Times where you Can't Argue with Elves in Comic Books.
- Both Marvel and DC's Atlanteans make frequent reference to how they "rule" most of the planet, making them clearly superior. In Kingdom Come, Aquaman even proclaims the rest of the world's needs as below him because Superman has an entire Justice League to handle the surface, while Aquaman is responsible for 70% of the world all by himself. Nobody ever points out that the oceans have a population numbered in the millions at most, are 99% unoccupied, and have maybe a dozen supervillains to worry about.
- Of course, Aquaman can communicate with every living thing down there, not just the Apparently Human Merfolk, so he counts them among his subjects.
- It's even worse in Marvel, where the Atlanteans are mostly extinct and have virtually no claim to any other ocean territory besides the Atlantic. Of course, very few people actually like Namor, and with the exceptions of Namora and Namorita, his subjects tend to be even less popular.
- Similarly, The Inhumans are often written as culturally posturing. As an isolationist civilization with similar powers to mutants, uplifted by advanced alien technology centuries before others, they're short on patience with humanity. Even as Main Characters of their titles and allies in others, they're abrasively standoffish. This at least appears cultural, as Inhumans inherited this attitude from the imperialistic and xenophobic Kree and Inhumans raised outside of their culture don't act nearly as superior.
- In Lands of Arran, the White Elves are presented as better in every way to humans, having a peaceful civilization yet accomplished soldiers, being wiser as they do not exploit the world of Arran only for their own profit and do not kill each other for petty material gains. The third volumes notably portrays Fall, a White Elf, trusting a human and bringing him to the Isles of the White Elves as a tragic mistake leading to a massacre of the Elves.
- The Echidna race in the pre-reboot continuity of Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics). They were isolationist even before the Floating Island came to be and are established as being the first animal race to evolve intelligence, making them the most advanced race on the planet. Under Ken Penders in particular, they always acted superior to everyone else and were never really called out on it, especially the Brotherhood of Guardians, who felt that anything that didn't directly concern the Floating Island wasn't their problem, even Robotnik taking over the rest of Mobius. It isn't until Ian Flynn replaced him as head writer that they finally do get called out for this, with Knuckles taking his father Locke to task over it when he tries to call his son back to the Island while Knothole Kingdom is in the middle of a crisis and Knuckles wants to stay and help his friends.
- In Marvels, Phil Sheldon eventually takes the position that the reason the baseline human population of the Marvelverse resents and protests against the superheroes protecting them is that they're jealous of their inherent nobility and self-sacrifice, rather than the comparatively understandable fear of having what amounts to physical gods brawling in the street. This position is even more odd considering that the series specifically shows Namor the Sub-Mariner's mercurial attitude towards humans and how that influenced public distrust of superheroes — and that a battle between Namor and the Human Torch was what led to the loss of Phil's eye in the first place. Anti-mutant prejudice is also portrayed as an irrational fear of being "replaced" by a posthuman race, despite the existence of criminal mutants providing a much clearer reason for anti-mutant sentiment.
- It's unclear if the reader is supposed to agree with Sheldon, though. Because he does snap out of it by the end, when Spider-Man fails to save Gwen Stacy, and Sheldon comes to the conclusion that he lost his objectivity.
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic (IDW):
- One example is King Aspen and the deer. While it's not to say the deer weren't definitely being victimized by the genuinely evil Well-To-Do and his construction company demolishing their forest, the deer retaliate by invading (read: destroying) towns full of ponies for their land. Even after realizing the ponies were innocent, the deer continued even though it hampered the ponies from aiding them until they got what they wanted. While they did repair the damage they caused, they're never once called on their actions, and in the end, Princess Celestia apologizes to them.
- Downplayed, with Cassie the Kelpie in issue #23, who brainwashed the entire town of Ponyville and had them try to tear down a dam that some friends of hers were stuck behind, uncaring if this flooded all of Ponyville in the process. Although she is Easily Forgiven, Rainbow Dash at least publicly call her out over the fact that this whole mess could have been avoided if she'd simply asked Twilight for help first.
- The mutants in Marvel's Ultimate Universe constantly talk about how genetically superior they are, and how it means they have a higher standard of behavior. On one occasion Professor X tells Cyclops that a certain instance of resentment is a human thing, and he is "pleased to say" Cyclops wouldn't understand. The ordinary human they are talking to at the time says not a word.
- This is especially grating since in the Ultimate Universe practically every character save for Spider-Man is an Adaptational Jerkass. This includes Cyclops, who many if not most readers consider to already be a douche in the regular continuity.
- Plus, in the proper 616 universe, it's the Brotherhood of Mutants who go on about how mutants are genetically superior and their main point of conflict with the X-Men is that the X-Men don't believe this. (Depending on the Writer, of course, but that's how it normally is.)
- What makes this especially ironic is that unlike the Main Marvel Universe of 616, the Ultimate Marvel mutants are not the result of evolution, they're actually a byproduct of the world governments attempting to replicate the Super Soldier Serum after WW2, which ended up screwing with the gene pool when the various failed super-soldier test subjects had kids of their own.
- As of House and Powers of X in 2019/2020, they are all onboard with this, with only a very few exceptions (Wolverine, Jean, and possibly Scott are among them). This leads to unsettling sights like Exodus preaching about mutant superiority in a cult-like atmosphere with a specific devil figure - 'The Pretender' (Wanda Maximoff a.k.a. Scarlet Witch). Oh, and he's preaching to children. As a whole, the representatives of the new mutant nation of Krakoa make no bones about the fact that they see themselves as the rightful inheritors of the Earth and are merely patiently waiting to become the dominant species (which going by In-Universe projected birth-rates, will happen in the next 20 years or so). In the meantime, they will use their miracle drugs (derived from Krakoan plants) to essentially addict humanity - while they aren't addictive by themselves, medicines that can reverse mental degeneration and extend lifespans by about a decade mean that they'll soon have the world by the short hairs. In fact, they outright state it.
- However, it's worth noting that this is slowly cranked down a notch after the initial excitement of establishing a nation is moved past and the Krakoans become much more comfortable in themselves, part of it is posturing, and pretty much everyone thinks Exodus is completely nuts. Wanda is also rehabilitated as 'The Redeemer', by Exodus, after she dies and is resurrected to create a mutant Elysian Fields/ultimate back-up that saved all the mutants that Cerebro wasn't able to pick up before. Additionally, it is also made increasingly clear that not all mutants are onboard with Krakoa, and even those resident on Krakoa aren't necessarily interested in some of its philosophies, and most aren't interested in the ideologies of the leadership on the Quiet Council.
- Even Professor X who is on Quiet Council laments that what Krakoa came to stand for goes against everything he believed in and he mostly just went along with it out of desperation to avoid an seemingly inevitable genocide rather than a true belief in mutants being different from, let alone superior to, humans, a concept he despises.
- This is especially grating since in the Ultimate Universe practically every character save for Spider-Man is an Adaptational Jerkass. This includes Cyclops, who many if not most readers consider to already be a douche in the regular continuity.
