyday people doing everyday stuff. The world is big and complicated enough that there are plenty of unhappy people wandering around.

But not after that Happy Man gets a hold of them. Okay, so the name needs work, but you get the point.

Little Johnny is sad because his favorite comic is lost, but all that changes when Happy Man shows up. Bam. Little Johnny is happy. Does he have his comic? No, Happy Man isn’t a galactic lost-and-found. But, by gum, Little Johnny is happy now because Happy Man makes people happy. That’s what he does.

Larry is sad because he's overweight in a world where people are judged by what they look like instead of who they are. But Happy Man can put a smile on that face. He won't help Larry lose weight because Happy Man is not a physical trainer. But, boy-howdy, Happy Man will make Larry happy. Hold your chin high, Larry, Happy Man is on the way.

Edmund from accounting is sad because her marriage is in trouble… that is, until Happy Man shows up. Kazzam. Is Edmund's marriage fixed? No. Happy Man doesn't do counselling. But Edmund from accounting is now happy despite his failing marriage. Another job well done.

I guess at this point it’s pretty obvious that Happy Man isn’t a very useful superhero. After all, he can’t really fix anything. That wasn’t part of the gig. He can’t find lost comics, can't help people lose weight, can't change the world from judging people who don't look like the world says they should look, can’t fix broken marriages... in short, Happy Man can't do much of anything. Happy Man, the remover of unpleasantness from all things unpleasant, is as lame as his name.

[An aside from the author] There are two different ways I can take this post right now. Option 1 is to tell you that God is smart enough to know that Happy Man is a bad idea, and so he won’t play that role in your life. He’ll give you joy in hard circumstances, but that’s different than the desperate happiness that people have when they try to ignore what’s going wrong. And that’s exactly the sort of happiness Happy Man is likely to offer. Option two is to compare Happy Man to recreational drug use and to remind you that ignoring your problems doesn’t make them go away. It often makes them worse.

But I’ve talked about Option 1 before, and Option 2 sounds too much like a sermon for my liking this evening. So, instead of talking about either option, I’ll leave you with one final thought. [End aside from author]

Spandex is a dangerous material and is best left to professionals. You’ve been warned.

[A note from the management] If you asked yourself, "What kind lame end for a post is that?" rest assured that you're not the only one. The quality control group of IKCRN is currently heavily sedated by Nyquil due to a dehabilitating head cold. Seizing the opportunity, the author penned the tasteless ending above. He has been severely flogged and will issue a formal appology when he regains the use of his arms. [End note from the management]


*The Paul in question is Paul the Apostle. He wrote a fair bit of the New Testament. There’s some good stuff about love in there, some confusing stuff about hair styles, and some controversial stuff about cutting off… uh… bits from bits… that is…. You’ll just have to read it yourself.

**This is not in any way saying that good requires evil to exist. What it is saying is that laser beam eyes don’t really have any commercial value outside of the ability to bore eye-sized holes in bad people to keep them from doing bad things to people who’d rather not have bad things done to them.