Would society really react to the discovery of Mutants like in The Gifted?

How close does The Gifted come to truly depicting what a mutant-inhabited U.S society would look like? Would it be close to what we’ve seen thus far? Unfortunately, it might be a lot closer than we would like to admit.

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While there are certainly elements of the show that appear dramatized, I think that it truly does a great job of showcasing the political chaos that would unfold in the U.S were we to find ourselves in the midst of gifted individuals. It would not be an easy transition for our already fear-prone nation. So let’s get into it.

Just as we see in the sad protest scene in episode 5, where Jace Turner’s daughter is killed by a mutant-created explosion, there would inevitably be violence in such a world. Just as we have problems with weapons violence today, there would be mutant violence as well.

The question is, how would we handle it? How would we react to the sobering but inevitable fact that not all mutants would be good, and not all of them would be bad?

It may seem like the answer is easy at first, learn to accept it, right? But it may not be that easy for everyone. Consider the sheer terror people would feel at the thought of someone/anyone they come into contact with possibly having the ability to destroy them at any moment, just because they feel like it.

It would certainly make our already complicated world, even more confusing, to say the least. Guns can be somewhat regulated with background checks, but these powers would belong to the individuals born with them. So there would be no ability to regulate such a thing without controlling the individuals who own them, which is what The Gifted shows Sentinal Services doing.

But before delving into the topic of government, let’s take a look at the different types of citizen reactions to the mutants portrayed on the show.

The theme of all of season one, which will likely continue into the following season(s) — is racism and bigotry in a whole different, but extremely familiar sense. There are those who hate mutants because of their abilities (sound familiar? Judging solely by the color of their skin?), and there are some that refuse to stoop down to that level of thinking.

To make the show more dramatic, it has been almost entirely humans vs. mutants to this point — probably a little more than would be the case in real life; but the division our nation would face as a result of such a scenario would likely be as tumultuous as anything we’ve ever experienced.

Some examples of clear comparisons to racism were in episodes three and eleven. In episode three, we find Caitlin and the kids seeking help from her brother, when all of a sudden, the neighbors show up with guns looking to rid the neighborhood of the mutants in their midst. Things get out of control very quickly as the group is forced to flee the scene with the self-proclaimed neighborhood watchman in hot pursuit.

Likewise, in episode eleven, we see a flashback of Clarice and a past boyfriend casually walking out of a movie theater only to be confronted by a group of anti-mutant extremists. “You’ve got no business being out among innocent humans,” one of them tells her as they spray paint her car. She ended up having to teleport away for her own safety.

Fear and hate have never brought the best out of mankind. And unfortunately/sadly, I believe there would be a lot of that to go around in a fictitious world filled with gifted humans.

I certainly hope I’m wrong about that, but our nation’s history would suggest otherwise. To that end, let’s take a closer look at Sentinal Services, the fictitious government-operated program designed to keep the nation safe from mutants in The Gifted. At first glance, most of us would scoff at such a concept — a program that tortures/spies on people for the safety of others? That would never happen. But it did happen.

Following 9/11, the U.S government enacted the first version of The Patriot Act, as a means of legalizing formerly illegal methods of gathering information. In essence, It made null and void the 4th amendment protection against “unreasonable searches and seizures” at the highest levels of government.

Using the information gathered by wire-tapping and mass data gathering became legal as a result of this law. But along with those things, our nation allowed for heinous torture.  Now, according to The Guardian, George Bush said that waterboarding allowed us to stop terrorist attacks; but our methods went beyond waterboarding.

There is a lot of debate about torture right now, but the point is this: mankind acts desperately when threatened — and the actions of the agents of Sentinal Services in The Gifted, are not outside of the realm of human possibility, in my opinion. When history is considered, it seems that humanity, at times, can be far from humane.

As far as less extreme circumstances are concerned, it would be more than likely that mutants, at a minimum, would be on a government watch-list. Federal surveillance, after all, hasn’t let much fly under the radar since 9/11 as we are still under an amended form of The Patriot Act today.

Life would never be the same.

The concept of mutants walking among us is so interesting because it involves human rights issues, weapons issues, racism issues, and public safety issues all in the same debate. This is part of the reason why The Gifted is such an intellectually dense show.

Would we ever learn how to function in a world like this without losing every good part of our humanity? Would we be able to live peacefully in a world where children have the equivalent power of a bomb or an explosive device at their disposal simply because they were born like that?

I think that it would take time, but if history has proven anything, it’s that we, as the human race, are capable of overcoming great odds, and horrendous mistakes to evolve into something better. We would figure it out.

Even though it probably wouldn’t look pretty at first, I think that we would eventually learn how to function in a world like that portrayed in The Gifted. What are your thoughts?