Maintaining your secret identity

[Morrus]

With a side order of "evil Elon Musk who's actually a genius set up the war so that Superman would do this and so that he could humiliate him on the world stage by beating him up with a Street Fighter clone version before having him arrested and locking him up in an extradimensional gulag which he happened to have handy."

Well, it is a comic book movie.

 

[jian]

Well, it is a comic book movie.

Yes it is, and it is the better for it!

It's a thankless part, but I do think Nicholas Hoult does a brilliant job as Luthor, especially when he articulates exactly what drives Luthor to be who he is (slight paraphrasing, I can't remember the exact words):

Superman: You're consumed by envy, Luthor, it's so obvious!

Luthor: No sh*t, I'm not dim. Envy consumes my every waking moment. When I hear someone praise Galileo, I want to throw up. But at least Galileo did something! He wasn't some dopey Venusian dumped on our planet to make us finally, inevitably, realise (tears in his voice, choking up) how stupid and weak we really are! My envy is a calling, Superman, to destroy you and reclaim our humanity! 1A! 1A! ONE! A!

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I asked around for a game a few years ago and the general view was that nobody in the UK would touch gold nuggets or raw gems, they certainly wouldn’t give you money for them. Even gold - relatively easy to test whether it’s actual gold or not - would require quite a lot of paperwork and they would really want to know where you got it. Nobody wants to handle potential conflict gems or be involved in money laundering unless you’ve faked the paperwork first.

As a guy who has never faked paperwork on his minerals, I can assure you there’s definitely workarounds. And a lot of them aren’t even illegal.

There’s lots of stones & nuggets found each year in regions known to be rich in minerals. Some companies and even governments run sites open to the public where they can pan or search.

Home | Emerald Hollow Mine

www.emeraldhollowmine.com

Gem Mountain Sapphire Mine | Montana's Oldest Sapphire Mine

gemmountainmt.com

Sometimes people simply find stuff.

Woman finds 2.3-carat diamond at state park to use for engagement ring

A woman determined to find a diamond for her engagement ring found one on the last day of her trip. (Source: Arkansas' Crater of Diamonds State Park)

www.fox10tv.com

You can keep gold nuggets found on public land if you were “casually prospecting”- not using commercial mining equipment- but you will be taxed.

(Rules may vary in other countries, obviously.)

Still worried? Buy up the contents of a storage locker. Say it was in there. (Superman wouldn’t do this, but I’m not him.)

IOW, “I found it.” clears a lot of barriers.

Beyond that? Again, I’ve been buying & selling gems & precious metals- as a hobbyist- for decades, and I can tell you In-person queries will often get different results than calling around.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Yeah, as we discussed at the time, stopping a war (or at least stopping a military assault) is well within Superman’s capabilities but is probably more calculated to annoy and frighten people than almost anything else he could do.

Even in a fairly straightforward situation (country A invades country B to conquer it with absolutely no justification) people would be upset because it would show that Superman can and will involve himself in human politics. The social media and agitprop capabilities of country A will now be focused on making Superman a pariah, and they’re likely to succeed in making him a polarising and divisive figure.

There is plenty for Superman to do in dealing with natural disasters and other problems not directly related to human politics. But then there’s the risk of him speaking out on what he’s been dealing with. If Superman says anything like “climate change is real and I’m starting to get tired of cleaning up your mess”, well, we’re back to him being a pariah and divisive figure.

OTOH, he could make the decision that stopping the war (or whatever) is morally justified, and accept that some will hate him for it.

History is full of examples of people who did exactly that.

 

[jian]

As a guy who has never faked paperwork on his minerals, I can assure you there’s definitely workarounds. And a lot of them aren’t even illegal.

There’s lots of stones & nuggets found each year in regions known to be rich in minerals. Some companies and even governments run sites open to the public where they can pan or search.

Home | Emerald Hollow Mine

www.emeraldhollowmine.com

Gem Mountain Sapphire Mine | Montana's Oldest Sapphire Mine

gemmountainmt.com

Sometimes people simply find stuff.

Woman finds 2.3-carat diamond at state park to use for engagement ring

A woman determined to find a diamond for her engagement ring found one on the last day of her trip. (Source: Arkansas' Crater of Diamonds State Park)

www.fox10tv.com

You can keep gold nuggets found on public land if you were “casually prospecting”- not using commercial mining equipment- but you will be taxed.

(Rules may vary in other countries, obviously.)

Still worried? Buy up the contents of a storage locker. Say it was in there. (Superman wouldn’t do this, but I’m not him.)

IOW, “I found it.” clears a lot of barriers.

Beyond that? Again, I’ve been buying & selling gems & precious metals- as a hobbyist- for decades, and I can tell you In-person queries will often get different results than calling around.

Yeah, that's all fair. But I guess you'd still have to say where you found it, and it's hard not be shady or unethical doing so. And you probably can't do it very often as the same person - one guy who keeps finding opals in the disused opal mine for tourists might be noticed.

 

[Morrus]

OTOH, he could make the decision that stopping the war (or whatever) is morally justified, and accept that some will hate him for it.

History is full of examples of people who did exactly that.

That’s exactly what he did in the film. Though he was a bit naive and underestimated the pushback he’d get.

 

[jian]

OTOH, he could make the decision that stopping the war (or whatever) is morally justified, and accept that some will hate him for it.

History is full of examples of people who did exactly that.

Oh yes, it's almost the only moral decision that a good person with those powers can make. Certainly in clear-cut cases. But the pushback these days would be terrifying. Even if Superman never looked at social media ever, it'd be overwhelming. How mentally strong would you have to be to stay true to yourself and believe in yourself despite that, I wonder?

That's part of one major set of reasons I'm very glad I'm not Superman. If my senses tell me about disasters that I can prevent all the time, how can I not go out and prevent them? What's the limiting factor - my mental and physical fatigue? If I have all the power, I have all the responsibility. How would I ever have a moment to myself, to be myself, and not feel like crap for it? And that's before an entire nation devotes its resources to destroying my willpower.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

That's part of one major set of reasons I'm very glad I'm not Superman. If my senses tell me about disasters that I can prevent all the time, how can I not go out and prevent them? What's the limiting factor - my mental and physical fatigue? If I have all the power, I have all the responsibility. How would I ever have a moment to myself, to be myself, and not feel like crap for it? And that's before an entire nation devotes its resources to destroying my willpower.

The very first Astro City story deals with this.

 

[Morrus]

That's part of one major set of reasons I'm very glad I'm not Superman. If my senses tell me about disasters that I can prevent all the time, how can I not go out and prevent them?

I guess the same reason you don't spend every moment of your day doing charitable works, and give your every penny to charity. Both of which are in your power to do, but you choose not to. Unless you do, in which case whose internet are you using?

 

[jian]

I guess the same reason you don't spend every moment of your day doing charitable works, and give your every penny to charity. Both of which are in your power to do, but you choose not to. Unless you do, in which case whose internet are you using?

Yes, that’s true. It is different when your contribution is unique and you see with your own eyes the difference you make with your own hands. My job has elements of the latter (not at all the former) and I’m glad it’s a job with normal hours and pay, the fact that it’s a transaction protects me from the feeling that I should be doing more.

(To answer your question, I’m transmitting directly into the internet using my electro-vision. I’m still trying to work out how to use it to erase Twitter.)