Unsurprisingly, the reaction to the news that Ben Affleck will portray Batman in the upcoming Man of Steel sequel has been swift and merciless: fans aren't happy, and they're using the Change.org petition site to express that displeasure. According to Variety, more than 30 petitions have popped up to request that Ben Affleck be barred from portraying one of DC's most prominent superheroes. For example, as of this writing, nearly 10,000 people have signed a petition that simply asks Warner Bros. to remove Ben Affleck from the project, and the comments section is positively filled with vitrol. "Affleck will fail as Batman and disappoint us all," writes Aryana A. "He is worse than George Clooney as Batman," says Vinicius Moretti.

On and on it goes, and that's just one single petition. However, it looks like some of those petitions have been pulled down, as there appear to be far less than 30 petitions actually active at the moment. The petitions went beyond Change.org, however — someone even submitted a petition to the White House "We the People" petition system that asked the government to make it illegal for Ben Affleck to portray Batman, or any other superhero, for 200 years. The petition has since been removed, but you can just take a look at Twitter to find plenty more disgruntled fans. Amidst the noise, however, there are the occasional voices of reason standing up in favor of Affleck — or at the very least, encouraging people to wait until he's actually put on the mask.