Tweet
I like to think of myself as a connoisseur of comic books. Now one comic book in particular that I have found to be very interesting is The Punisher by Marvel Comics.
The Punisher is about a former soldier whose family was massacred by the Mafia. Since that time, he has carried a very effective one-man war against crime.
In the last few years, The Punisher comic book has been the showcase of, shall we say, repulsive actions, all viewed in living color including but not limited to:
Eviscerations (i.e. disembowlements), cannibalism, rapes, immolations (i.e. setting people on fire), close-ups of violent shootings, death by snakes, piranhas, sharks, polar bears (the scene in which the polar bear swipes the man’s head clean off was simply incredible), beheadings, the destruction of an entire island by a nuclear bomb, a tossing of a gangster from the top of the Empire State building (in the full view of a young teenager who got super excited over it), testicular castrations . . .
I think you get the picture.
But not once, I repeat, not once has any religious right group raised anything resembling anger, outrage, disgust, or downright shock over any of these things.
But these groups are crying bloody murder now and you know what they are angry about?
The wedding of a gay superhero, Northstar, to his boyfriend in another Marvel comic:
From that lovely bastion of phony news, One News Now:
Pro-family groups are outraged by the recent announcement about plans for some comic book super heroes to embrace alternate lifestyles.
. . . Focus on the Family’s Glenn Stanton, director of family formation studies, says it is “shameful” to press this issue upon children.
“What’s really disturbing about this is the real arrogance of these cartoon creators who think their job is not just to entertain, but to indoctrinate, to preach at us,” he observes. “We go to church to be preached at; we don’t go to comics to do that. And again, it’s just arrogance on the part of these creators.”
He also dubs it a political move. “It’s kind of activist comic books, which we don’t need. Comic books are for entertainment; they’re not for activism, social activism,” Stanton contends.
. . .Monica Cole of OneMillionMoms.com, an advocacy branch of the American Family Association, agrees.
“DC Comics and Marvel, they have an agenda, and it’s to indoctrinate children at a younger age,” she laments. “And they’re doing it. They’re being successful at it.”
Now I usually end a piece like this with a quirky comment, but I don’t think I need to.
Sometimes the idiocy of the religious right speaks very well for itself.
3 Comments
The owners of the plantation like to dictate everyone else’s lives because that’s how owning works. To move to a post-plantation world where we all are equal means we have to disrupt the structures and owning behaviors of the the owners. This is a multi-pronged approach but one significant piece is to support the ICC Vatican Prosecution (more background here and updates at SNAP Network). Just the challenge itself tips many folks off to the operations of this organized crime outfit collecting rents from pedophilia, child trafficking, money laundering, insurances, hedge funds and “banking” (not an exhaustive list as they are very secretive, have ties to our government and we don’t know all their operations). The sooner this tax exempt group that has access to nearly every country in the world and its own seat at the UN is disbanded, the criminals are off serving their sentences and their treasure trove of assets (e.g. library of cultural antiquities stolen during prior centuries’ wars they openly conducted) are either repatriated or sold off, the better.
I’ve drawn comics for Marvel and for DC, and I can say there IS a clear agenda… selling comics. Social activism? Don’t make me laugh. Most creators don’t have time to think about anything other than getting their work out on time. This isn’t about indoctrinating anyone. It’s about selling a heap of comics. And guess what, the more noise these groups make, the more copies Marvel is going to sell.
And for the record, if they think these comics are for kids, they’re even more out of touch than I thought. The overwhelming majority of comics are producing for a target audience of 20-30 year old men. And they have been for a long time now. You can still find a few comics geared towards kids, but they’re few and far between.
ummm….growing up in the 60′s and 70′s including a non-white in a comic book was ‘social activism’. I like to think I did learn some things reading those comics and I do hope those who read them today learn something as well.
To have a motto to live by, like “Life, Liberty, the Pursuit of Happiness”
To have a symbol to stand by, um…. 3 gold chevrons under a silver eagle looking forward on a Navy blue feild.
To be able to wear a cape if they want too, (uh, mine’s at the cleaners right now so if the world is in peril please leave a message at the beep and I’ll get right on that as soon as it gets back from the cleaners)