Smell that, son. It's the scent of fuckwit on the air. Yes, I know, we're supposed to be an advanced civilised society, but fuckwits and arseholes still manage to wriggle their way to the top of food chains and under our skin. It's kind of our fault for having a civilised and advanced society that we allow these...um...interesting individuals to burble away and annoy us. Would be nice to just round a few particularly dicky dicks up, through them on an enclosed plain and hunt them down. Population control. Alas the whole 'illegality' and 'immorality' of such a venture bugs some people. For some reason.
I've been vocal about my annoyance at the sexism and misogyny in two of my favourite art forms before. Gaming has seen a high-profile debacle with the Game Jam that went down the toilet because of sexist remarks. You have to applaud the people who put a middle finger up to that shit. It's not the first incident of its kind in gaming and I don't think it will be the last – not for a good long while, sadly. I can't help feeling that all the nasty shit some gamers say while playing online might be the desired end result for some games creators, "I'm miserable, so you're all going to be miserable. Ha ha ha ha ha ha!" Or something.
I want to talk comics, though.
Recently this bullshit pushed its sweaty way into my consciousness. Do I need to tell people what's wrong with this situation? If I do, then please feel free to go for a walk down the middle of a motorway, you know for your own and everyone else's sake. It will be for the best.
Going by the discussion and the toxic sludge that passes for forums and comments sections, talk I must. It's because it talks of a wider problem in our culture, where treating women like punching bags, both emotionally and physically, still doesn't have the stigma it deserves.
Let's go back to that misty time of April 11th of this year, an idyllic time when everyone got along and no one was throwing around rape threats like it was big and clever.
What?
It's never been like that?
Okay, but this part of the story still starts on that date. A day when a woman decided to critique a recent comic book cover. She pointed out that while the figure work was mostly pretty good, the composition was dodgy as fuck. I mean, to me, most of the things around the figures look like they've been scribbled in without any thought about whether they should be there. That lunch bag in Beast Boy's hand looks especially tacked-on. She points out something that could be potentially racist. That last one's hard to call, it could just have been down to the overall iffiness of the composition.
The less ambiguous issue is with Wonder Girl's anatomy. Namely her gigantic, unreal knockers. Miss Asselin rightly takes issue with the blatant sexualisation of a teenage girl, fictional she may be, but it's still a creepy thought. She points out the ridiculous proportions of the character's hips before turning her attention to everything that's wrong with Wonder Girl's breasts. You can read it in the link.
And that's what people took issue with. How dare she, a mere woman and non-artist, criticise a comic artist for DOING WHAT A VAST SWATH OF COMIC ARTISTS DO! Then came the rape threats. Rape threats.
I'll say that a third time so that those of you who don't quite get it can feel the full horror: rape threats. We know the people involved know what they do is wrong because they concealed their activities in private correspondence.
This kind of thing isn't acceptable. This is shit. It's nasty and unpleasant and, if the all-time number one downloaded song ever is an indicator, disgustingly prevalent. We have a culture in which threatening rape is a way of dealing with women. How is this still a thing? Why are we still letting it happen? Are we afraid of losing our bros when we call them on having grotesque attitudes towards women. Let me tell you, you don't need friends like that, yer mate who's always calling women sluts and whores and thinks they're good for nothing but bed post notches is the human equivalent of radioactive waste. His attitudes are going to reflect on you and give your soul cancer. You wouldn't sit on an atomic pile would you? See?
Even in the public domain, people who are supposed to be professionals in the field resorted to, "you have a vagina, so you are wrong," arguments when it was clear their defence of one of their colleagues wasn't going their way. That's harder to deal with, because they don't seem to see what they are doing is wrong. That's a problem too big for my puny brain to think up even a bullshit solution for.
And the argument it's the way comics are done is such a huge pile of bullshit there are satellites orbiting it. We have the capacity to change that particular status quo. Ridiculously-boobed women (teenagers and adult women) are the juvenile fantasies of a small part of the comics community, yet it's those shit heads who call all the shots. Yes, they're the loudest monkeys in the enclosure, but they are also the most stupid, selfish and least representative. Big companies can take away their power with one simple tactic: ignore them. It's not our fault some essential part of their life is missing. Get on with doing shit that isn't offensive in every wrong way and start to grow. You won't be seen as unsympathetic, you'll be seen as smart. Ignore the fuckers who want comics to stay the same stunted medium forever*.
What I say to everyone: is shout as loud as you can about these internet degenerates. Shine a big torch on every reprehensible proclamation. There should be a website dedicated to this, where women who've been on the receiving end of this crap can post the sickening crap they have to put up with so that the rest of us can laugh and the pathetic specimens who feel it's right and proper to verbally beat women down with grimy threats just so they can feel empowered. Would such a place work? Dunno. It would be nice to experiment and see. Someone. Anybody?**
* Actually moderating forums and comments sections might be a good start too. Too many of these places just let slobbering misogyny and any other foul prejudice run rampant without saying much. Don't feed the trolls is not an adequate way to moderate a forum either.
** And fucking hell more shit!
Will
Showing posts with label comics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label comics. Show all posts
Wednesday, 23 April 2014
Saturday, 11 January 2014
Staring at the Puzzle Cube (It is A Cube, Right?)
Alan Moore and Grant Morrison are a strange pair. They’ve got that thing about magic. Well, Alan Moore is a practitioner of Magic, while Grant Morrison is a man who goes in for Chaos Magick (pronounced Mage-ick, if my sketchy sources are to be believed, don’t put too much stock in it). I won’t go into what either of these things actually mean, because I don’t fucking know and I don’t have time to rummage around to find out. Actually, their interest in these similar-sounding esoteric pastimes is really the only strange thing about either of them.
Not being friends with either man and not even being acquainted with one, I can’t give any insights into their thought processes. You know, that whole having only a shallow exposure to them, so anything I were to say about what’s going on in their weirdly oppositely-haired domes is going to speculative at absolute best and spurious at worst. I hate spurious.
Fucking hell this is starting to sound serious. Lemme give some disclosure, I’m not an academic* or a journalist. Anybody who claims so is up to something and should probably be hunted down and forced to do something unpleasant, like watch nothing but Eastenders and River City for a week. Yes, I am a terrible man.
Anyway.
I find they both sound even-tempered and reasonable when they speak. The only anger I’ve ever encountered (in my limited experience, mind you, I have to stress that again for those gimps picking and choosing words to use against me) is from Grant Morrison when he talks about Mark Millar. A whooooooole different kettle of bile, there, and something I will never touch on again. Intelligence is the lasting impression from Morrison and Moore.
They are both also highly successful and influential comic story tellers with a background in artwork. Watchmen, V for Vendetta and From Hell are some of the seminal comics works Alan Moore has graced the world with. Grant Morrison spent five years telling the story of The Invisibles. Both have done much, much more than I’ve listed and you have to whole internet right there to find out, you lazy fuck. They’ve both got something of a pedigree, in case you aren’t familiar.
There is also THE FEUD. Alan Moore doesn’t like Grant Morrison. At least that was the impression given for a long time and the best you could say was Moore wasn’t a fan. Then an interview with Pádraig Ó Méalóid, claiming to be Moore’s last, swatted the internet in the buttocks a few days ago. And my, my did it get a squealy reaction. Moore hates, hates, hates, hates, HATES, HATES, FUCKIN’ HATES Grant Morrison. With a side order of hate**.
My understanding is that Grant Morrison, again, until recently wasn’t entirely in love with Alan Moore either. Again, this changed with an interview at the end of 2012 conducted by Laura Sneddon in which he showed some consternation and confusion about the tension between himself and Alan Moore, as well as the timeline and events†.
The comics internet was shaken to its core and turned a lot of people into fuckin’ Twilight fans – turning into Team Moore and Team Morrison with all the ridiculously juvenile and noxious bullshit that entails. Seriously I’m embarrassed for the comics community (and some of the industry) for the way this whole business has been treated. Them and us isn’t a healthy attitude in relation to a personal conflict like this, no matter if the participants want you to do it‡. It’s human nature to leap on a flaw of someone you aren’t enamoured with§, but I do wish more people, people who oughtta know better would take a step back and use the mushy grey stuff in their skulls. Oh, and engage the empathy bone. Essentially a lot of Forest Whitaker eye going on – and there was enough of that anyway.
So, it’s turned into a complete fucking mess with people making arseholes of themselves on either side of the argument. Though there have been some islands of sanity and sense in this lake of bubbling vitriol.
I was going to compare and possibly contrast their accounts of Morrison’s and Moore’s ongoing relationship, because relationship is what it is, one based on verbal swipes through intermediaries. It’s not a pleasant relationship, but there is a connection and it’s something they need to work out between them, without the braying peanut gallery of the internet inciting more from them, something that’s been absent from historical literary feuds. Looking at the two interviews (the Morrison one being a weirdly editorial affair with him adding changes in red and everything) it seems so tangled and twisted I’d just find myself in knots about them. It invites another one of those Can-Can moments, I’m afraid.
So, as I’ve written this, with an eye for looking at the affair, I find myself being distracted and disheartened by something that’s bothered me about the comics community for a long time: the vocal minority of arseholes it engenders. The unwelcoming trolls and ogres who have set themselves up at the gates of the community judging who is worthy, grovelling at the feet of people in the industry while preparing knives to hamstring and hack apart those same individuals. Seeing industry figures jumping in on this behaviour just makes me stand back in confusion and go, “Huh.”
There’s an ingrained aggression in the comics community. Nothing wrong with aggression, it creates energy and drives artistic expression. It’s when this aggression gets redirected at inappropriate sources like women, gays, creators and each other it’s done with all the grisly violence of a troop of chimps taking a baby, and it’s about as brutal and upsetting as that image conjures. It’s what taints the medium for people outside of it. And there’s a lot of writing on this behaviour, particularly the shameful treatment of women (and in the last year, incidentally, of women in the games industry), and I’m not the best source for it.
So what do we do about this handsy uncle no one talks about part of the comics community? Well we start talking about it, we engage it; see if we can change something about it. Not an easy task for the spittle-chinned glaring bastard, threatening us with death and rape, but in this case robust discussion needs to take place. Because (clumsily switching metaphors) cancer doesn’t go away by ignoring it. Treatment, that’s the thing.
It might not be so bad if the industry side of the didn’t foment it and encourage it. Pandering to the lowest members of a rich community is not the way to keep it alive–
Stop acting like cocks, is what I’m saying.
Fucking hell, that’s all it boils down to: stop acting like cocks. Think about what you’re going to say before you launch into a venomous tirade or write yet another story objectifying women and consider, perhaps there’s another way. Being a cock gets you attention but it fucks up the whole place for everyone else. This doesn’t mean disagreements aren’t going to happen, but perhaps it will create discourse a bit better than, “Youre a fucking fagot fucktard,” and it means we can have industry characters who aren’t misogynistic, homophobic narcissists.
Of course, yes, I’ll do the obligatory it’s only a minority of the community who behaves that way. And I wouldn’t say it if it weren’t true, however it would be nicer if it were a dwindling minority. Let them be as vocal as they want, too, then we know who they are and point out to those who don’t know, that’s not the way to behave.
So, what was going to be a sticking my oar in to an argument I have nothing to do with (albeit, I was doing it dispassionately, with a hint of humour§§ and adopting the middle ground) has turned into a small attempt at weakening the hold on the comics community of the sweaty arsehole element. I think that’s in the territory of ‘win’, don’t you?
Now I’ll shut up for a few days.
* Y’know despite this little nugget of internet obscurity having an academic bent. Or it was.
** He’s no fan of Laura Sneddon, either, but that’s for someone else to blether about.
† The Alan Moore interview can be found here: Last Alan Moore Interview? this is a long article. The Grant Morrison interview can be found here: The Strange Case of Alan Moore and Grant Morrison, as Told by Grant Morrison. I so wish these interviews had happened closer together. No doubt by next week there’ll be a new Morrison one.
‡ Which Alan Moore does and it disappointed me. Perhaps it was point-making hyperbole, but it’s so easy to misunderstand. And people did, wilfully and enthusiastically.
§ I’m guilty of it myself and it drives my wife nuts. Doesn’t mean I condone it.
§§ “Y’whut?” I hear you cry. Cunts.
Will
Not being friends with either man and not even being acquainted with one, I can’t give any insights into their thought processes. You know, that whole having only a shallow exposure to them, so anything I were to say about what’s going on in their weirdly oppositely-haired domes is going to speculative at absolute best and spurious at worst. I hate spurious.
Fucking hell this is starting to sound serious. Lemme give some disclosure, I’m not an academic* or a journalist. Anybody who claims so is up to something and should probably be hunted down and forced to do something unpleasant, like watch nothing but Eastenders and River City for a week. Yes, I am a terrible man.
Anyway.
I find they both sound even-tempered and reasonable when they speak. The only anger I’ve ever encountered (in my limited experience, mind you, I have to stress that again for those gimps picking and choosing words to use against me) is from Grant Morrison when he talks about Mark Millar. A whooooooole different kettle of bile, there, and something I will never touch on again. Intelligence is the lasting impression from Morrison and Moore.
They are both also highly successful and influential comic story tellers with a background in artwork. Watchmen, V for Vendetta and From Hell are some of the seminal comics works Alan Moore has graced the world with. Grant Morrison spent five years telling the story of The Invisibles. Both have done much, much more than I’ve listed and you have to whole internet right there to find out, you lazy fuck. They’ve both got something of a pedigree, in case you aren’t familiar.
There is also THE FEUD. Alan Moore doesn’t like Grant Morrison. At least that was the impression given for a long time and the best you could say was Moore wasn’t a fan. Then an interview with Pádraig Ó Méalóid, claiming to be Moore’s last, swatted the internet in the buttocks a few days ago. And my, my did it get a squealy reaction. Moore hates, hates, hates, hates, HATES, HATES, FUCKIN’ HATES Grant Morrison. With a side order of hate**.
My understanding is that Grant Morrison, again, until recently wasn’t entirely in love with Alan Moore either. Again, this changed with an interview at the end of 2012 conducted by Laura Sneddon in which he showed some consternation and confusion about the tension between himself and Alan Moore, as well as the timeline and events†.
The comics internet was shaken to its core and turned a lot of people into fuckin’ Twilight fans – turning into Team Moore and Team Morrison with all the ridiculously juvenile and noxious bullshit that entails. Seriously I’m embarrassed for the comics community (and some of the industry) for the way this whole business has been treated. Them and us isn’t a healthy attitude in relation to a personal conflict like this, no matter if the participants want you to do it‡. It’s human nature to leap on a flaw of someone you aren’t enamoured with§, but I do wish more people, people who oughtta know better would take a step back and use the mushy grey stuff in their skulls. Oh, and engage the empathy bone. Essentially a lot of Forest Whitaker eye going on – and there was enough of that anyway.
So, it’s turned into a complete fucking mess with people making arseholes of themselves on either side of the argument. Though there have been some islands of sanity and sense in this lake of bubbling vitriol.
I was going to compare and possibly contrast their accounts of Morrison’s and Moore’s ongoing relationship, because relationship is what it is, one based on verbal swipes through intermediaries. It’s not a pleasant relationship, but there is a connection and it’s something they need to work out between them, without the braying peanut gallery of the internet inciting more from them, something that’s been absent from historical literary feuds. Looking at the two interviews (the Morrison one being a weirdly editorial affair with him adding changes in red and everything) it seems so tangled and twisted I’d just find myself in knots about them. It invites another one of those Can-Can moments, I’m afraid.
So, as I’ve written this, with an eye for looking at the affair, I find myself being distracted and disheartened by something that’s bothered me about the comics community for a long time: the vocal minority of arseholes it engenders. The unwelcoming trolls and ogres who have set themselves up at the gates of the community judging who is worthy, grovelling at the feet of people in the industry while preparing knives to hamstring and hack apart those same individuals. Seeing industry figures jumping in on this behaviour just makes me stand back in confusion and go, “Huh.”
There’s an ingrained aggression in the comics community. Nothing wrong with aggression, it creates energy and drives artistic expression. It’s when this aggression gets redirected at inappropriate sources like women, gays, creators and each other it’s done with all the grisly violence of a troop of chimps taking a baby, and it’s about as brutal and upsetting as that image conjures. It’s what taints the medium for people outside of it. And there’s a lot of writing on this behaviour, particularly the shameful treatment of women (and in the last year, incidentally, of women in the games industry), and I’m not the best source for it.
So what do we do about this handsy uncle no one talks about part of the comics community? Well we start talking about it, we engage it; see if we can change something about it. Not an easy task for the spittle-chinned glaring bastard, threatening us with death and rape, but in this case robust discussion needs to take place. Because (clumsily switching metaphors) cancer doesn’t go away by ignoring it. Treatment, that’s the thing.
It might not be so bad if the industry side of the didn’t foment it and encourage it. Pandering to the lowest members of a rich community is not the way to keep it alive–
Stop acting like cocks, is what I’m saying.
Fucking hell, that’s all it boils down to: stop acting like cocks. Think about what you’re going to say before you launch into a venomous tirade or write yet another story objectifying women and consider, perhaps there’s another way. Being a cock gets you attention but it fucks up the whole place for everyone else. This doesn’t mean disagreements aren’t going to happen, but perhaps it will create discourse a bit better than, “Youre a fucking fagot fucktard,” and it means we can have industry characters who aren’t misogynistic, homophobic narcissists.
Of course, yes, I’ll do the obligatory it’s only a minority of the community who behaves that way. And I wouldn’t say it if it weren’t true, however it would be nicer if it were a dwindling minority. Let them be as vocal as they want, too, then we know who they are and point out to those who don’t know, that’s not the way to behave.
So, what was going to be a sticking my oar in to an argument I have nothing to do with (albeit, I was doing it dispassionately, with a hint of humour§§ and adopting the middle ground) has turned into a small attempt at weakening the hold on the comics community of the sweaty arsehole element. I think that’s in the territory of ‘win’, don’t you?
Now I’ll shut up for a few days.
* Y’know despite this little nugget of internet obscurity having an academic bent. Or it was.
** He’s no fan of Laura Sneddon, either, but that’s for someone else to blether about.
† The Alan Moore interview can be found here: Last Alan Moore Interview? this is a long article. The Grant Morrison interview can be found here: The Strange Case of Alan Moore and Grant Morrison, as Told by Grant Morrison. I so wish these interviews had happened closer together. No doubt by next week there’ll be a new Morrison one.
‡ Which Alan Moore does and it disappointed me. Perhaps it was point-making hyperbole, but it’s so easy to misunderstand. And people did, wilfully and enthusiastically.
§ I’m guilty of it myself and it drives my wife nuts. Doesn’t mean I condone it.
§§ “Y’whut?” I hear you cry. Cunts.
Will
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