Editors’ note: The opinions and ideas expressed in The Accidental Gentrifist are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the outlook and belief of anyone else in the Ist network.

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Editor's introduction: Ben Reed is an Austin author, pedal pusher, and appreciator of well prepared fish. He lives and writes on the east side, and will be contributing to the Austinist on a bi-weekly basis. Cheers!

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If you were ever part of the bar scene of downtown Austin, specifically on Red River, you might know the man of whom I am about to speak. For the sake on anonymity (and because I don’t know his real name), I will refer to him simply as Batman. Because, for one, he had the Batman logo tattooed across is chest. And he would wear Batman-esque boots. He also seemed especially physically fit, and not without the easy charm of a Bruce Wayne. And, on at least one occasion, he gelled his hair to resemble the bat ears of same caped crusader. Further, on one Halloween I spied him dressed in a Keaton/Kilmer-era costume so realistic, I swore he must have stolen it from Warner Bros. Finally, I seem to recall his car was not un-Batmanlike. Like himself, some kind of classic convertible. A friend believes he’s some kind of car salesman. But then, everybody needs an alter-ego.

But more on him in a moment. First, a little background:

In 1886, Robert Louis Stevenson’s novella The Strange Case of Dr .Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was a best-seller and immediate success, renown for its unprecedented and realistic portrayal of the psychopathology of split personalities. While shape-shifting and doppelgängers had already been present in European folklore for centuries, the duality of Jekyll and Hyde would lay the framework for the heroes and antiheroes of popular culture to this very day, birthing the hyperealized expression of inner conflict and private wars between good and evil, reaching a zenith over a halcyon half century of American pop culture, where a long line of oddly-clad heroes with split personas transitioned seamlessly (no pun intended) from radio and comics to television and film, losing nothing as they changed media. These symbolic figures were so laden with universality and psychological import that they were consistently—even superlatively—human. Even when placed in dubious or unbelievable situations, some of which involved laser beams and death-rays and moats full of unforgiving crocodiles.

Throughout, these heroes have given us not just themselves, but their alter-egos as well. In 1919 it was Don Diego Vega as Zorro. The 1930’s gave us Kent Allard as The Shadow, Clark Kent as savior/stud Superman, Dan Reid as The Lone Ranger, his son Britt as The Green Hornet, ‘Kit’ Walker as The Phantom, and, of course, Bruce Wayne as Batman. The 40’s saw the introduction of Alan Scott as The Green Lantern, Billy Batson as Captain Marvel, Steve Rogers as Captain America, and the lovely Grecian Wonder Woman, sometimes assuming the identity of Nurse Diana Prince. The Post-war era saw no freshman with any real shelf life. Bruce Banner became The Incredible Hulk in 1961, ushering in the Marvel age as well as Peter Parker (perhaps the first awkward teen alter-ego), followed by the blind Matthew Murdock as Daredevil. The 1970’s bequeathed Johnny Blaze as Ghost Rider and James ‘Logan’ Howlett as Wolverine. The 1980’s… well, there was Prince Adam, who hefted his large steel phallus to become He-Man, a medieval/extra-terrestrial gladiator whose curtains didn’t exactly match his drapes. (The eyebrows always give it away.)

The above list of characters includes three men in black masks, a blind devil, a brutish green colossus who can’t control his destructive rage, a bat, a spider, a hornet, a wolverine, a biker with a burning skull for a head, a chain smoker with metallic claws for knuckles and a top-heavy, ambiguously gay, steroidal homunculus with a pageboy haircut. And these are the good guys. The base fear and atavistic lethality of these symbolic incarnations represent the nature of the rage and fear that the alter-ego compartmentalizes into a positive agent of justice. Keep in mind, the mask always becomes the 'real' identity, just as the alter-ego ironically becomes the mask.

In a Freudian sense, alter-ego is really Super-Ego, acting as the pillar of the conscience and maintaining ingrained prohibitions against cultural taboos—which ostensibly include skulking about metropolitan back alleys in a cape and tights. The ‘super’ identity is more like the Ego: His (or her) physical survival depends on a defensive mechanisms that mediates morality (justice) with primitive drives (revenge). A balancing act between the strategic and contemplative Super-Ego and the sexual and aggressive id. Heroes are, in reality, how we sometimes wish to see ourselves: fantastically capable and virtuous incarnations, a fully integrated fusion of man and champion.

Comic book writer Warren Ellis asserts that he’s only credited with inventing the phrase ‘Underwear Perverts’ because Boing Boing editor Cory Doctorow said so. What, you ask, is an Underwear Pervert? Well, they belong to a phenomenon of ‘normal’ people who don homemade costumes before leaving their homes to ‘fight crime’.

Exhibit A: Citizen Prime. An Arizona businessman named Jim. By night he cruises Tempe in a Nissan X-Terra equipped with a stun gun, a police baton, and beanbag-firing rifle. He spent over $4,000 on his costume and his Myspace page plays the Buckaroo Bonzai theme song. There you can listen to his radio program (which asks, ‘Are you primed?’) and link to the profiles of his own gaggle of Super (Myspace) Friends, which include Savage Sparrow, Tothian™, and, my personal favorite: Slapjack.

Let’s ignore, for a moment, the disconcerting image of middle-income men armed with quasi-lethal antipersonnel devices, sleeplessly cruising urban desert wastelands in over-powered and under-braked Japanese SUVs. Let us consider, for a moment, the intent. Caped crusaders are the resurrection of our idealized identity, risen phoenix-like from the ashes of their own worst defeats, losses, and humiliations. They return for only one reason, which is the opposite of villainy: to prevent others from experiencing that same fracture and pain. And if that is what lies at the heart of these perverts, well, I’m on board… as long as a slow night fighting crime doesn’t result in them crossing my path as I’m (peacefully!) stumbling home after a long night out.

When I hear stories of men like Citizen Prime, I often think of Austin’s own Batman, and I wonder: Do the Underwear Perverts mock him for not thinking of an ‘original’ name and costume? And does he consider himself to be in a different place, heroically and artistically, to pay homage to a classic hero in lieu of enjoining his own custodial war against the dregs of society? Or does he? And finally, if I were to ask him these questions, would he stun me?