FRANCE – Masked superheroes are today unified in outrage after France’s constitutional court passed a law banning costumes which incorporate a full-face mask from being worn in public. The legislation makes it illegal for to wear the very masks they depend on to protect their secret identities while saving ordinary civilians. “This is straight prejudicial bullsh*t!” blasted Spiderman, a New York resident on vacation when the law was passed. “When I heard that crap, I swung up outta that bitch and back to New York. I only take my mask off for Mary Jane. ”
He added that he felt the move would be racist, if you could tell what race people were underneath their masks.
The ban has strong public support from those who fear what they don’t understand, but critics point out that only a handful of superheroes actually wear full masks and many were ‘actually quite nice’. French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who is not a superhero, argued the masks were a symbol of oppression, urging those with powers to stop defining their existence by what some ‘maniacal villain may do to loved ones if their identity was exposed’.
‘Supervillains are the only winners here’
It’s feared the precedent could be replicated in the United States after Batman was recently ordered to remove his mask when giving evidence against the Joker in court. The caped crusader refused to comply, insisting that ‘the only expression that matters is the one heat moulded into my mask.’
Spiderman, Batman, The Flash and Captain American are just some of hundreds set to be affected by the change which includes a six-month period of ‘education’ to explain to those already wearing a mask that they face arrest and a fine of 150 euros (£130) if they continue to do so in public spaces. Police unions have however, expressed concerns over how such a law could be enforced and the idea of pursuing people who can swing from building to building, fly, or just crush them with super-strength.
A local comic book store clerk believed the end result of this ban will be “further isolation of extra-ordinary men and women who are still just people like you and me.” Although unaffected by the law, he opposed it on the grounds that it was nothing more than the fear of those who look different, “who can run faster than a speeding bullet, shoot webbing from their wrists…or whatever the hell Ant-Man does.”
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