If there's one thing that distinguishes Supergirl and its star Melissa Benoist from pretty much all other TV superheroes ever, it's the show's and the star's willingness to get out in front of societal issues and deal with them in a progressive way—and the latest season has jumped into the political fray headlong and feet first.
Benoist has long been recognized as at least a liberal. Just a couple of months after President Grab 'Em By The Pussy took office, Benoist was part of the Women's March on Washington, holding a handmade sign that read, "Hey Donald, don't try to grab my pussy—It's made of steel." She's also tweeted such thoughts as, "Support survivors, share your story, take a stand against and help raise awareness about domestic violence and the epidemic it is," and "Proud to stand in solidarity with sisters for equity, parity and a better future and proud of…"
And while Benoist doesn't have any screenwriting credits on her show, it's getting more and more reflective of her values—most notably the current season, where the President of the United States (Bruce Boxleitner) has rescinded the "Alien Amnesty Act" signed into law by his precedessor (Lynda Carter) and set Agent Liberty (Sam Witwer) on a mission to round up and imprison every alien in the country. And, this being a comic book-based show, we're not talking about Mexicans; we're talking about immigrants from other planets—and yet, it's just possible to come away from each episode with the sinking feeling that the plotline is about human immigrants and the violence perpetrated on them by ICE and other "law enforcers."
One of those aliens that Supergirl befriends is Nia Nal, born on Earth but the daughter of a human father and a mother from the planet Naltor. Nia is played by Nicole Maines, and in real life, Nicole is transgender, a fact that was reported by several news organizations when she debuted on the show in 2018, but which has escaped the attention of everyone on the Religious Right—except one Lindsay Kornick, who's published a couple of rants on the fundamentalist "news" site Newsbusters, most recently with the "ironic" headline, "'Supergirl' Trangender Hero Preaches 'Sharing Our Truth' on 'Authentic Selves'," which begins, "Let’s face it, CW’s Supergirl has always been preachy. But there’s preachy, and then there’s obnoxiously, sycophantically preachy. The superhero series flies towards the latter in yet another episode proclaiming how being trans is being 'strong' and 'authentic' nowadays."
The inspiration for the rant that follows was last Sunday's episode, "American Dreamer," a title with a double meaning all its own: Maines' character on the show has the secret identity of "Dreamer," who has the power to see the future in her dreams, and of course, Nia Nal considers herself an American, having been born here, though Agent Liberty can only see the alien blood coursing through her veins.
As part of her effort to thwart Agent Liberty's pogrom against alien residents, Supergirl uses her secret identity as news reporter Kara Danvers to interview Dreamer on her company's TV show, where she asks at one point, "So you are both human and alien?"
"Yes," Dreamer replies. "My parents believed that humans and aliens could co-exist. And I'm living proof of that. But growing up wasn't easy. I am also a trans woman. I'm different, Miss Danvers, but so is everybody. And I don't know when that became such a bad thing. The greatest gift we can give each other is our authentic selves and sharing that. Sharing our truth is what will make us strong. So, here I am. I am both human and alien. And I am a trans woman. S'mores are my favorite dessert. But I will always choose salty over sweet. I broke my nose when I was 15 during a game of kickball. My mother was my heart. And since I lost her, it's felt like a piece of me is missing. But my father is my spine... And I am proud of all that I am."
To which Kara adds, "You should be." [All emphasis courtesy of Newsbusters]
Kornick's reaction? "The other characters predictably hail her words as brave and inspiring instead of the preachy and cringey mess they really are. They act like we’ve never heard these words before in the media or even on this very show. We didn’t believe it then, and we don’t believe it now."
Indeed; the first time Kornick heard those words was back in January, during an episode where Supergirl accompanies Nia back to her hometown, and Kornick's bigotry toward transgender people is clear in her opening paragraph: "CW’s Supergirl has promised to debut the first transgender superhero on television, and now we’ve reached the cusp of that character's origin story. To absolutely no one’s surprise, it’s deluded, self-righteous, and more than a little confusing. But that’s what you get when pretending a man has the superpower to transform into a woman."
To be clear, "transforming" from a man to a woman isn't Nia's/Maines' power. She is a woman; her power is to dream the future, which she inherited from her mother. But pretty much no one who writes for religio-conservative websites is willing to admit that there's actually such a thing as a transgender person; as far as they're concerned, they're all men pretending to be women. It's an article of faith among The Faithful.
And that's part of the reason why Kornick is so bent out of shape when Nia tells her sister Maeve, who believed that she would be the recipient of her mother's predictive power rather than Nia.
Kornick quotes this bit of Maeve's dialog from the January episode: "How did you, of all people, get the powers? They're supposed to be passed down from mother to daughter. So how did someone like you get them? You're not even a real woman."
Of course, Kornick is all over that: "This is supposed to be a personal blow, but the thing is … Nia isn’t a woman. And she’ll never really be one. She wasn’t born with an XX chromosome, so she isn’t genetically a daughter. The series could in theory explain that biology works differently on Naltor than Earth, but then she couldn’t be the accurate transgender representation everyone wants her to be. Even if this episode wasn’t chock full of liberal nonsense, it would still be confusing."
Only to people who don't accept the fact that some people's gender doesn't match up with their genitalia, asshole!
But Supergirl deserves major props for not only casting a transgender woman as a transgender character on the show, but making her a major superhero—and in the process, infuriating people who can't get over the fact that some women have dicks.
Pictured: Nicole Maines as Dreamer
