Reecey's art and life

I think I’ve figured out what my problem with Kamen Riders is (I have the same problem with Sentai too).

 I mean, Toei calls them superheroes and it doesn’t wash with me. They don’t fight crime, just the forces of evil. So can we really say they count?

 My house mate disagrees, saying that they perform heroic feats and have superpowers, therefore they count.

 Personally though, I find myself disagreeing. I think this may be because Batman is counted as a superhero, as is the Black Canary, Blue Beetle II, Black Panther (I love this guy, he’s a bit self-righteous occasionally, but he’s a superhero. It’s only to be expected) and many other none or low powered superheroes. Their status as superheroes isn’t based on them having powers, it’s based on their behaviour.

 Of course, my housemate argues that Kamen Riders are so overpowered that if they fought crime, then they’d end up killing people. This may be true, but Kamen Riders often kill sentient beings, and occasionally humans too, so I question the validity of this argument. Not just because of that, but for another reason.

 They’re not the only overpowered heroes. Superman famously lives in a world made of cardboard and he still goes after muggers and rescues cats from trees. He can kill people just by looking at them in a very literal way.

 No Kamen Rider is actually that powerful, and yet, they don’t fight crime. My housemate’s insistence that they don’t because they don’t want to hurt people falls flat in my opinion because in all the Kamen Rider series I’ve seen (which is admittedly only three) there’s never any talk about it. They don’t think about it, nor do they try and end up doing some real damage and never do it again. It’s more like it never crosses their mind. If he’d seen something like this happen in a series, then he would have mentioned it.

 So, do they count?

 Strictly speaking, the definition of superhero is vague enough that they do count, in exactly the same way that Batman counts. However, in my opinion? I don’t think so.

 Kamen Riders are most definitely heroes with superpowers, but I think they fall a little short of being ‘superheroes’.

 For that, they’d need to fight crime as well as the forces of evil.