Because he's Superman.
So thete1 is, as everyone knows by now, madly spreading the love of Supreme Power. If you didn't know this, you can check out her posts. Because I have no strength to resist, I got swept along.
The thing about Supreme Power that really does it for me is how closely, in one sense, all the characters map to the JLA, and in another sense, the differences. It's the JLA without worrying about what reading it will do to the children. It's the JLA without years of Golden and Silver Age crack/baggage which can never be jettisoned without offending the fanboys, or never will be, because the writers are fanboys. It's the JLA, in a world more like the world we live in. It's the JLA without the odd moral mapping that comes from believing in the moral rightness of vigilante justice, and Superman as the final moral arbiter for the planet.
I'm not sure if it would be so seductive to me without the resonance of the DCU characters which are being referenced. I think so, but it's impossible to tell.
Without spoiling anything, Mark has basically Superman's back-story, but without the warm fuzzies. Part of Superman's advantage, and the reason he's capable of being this Atlas of morality who upholds the entire DCU vigilante population, or maybe the whole world, is that he lucked out and won the lottery with the world's greatest parents. Imagine, for a moment, a Superman raised by, say Jack Drake. Or even someone less obviously terrible, like Max Mercury, or Barry Allen. He wouldn't be possessed of the unshakable conviction in the moral absolute, which is, I believe, necessary for him to hold the place in the pantheon that he does. (Pantheon here used metaphorically, not literally as could be the case in the DCU)
(Here I get into more vaguely spoilery territory, and if you haven't already read Supreme Power 1-8, you should stop now)
Mark didn't get these fantastic parents. So for him, he's been taught about right and wrong, but it's not a bedrock of certainty for him, the way it is for Clark. He's got some pretty solid reasons for doubting that those categories are even meaningful. The people who taught him about these ideas didn't adhere to those standards. Those ideas were used to manipulate him. And he knows it.
So the question is, why isn't he much more amoral than he is? Dunno.
The other thing that allows Clark to be Superman, is, I think, his core affection for the human race as a whole. There are individuals he loves (his parents, Lois) but he also thinks humans are, at heart, good people. But I fail to see how Mark could possibly have formed this impression. Or, I can see how the impression was formed, but I can't see how it survived. Instead of affection for the human race, all he has is to make him reach out to other people is loneliness, without even the expectation that other people will reach back
What Mark is missing is Lois Lane. You can't really have Superman without a person on whom he anchors his humanity. Maybe that's in the cards for Mark. (Stan?) We'll see.
Tell me if I'm wrong, right, or off in my own universe.
The thing about Supreme Power that really does it for me is how closely, in one sense, all the characters map to the JLA, and in another sense, the differences. It's the JLA without worrying about what reading it will do to the children. It's the JLA without years of Golden and Silver Age crack/baggage which can never be jettisoned without offending the fanboys, or never will be, because the writers are fanboys. It's the JLA, in a world more like the world we live in. It's the JLA without the odd moral mapping that comes from believing in the moral rightness of vigilante justice, and Superman as the final moral arbiter for the planet.
I'm not sure if it would be so seductive to me without the resonance of the DCU characters which are being referenced. I think so, but it's impossible to tell.
Without spoiling anything, Mark has basically Superman's back-story, but without the warm fuzzies. Part of Superman's advantage, and the reason he's capable of being this Atlas of morality who upholds the entire DCU vigilante population, or maybe the whole world, is that he lucked out and won the lottery with the world's greatest parents. Imagine, for a moment, a Superman raised by, say Jack Drake. Or even someone less obviously terrible, like Max Mercury, or Barry Allen. He wouldn't be possessed of the unshakable conviction in the moral absolute, which is, I believe, necessary for him to hold the place in the pantheon that he does. (Pantheon here used metaphorically, not literally as could be the case in the DCU)
(Here I get into more vaguely spoilery territory, and if you haven't already read Supreme Power 1-8, you should stop now)
Mark didn't get these fantastic parents. So for him, he's been taught about right and wrong, but it's not a bedrock of certainty for him, the way it is for Clark. He's got some pretty solid reasons for doubting that those categories are even meaningful. The people who taught him about these ideas didn't adhere to those standards. Those ideas were used to manipulate him. And he knows it.
So the question is, why isn't he much more amoral than he is? Dunno.
The other thing that allows Clark to be Superman, is, I think, his core affection for the human race as a whole. There are individuals he loves (his parents, Lois) but he also thinks humans are, at heart, good people. But I fail to see how Mark could possibly have formed this impression. Or, I can see how the impression was formed, but I can't see how it survived. Instead of affection for the human race, all he has is to make him reach out to other people is loneliness, without even the expectation that other people will reach back
What Mark is missing is Lois Lane. You can't really have Superman without a person on whom he anchors his humanity. Maybe that's in the cards for Mark. (Stan?) We'll see.
Tell me if I'm wrong, right, or off in my own universe.