A judge has declared that the X-Men, that outcast band of mutant heroes, feared and hated by the ones they protect, are, in fact, not human, but “nonhuman creatures.”
Ironically, the ruling comes at the behest of Marvel itself.
Marvel subsidiary Toy Biz Inc. pushed Judge Barzilay to declare its heroes nonhuman so it could win a lower duty rate on action figures imported from China in the mid-1990s. At the time, tariffs put higher duties on dolls than toys. According to the U.S. tariff code, human figures are dolls, while figures representing animals or “creatures,” such as monsters and robots, are deemed toys.
Those tariffs have both been dropped, but Toy Biz is still embroiled in a suit with the Customs Service over the tariffs at the time.
Also ironically, it was the US government that was coming to the aid of our embattled mutants.
Toy Biz, in its filings, pulled no punches. The figures “stand as potent witnesses for their status as nonhuman creatures,” the company argued. How could they be humans, Toy Biz said, if they possessed “tentacles, claws, wings or robotic limbs?”
The U.S. government showed more feeling. Each figure had a “distinctive individual personality,” the federal legal team argued. Some were Russians, Japanese, black, white, women, even handicapped. Wolverine, the government insisted, was simply “a man with prosthetic hands.” Justice Department lawyers who handled the case didn’t return calls seeking comment.
Nuff said.
(via BoingBoing)
Man, people are taking this way too seriously! They’re acting as if this ruling somehow affects the characters in the comics. Just chuckle over it and then forget it, guys!
Actually, I think it would be amusing if they somehow did manage to work this into the storyline.