"Now, it's OUR TURN!" (Janet Van Dyne, aka The Wasp)

"Now, it's OUR TURN!" (Janet Van Dyne, aka The Wasp)

That's Janet Van Dyne, also known as The Wasp.

She's been on my mind, because I've been thinking about leadership.  Now, it's no secret that I'm a government employee.  As a result, I was one of the more than 800,000 people who found themselves temporarily out of a job and not being paid during the "Government Shutdown" that ran from October 1st to October 16th.  

So, yeah - you bet I've been thinking about leadership.

More specifically, I've been thinking about what kind of people seek positions of leadership, and whether such people are the sorts of people who ought to be allowed to lead us.

But I'm not just talking about governments.

I'm talking about any group of people that ends up with someone moving into a position of leadership.  And, of course, this has me also thinking about the obstacles some groups of people face in trying to access positions of leadership, up to and including the basic authority of self-determination in various global cultures.

This, of course, has me focusing my thoughts on women and girls, who traditionally and historically have faced uphill battles in many cultures around the globe in terms of leadership and self-determination.  And you know what?  I think that's all the more reason why women and girls can and should lead in so many ways.

But it's not as simple as all that.  It can be complex, and there can be in-fighting and cliques and complications.  There can be disagreements over how to get things done.  And those in positions of authority or renown can sometimes stumble and fall.

This brings me to a key example.

Take this article, for instance.  It really got me thinking about leadership in this way.

Here we have Jezebel, a website that says it's about empowering feminists.

And then they go and publish the following content:

Jezebel is regarded by many people as being an irreverent website that looks at public issues from the point of view of women.  They are often seen as leaders in breaking stories of interest to women from a woman's perspective.

Historically, articles on Jezebel's website have been highly critical of people and policies that objectify or diminish women.  But, then, along comes that article's language:  "Beckies?"  "Uptight suburbanite women?"  "Conservative-looking?"

So this begs the question - is it OK for people to judge women based on how they look?  Is it OK to say that a woman's appearance makes her look "uptight?"  Isn't that dangerously close to the logic that says it's OK for someone to look at a woman and say she looks "loose?"

I submit that it's never cool.  But how could people who are viewed as leaders in pointing out the bad behavior of those who objectify women suddenly go off the rails and do it themselves?

I submit that it's a critical failing of self-analysis, the moment when a cause becomes The Cause, and when the will to power to change the world takes over and overrides common sense.

The temptation to demand control in order to affect change grows too strong, and we end up using the tactics of our opponents.  There's a seductive quality to this will to power.  It whispers to us that we can make the world a better place, if only we sacrifice our principles and use our opponents' methods.

So, if even the best of us can be so quick to give in to temptation, how do we make sure that the people who lead us are the right ones for the job?  How do we monitor the activities of people who take up the mantle of representing our viewpoints and issues?

Here's the answer.

We can't.

Our leaders - whether elected or self-appointed or given the mantle by virtue of happenstance - are not gods.  Gods are fictional.  And, even if our leaders were gods, our fictions tell us the gods wouldn't do that much better than we do, because they'd be subject to the same temptations we mortals deal with day to day.

So is it hopeless?

Of course not.

In America, our principle symbol of liberty is a woman, of course.  And, as you can see in the picture, she holds a torch.  A torch can light the way, but it can also be used to shed light into the darkness.

And that's where I think our responsibility - the responsibility of those who aren't leaders - comes into play.

It's our job to shine our own personal spotlights on the people who choose to be or end up becoming our leaders.

Leaders sometimes mess up.  Leaders sometimes falter.  Leaders often fail us.  And - if we shine our spotlights on them - they often don't live up to our expectations.

But that's precisely why we have to shine that spotlight - every time.

It's not the leaders' job to tell us they're doing a good job.  It's our job to make sure they are.

So what does voting, civic duty and the seductive power of leadership to corrupt have to do with Janet Van Dyne?


The answer is: everything.

Allow me to elaborate with a particular quote from a well-known book.

And it's as simple as that.

And Janet Van Dyne is regarded as one of the greatest leaders of The Avengers for the very reason articulated in the quote.

But to understand Janet's power as a leader, we have to look at her less-than-authoritative beginnings.

Janet, in her inception as a character, wasn't exactly afforded the same respect she has commanded in more modern stories.

At the start, she was portrayed in a very stereotypical fashion, portrayed as a spoiled young woman who was used to living a posh lifestyle.

In other words, few of her teammates saw her as someone with leadership potential.

What's also unfortunate is that Janet's initial contributions to the Avengers team were often restricted.

Writers didn't exactly take advantage of the character to her full potential.

At the start, she wasn't leading much beyond ... wasps.

Janet was, sadly, relegated to such "wasp attacks" - and the occasional spying mission - in these first few adventures.

And nobody was thinking of electing the woman who could control wasps as the leader of a team that sometimes took its orders from Captain America.

But, eventually, she did take a position of leadership.

And, in point of fact, this shift made for a great series of stories - classic Avengers tales, in which we got the chance to see Janet slowly transform from "The Winsome Wasp" into a full-fledged hero and eventually the leader of what's possibly the greatest superhero team in comic books.

But here's the point of it:  Janet didn't set out to lead the Avengers.  She simply got the job after a while - and yes, as it turns out, she was a good leader.  And despite her many costume changes over the years, that mantle of leadership returned again and again - because it suited her.

And Janet inspires me not just for the quality of her leadership or her fashion sense, but for the nature of how she leads.  She inspires me in part because of the difficulties she has faced in her life.  She inspires me because she shows that, when leadership is thrust upon a good person, the person often rises to the occasion.

And I need that reminder in my own life, because of how cynical I can become regarding real life leaders.  I need to immerse myself in a world where brave and courageous leaders fight the good fight to overcome the seductive temptation of corruption.  It's like taking a shower for my mental state - a scrubbing brush I use to exfoliate my spirits when real leaders prove they're beneath our trust.

The Wasp also helps me remember that strength and character don't necessary come from an austere life.  Neither do these traits come from a carefree or untroubled life.  Virtue doesn't always come from someone who has lived a "pure" existence free of adversity.  A person's authority doesn't necessarily mean that person has to never have been a victim in her life.

Janet isn't perfect.  She's made mistakes.  She's taken the wrong path - multiple times.  She's fallen in with bad people and made poor choices. But I still think she's the best leader the Avengers have ever had - and it's in part because of these problems she's overcome.

In other words, it's specifically because she's led a challenged and difficult life that she makes such a good leader - because she's been through the traumas and seen the abuse.

She's seen what sorts of seriously severe damage untamed aggression and corrupt behavior can cause.

And we know from her history with these sorts of traumas that she'd rather suffer untold agony than treat people the way she was once treated in her life.

She has faced abuse and said "no" to the temptation to inflict it on others.  She has risen above any desire to make others suffer to elevate herself from her own suffering.

And when she fights her battles, it's not for herself or her own aggrandizement.  Rather, it's to defend the people who count on her to stand up and represent and guide them.

So what does it mean to be a good leader, then?

To me, it means not wanting to be a leader - the top trait of good leaders throughout history, from a certain point of view.

But it also means being willing to serve as a beacon to inspire others, despite not seeking power.

To me, it's about listening to the voice of one's conscience, and to the voices of the people around you.

It's about prioritizing those voices over the voice that might tell you that you could do "just a little bit more" if you succumbed to those aforementioned temptations.

It's about tuning them out and focusing on what's important, the goal in front of you.

It's about recognizing you're not perfect.

It's about recognizing you make mistakes.

It's about owning your mistakes, no matter how embarrassing they might be.

It's about always seeking truth - both in the world around you and inside of yourself.

It's about being willing to face the ugliness that's inside yourself and other people - and being able to come out the other side of confronting that ugliness with your sanity intact.

It's about finding and using your pride in yourself to go forward, without that pride being muted by what you've faced in the past, and how the voices that narrate the world try to limit what can be achieved - and who can achieve it, and how.

It's about courage that transcends facing off against enemies.  It's the courage to keep your quest to achieve your goals in check, so that your cause doesn't become The Cause.

It's about setting goals with others if you want to change the world you share with them.  It's about recognizing the importance of sharing of yourself.

It's about focusing on recognizing the humanity in your opponents as much as you focus on the humanity of those you support, even at the cost of achievement of what you consider success.

But, to me, all of that is secondary to one element I think every leader should contemplate when making a decision, a question every leader should ask.

I think every leader should be able to ask whether or not they will be able to look back at every decision they have made and determine that it was made not for expediency or convenience or achievement, but because it was truly the most moral and correct decision to make.

When we do that, we can grow from any size to become both leaders and heroes.