Korra Shrugged

I have come to the conclusion that The Legend of Korra is turning into the fantasy version of Atlas Shrugged.

amanda91 brought up Ayn Rand in her recent post comparing the Equalists' energybending to the dystopia of Harrison Bergeron. (amyraine made the same comparison earlier in an epic thread over on overlithe 's LJ, which is kind of funny because Amanda and Amy seem to be coming at the issue from opposite directions.)

That, and overlithe's recent post LoK, Being on Team Human, and Stories About Nothing (read it, I say. READ IT!!) made it click for me.

Atlas, as you may know, is all about the blueblood paranoia that the jealous rabble will come after the special talented people. It ignores or makes light of actual social injustice in favor of the fantasy that it's the elites who are truly persecuted.

In Korra, the murder of entire non-bender families is No Big Deal, or the equivalent of Bitches Lie about Rape in Amon's case (via overlithe's comment.). These stories are almost impossible to sympathize with because a) there's next to no detail, and b) every non-bender we know of--except Asami, who is dating a bender--who suffered this tragic loss is a terrorist.

Compare that sparse treatment to the great physical and emotional detail the creators expended on non-lethal energybending, and the way the most sympathetic characters in the show fear it (Korra) or 

end up its victim (Lin).


So in LoK story logic:

Non-bender lives <<<<<< Bender powers

Unfortunate Implications are unfortunate.

Actual members of actual disadvantaged groups in this little place I like to call Real Life are murdered without law enforcement or the judicial system giving a shit about it. In real life people do turn to violence from grief and rage because they have no other recourse, and power-hungry manipulators do use such people to do terrible things.

Discrimination, loss of faith in the system, government failure, and terrorism are real-life issues. Magic kung-fu is not. Between real-life problems and made-up ones, I always find the real ones more interesting, more relevant, and more moving. LoK has chosen to ignore the real issues in favor of fake ones, which is why it's losing my interest. (This paragraph is basically a digest of overlithe's post "Being on Team Human," linked above.)

LoK has turned into a fantasy, not the magical kind but the narcissistic delusion kind, that the privileged are the true victims who are hunted down and hated for being So Very Special. It's a premise I found boring and irrelevant in Atlas Shrugged, and I find it boring and irrelevant here.