Did "Spider-Man: No Way Home" Illustrate The Dangers of Progressivism?

WARNING: POTENTIAL SPOILERS

Over the weekend, a couple of friends and I saw the latest Marvel movie, Spider-Man: No Way Home. Over the years, I have had a mild interest in comic book movies and spin-offs. The characters and backstories are wildly fascinating. Batman and Joker are two of my favorite characters ever created. For my money, the movie Joker was the best film to come out in 2019. Unfortunately, the market has become oversaturated with lackluster films force-feeding audiences the woke agenda. Isn't it interesting how many superheroes these days are coming out?

Spider-Man: No Way Home was a refreshing break from the slew of woke superhero films trying too hard to appease everyone. With a domestic opening weekend of $253 million, audiences were pleased with the output.

Underneath the intertwining of three Spider-Man universes, the movie offered a cautionary tale about how dangerous modern-day progressive dogma can be.

At the beginning of the film, Peter Parker is accused of murder, which compromises his anonymity as Spider-Man. Consequently, Parker and his friends, MJ and Ned Leeds, suffered harsh public ridicule and were denied enrollment into MIT. In a hail-mary attempt to get in, Parker enlists Doctor Strange to cast a spell on the public, erasing any memory of him. Due to Parker's malfeasance, wanting to spare his friends and his aunt May from the effects, the spell is corrupted, luring villains from other universes into theirs.

Progressivism conceals arrogance under the guise of humanitarianism. To be effective, it must cause havoc to traditional ways of life. Take minimum wage laws, for instance. Raising the national minimum wage to $15 per hour will undoubtedly cause more harm than good. Earlier this year, a Congressional Budget Office analysis predicted a minimum wage increase to $15 would lift nearly a million citizens out of poverty at the expense of a million and a half jobs.

Furthermore, because people live above the poverty line does not mean they are living prosperous lives. For example, the poverty line for an individual in the States is $12,880. At the raised minimum wage, that person would make $31,200 annually. In this case, politicians can tout the success of lifting a person out of poverty, but the person is still poor. Especially if it is in a large Democrat-run metropolis like San Francisco.

Similar to how progressives destroy to satiate their own agenda, Peter Parker was willing to have a spell cast on everyone's memory for his own personal gain. His selfishness is what caused the entire plot of the movie. Doctor Strange did his best to curtail Parker's selfish endeavors, with little avail until the end.

Another significant player in the film was Parker's aunt, May. In response to the supervillains infiltrating the main protagonist's universe, May fed Parker the tired cliche, "With great power comes great responsibility." Peter was implicitly instructed to find a way to help "cure" the villains, even though he had the opportunity to send them back to the universe they came from. This is when the movie takes a dark turn. Parker's battle with the Green Goblin is what eventually killed May Parker.

This scenario is analogous to modern-day feminism. Not only has it led women astray, but the men who have been imbued or guilt-tripped into believing feminist doctrine.

BLM and other feminist movements favor abolishing the nuclear family and eradicating the patriarchy. On the surface, it seems like a noble cause: to empower women. Laying in the wake of feminism is chaos. Homicides, attempted murders, robberies, and rioting are all up. Many of these crimes are being committed by people who grew up without a father in the home. Eliminating fathers from the home is the number one social crisis in America. When strong male leadership is absent, people will find a father in other forms, whether television, the streets, drugs, or feminism. Some of today's feminists lean towards birth control pills, alcohol, and pets to fill the void only a man can.

Thanks in part to Aunt May, the villains were allowed to do what they do best. Unfortunately, May's pep talk with Spidey also led to her untimely death. 

In states like California, new legislation is in favor of criminals. Proposition 57 eliminates cash bail for non-violent offenders. This means arsonists, rapists, and other perpetrators of "non-violent" crimes are back on the streets quickly. In addition, because many criminals are non-white offenders, progressives use the race card to turn criminals into victims.

In Spider-Man: No Way Home, Peter Parker turns evildoers into his victimhood science experiments. He and his team concoct antidotes that eliminate the malevolent spirit overtaking the villain. In other words, Parker believed the villains were "victims" of dire circumstances.

Many younger progressives feel our current way of governing is archaic. They believe profound changes need to be made to every aspect of our society. Sometimes (I reiterate, sometimes) their intentions are good. However, they may not be able to see the big picture to make their ideas useful.

Peter Parker represents today's Millennial and Gen Z progressives. While good on the surface, his ambitions were driven by selfishness and feminism. In the end, Parker needed the sage Doctor Strange to protect him and his loved ones...from himself.

Hopefully, today's progressives will find their own version of Doctor Strange...to protect them (and our country) from themselves.