I recently watched Superman Returns and it states that Lois wrote an article entitled "The World Doesn't need Superman" I would argue however that we do in fact need superheroes (even fictional ones are useful!!!)

This is my argument:

1. In the midst of pluralism we have so many different cultures able to communicate so freely with each other and with each of these cultures they bring their own sense of beliefs and values. This has happened so much that there are less and less values that we can call non-negotiable.  A Superhero, however represents an agreed set of values that we all admire, e.g. that life should be protected, truth (even though Suerman actually lives a life of lies!) and justice.  We actually need a Superhero like this to show are commonalities rather than highlighting our differences which recent conflicts tend to do.
2. For young people and children where do they receive their moral guidance.  In the past the majority of children and young people (in Britain and probably the US) attended Sunday School at Church, however now less and less do that.  These children and young people also have less guidance from their families because families have become more and more distant normally because people have travelled for employment reasons etc. resulting in children seeing their grandparents, aunts and uncles less regularly.  This is without even mentioning the number of families in which parents are estranged from their children.  This means that there are less adults who are significant to children and young people for them to emulate and therefore need to emulate other moral pillars of society who are sometimes fictional in nature.
3. Sometimes we need a superhero to remind us that everything is not well in the world.  If you have ever watched Mission Impossible (2) you will remember that every superhero needs a villain.  Sometimes we can be so passive about the world that we live in and forget about the injustices that around us, or at least ignore them!  We need to be aware of these injustices and act upon them.  As Sandi Thom states maybe we were "born too late to a world that doesn't care." (who sings: "I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair").  We should care and we should act!

Personally I believe we don't need to rely on a fictional superhero but rather on God (Father, Son and Spirit) for some of these, but let us not just sit back and leave it to God - I believe He wants us to be active participants!