it's a bird. it's a plane. it's an undocumented immigrant.

oh look, a foreigner play an american icon. 

about a year ago i was watching a documentary about superman, look, up in the sky! the amazing story of superman. yes, i'm that girl. but to my defense i've been obsessed with the man of steel since i was a kid. you see, i had the pleasure of growing up with boys, who were all obsessed with superheros. (don't even get me started on x-men. rogue and gambit 4eva. they were my otp before i even knew what otps were.) it was also probably the hair. i have a thing for men’s hair. or maybe it was the fact that he was the ‘all- american’ boy who had extraordinary power. he grew up in kansas, on a farm; i mean how much more classic americana can you get. as you might guess i also have a thing for americana. whatever it was, superman/clark kent/kal-el and I have been tight since we were kids.

an interesting point that the documentary brought up was that superman was an immigrant. he wasn't from the states, or even from this planet. he was a bit of an outsider because of it. despite it all, he managed to be metropolis' hero and the ‘all-american’ hero to countless boys across the states and even the world. to understand this you should know that, jerry and joe, were children of jewish immigrants who often felt like they didn't fit into their ‘all-american’ surroundings growing up. they felt like outsiders, just like kal-el did. they romanticized their emotions/experiences and made superman. i had stored this information in the back of my mind for when i would potentially come across someone who loved superman but was so blatantly anti-immigration; it was going to be my closing argument. it wasn't until last week when thinkprogress wrote an article that touched on the matter that I felt the need to write about it.

let's start with his name, kal-el. it obviously didn’t sound ‘american’. imagine how many teachers growing up would have butchered that. so his parent re-named him clark kent, something that was easier to pronounce and very american (in fact jerry and joe got the name clark kent from combining clark gable and kent taylor, two american film icons they grew up with). this is something that i saw all the time growing up. i grew up in a suburb outside of LA that was mostly half hispanic and half asian. a lot of my asian friends had chinese and vietnamese names that most couldn't pronounce. they saw that their birth names made them different and they began adopting english names like sarah or ryan. it wasn't that they were embarrassed it was just that they didn't want to stand out. they wanted to fit in and it was their way of assimilating. i saw it a lot in the hispanic culture as well. my uncle was named pedro but i only ever heard my grandparents call him that. to everyone else he was peter. he changed his name to something that was more american friendly, so he  could fit in when he immigrated to the states at a young age. a cousin of mine was given the name esteban after his grandfather, but goes by steve; showtime’s weeds did the same thing with nancy’s youngest boy. it’s something that millions of people do across the country to feel less left out; they have a desire to fit in and do so by sounding more american and so some often change their name when introducing themselves to others. clark's parents did so that he wouldn't feel left out, so that he would acclimate to his new home better.   

although superman is an american icon, he's still an undocumented immigrant. he came to this country with no papers. he came to this country in a rocket disguised as an asteroid. it is no different than people coming to this country illegal through cargo from overseas or from 18-wheelers from south of the border. the difference is that kal-el became a beloved superhero. no one ever asked to see his birth certificate cause he was too busy saving the world. if only that type of behavior held up today (i'm looking at you 'birthers'). but the thing is that many undocumented immigrants come to this country illegally without a say because their parents thought it'd be best for them, just like kal-el's parents did; they too want to be heroes but can't. they want to be doctors and lawyers and teachers, but they can't because they can't get the financial aid to help them or even if they do manage to come up with the funds their degree wouldn’t be valid. this is something that i see all the time. why was superman given the aid to go to college and become a report, cause let's be real his struggling family farm probably couldn't have paid for the whole thing, but kids now a day’s aren't given the same treatment?  or why wasnt he being harassed and deported, like many young people are being today? its because he exemplifies americana but not in the way you might think seeing that he's small town kid from kansas who grew up on a farm and became a report. it’s because he was an immigrant who came to this country and became something of himself. he's the american dream.

on a side note many have complained that an american isn’t playing superman in man of steel, since superman is an american hero and all. but its fitting and ironic all at once that a foreigner with really good hair is playing kal-el/clark kent/superman.