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Designated Sidekick *I do want to put an explanation on this point: This is a surprisingly recurrent …. I love being the goddamn Designated Sidekick. …
girl-wonder.org/designatedsidekick/ - 51k - 22 Jun 2007
Google makes me sound like a Frank Miller character. What happened to their promise of not doing evil?
(I’m not actually dead. Really. It’s June still isn’t it?)
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The Paper Mirror [link via Via [tekanji]@shrub]
I didn’t see myself reflected in the same panels which tekanji used, which itself is the nature of the paper mirror. What I did see in these two frames was something I’d taken for granted. Something Willow E pointed out…
… I want to see myself reflected in our modern myths, in these powerful tales of courage and wit, bravery, sacrifice and determination. I want my own heroes (those just like me through appearances, background or ethnicity) to be weaved into the general tapestry. I want the lessons learned and encouragements given to apply to me (and other women like me). I want to see aspects of my dreamings.
- Willow E of Seeking Avalon guest blogging on GRC …
I have to admit to being both clueless and getting the point in parallel. It’s not an acheivement, it’s a mistake of assumption that because I read that as a post from a fan of comics, so would everbody else. We’d all pick up the column, see that point, get that point, and go “Yes, this is what comic creators need to think about. Telling stories that resonate with the readers through characters they can identify with in their own lives” . After all… back in January, I was after the same thing
Some of those more and more readers might actually want to see characters that speak to their lives, their desires, their hopes and their dreams. When I was in high school, having Oliver Queen and Dick Grayson was to have characters who I could identify with, and to use to pin my fantasied reality of an ideal world to my reality. I wanted to be Oliver Queen, muckraking journalist by day, costumed crime fighter by night. I had that character, and the white male middle class entitled and privileged costumed hero to call my own.
For me, Ollie Queen wasn’t about being deniably ambiguous. He was about being identifiable and unambiguous.What’s wrong with wanting the rest of the place to have characters they can call their own without having to permanently wear a shadow of deniability?
There’s something about the paper mirror that I’d forgotten. Something, that by virtue of my position in society, I’d overlooked. I’m used to seeing the reflection, to seeing the character that’s about me, for me, by people who want to tell stories to me. I talk a lot about identifying with Green Arrow as my paper reflection, as many people have noticed. In the last couple of days, I realised something.
 I may want to be Green Arrow, but I’m Green Lantern. I’m white, I’ve got authority and power, I’ve got privilege, and I’ve been blind to race. I never addressed race because I never thought of it because I’m part of the crew that benefits from the invisibility of others. When Willow E talks of identity, it’s identity of race. When I talk of identity, it’s for gender or sexual orientation, because I have unambiguously white characters to call my own. I can identify with Dick Grayson or Oliver Queen or hundreds of other white characters. This option isn’t there for everyone, and I never noticed that.
Since Willow’s post, I’ve been facing up to that realisation that I never dealt with an issue so ingrained to the treatment of people as people, not little categories of [Us][Sort of like us]and[Other]. Part of facing up to that fact has been that I have not wanted to willingly accept the responsibility for missing this, or taking it on in the future.
I wanted to say “Hey, look, having enough trouble holding it together on the whole feminism front, so, uh, I’ll take a pass on the race issue”. Here I am sitting in my nice safe suburb, with my nice safe career in my nice safe established comfort zone thinking about conceptual paradigms of “mission creep” to justify ignoring racial issues.
I want this to be very clear. I wanted to not tackle this, and I wanted to justify my way out of dealing with the issues and excuse myself from room and slink off to a comfort zone.
It’s one thing to be blind.
It’s another to close your eyes tightly and claim not to be able to see.
So, the way I see it is this - I have a choice.
I can open my eyes, and start down the path to doing something positive to address the issue of race in the DS column, and in my life.
I can keep my eyes closed and say “I benefit from this, I wish for it to continue”.
I could mount an argument against getting involved, I could justify my way out of it, and I’d be able to point to all sorts of justifications and probably even some citations and references. I’d be talking complete bullshit though, I didn’t tackle race before because I didn’t see it. Now it’s been pointed out to me, I don’t have that excuse.
To be bluntly honest, I ran through a bunch of thought processes.
- “I don’t want to have to deal with this” (What? I think everyone else wants to?)
- “But I’m just a white guy with privilege, what use can I be?” (this stopped me with feminism?)
- What do I know about race?” (what did I know about marketing before I started studying it?)
- “I’ve been a big enough class traitor over feminism*” (seriously, see the footnote for explanation)
I spared myself the embarrassment of dredging the truly inane squares on the bingo card, but I figure 3 squares and the freebie before I hit the brakes on shy of calling out “HOUSE”.
For a few days, I have given the idea of keeping my eyes closed serious consideration. This is an unpleasant truth to consider, for me to say and perhaps for you to read. But it is a necessary truth for me to have to realise - for a period of time, knowing that there was a problem, I wanted to not get involved. I ain’t no saint, I ain’t looking for pats on the back (or the metaphorical cookie). Just a record of the realisation that I had a choice here, and I had to think about that choice, and when I made that decision, it was just that - a decision. It wasn’t innate, it wasn’t automatic and for anyone else who finds themselves in my position, understand that the temptation to look the other way was strong.
I want to open my eyes. The light’s gonna hurt like hell, but I ain’t doing this because I want to feel better about myself. I’m doing this because closing my eyes and wishing for it to go away is to support making people invisible. To perpetuate something that is wrong, and to support with actions what I oppose with words.
Individual responsibility means fronting up and making the personal changes. It means saying “I” a lot, and doing things by myself but not necessarily for myself.I have a lot of work to do to in this area, and I will make mistakes, and I run the risk of backsliding and not addressing any race issues over time. But I know as well, I’m not doing this alone, and I know that I have access to a truly amazing community of people, both within Girl-Wonder, and across the broader internet.
Year Two of operation ain’t gonna be easy.
Count me in.
Designated Sidekick
*I do want to put an explanation on this point: This is a surprisingly recurrent issue in my head. I know that I was raised by the patriarchal system and attending an all male Christian Brothers school under the patronage of Saint Joseph is pretty much the pinnacle patriarchy factory. Some days, I can’t stop the thought that I am actually a traitor to my class from popping into my head. There’s some deep code that runs under the surface and I know it’s there. That’s doesn’t stop the code from running, it just helps identify the source of the pop-up windows in my mind, and knowing what’s my thoughts, and what’s a residue from the system that was meant to keep me in line.
Discuss the post here in the comments, or down yonder on the G-W Message Boards
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Word on the street is there’s an exclusive club.
So exclusive, the founder doesn’t even get to join.
It’s a draftee only affair.
You don’t actually get to volunteer in the traditional sense, you’re drafted by committee of one, and only after strict membership vetting procedures.
I refer of course, to Misty Lee’s comment
“And you know, also, someone raised the point in, I don’t know if it was in a forum I was reading but it’s something I’ve heard a million times before - but usually, the strongest and loudest protest over sexy things come from ugly fat girls.”
Okay, here goes my audition.
[VOICE TYPE = LOUD]
[COMPLAINT TYPE = STRONG]
Here’s a short list of problems I have with the “sexy”
- The sexy is used during violent events of a story.
- The Sexy is used to justify misrepresenting both comic book characters and content of the comic books when used on the covers
- See also the dismissal of any part of the comic book buying population that pays money for your product as “outsiders” because they don’t want bondage scenes on the book covers for teenage comics
- Trying to expand the readership of comics by BRINGING DA SEXY TO THEM by… wait, does anyone actually believe that? That comics are putting the sexy on for women by having muscle bound men do manly things?
- If so, why are these beefcake men with their rock hard pecs and their toned abs totally flat groined? Steroids only cause shrinkage of the testicles (tho, as my reference site puts it “won’t do your pants package any favours” is a good description of being male in comic books) All packaging, no package.
- See also putting signs out with “CHICKS WANTED FOR TOTALLY NOT SEXIST COMIC BOOK READERS CLUB” on the door, then having “YOU MUST BE THIS SEXY TO ENTER” signs in the entrance way after they’ve been charged for the door price
- See also opening another comic book club called “THE CHIX ONLY COMIC BOOK CLUB”, decorating in pastels and pinks, and naming it after a derogatory slang term for women, and wondering why the women who wanted to read about superheros aren’t thrilled to be thrown out of the superhero comic book club to a club that still doesn’t serve superhero comics.
- Responding to said complaints with “Go read manga”
- Then complaining when manga sells more.
- The sexy is so narrowly defined as “Stuff for heterosexual men” that it causes a major freak out when a non erect penis appears on a cover….
- Since y’know, comic book covers are about the sexy.
- And there’s nothing sexy about a penis.
- And if there is something sexy about it, it’s called yaoi
- And if there’s something sexy about yaoi it’s that chicks dig yaoi.
- And the fact that women constant get to look at the anatomy of other women if they want to read comics, but it’s the end of the universe as we know it for a man to see another man’s penis in artistic rendered underwear… dudes, seriously, WTF? Has it occurred to you that maybe if you’re this freak by seeing another guy’s concealed crotch, you might want to start asking yourself how happy women are about the constant pantyshot-o-rama of drawing comic book women. Maybe, just maybe, we could stop focusing on the crotchwork of the comics and start focusing on the actual crime fighting stuff and superheroism?
- And the fact that if I was Citizen Steel, I’d be asking for an outfitting from the Gray Nicolls Cricket Protector series. This is the armour worn by men to play a game of cricket. I’d be unwilling to fight crime in much less than some of the hardware on offer here. Especially the Abdo Guard. That would have to be the minimum starting point for armor plating.
- [Disclaimer: I’m not a share holder in Gray Nicolls. I’ve just had the luxury of having been wearing one of their guards on the occassions where I was stabbed in the crotch in the course of a fencing bout and during a martial arts contest. Having been kicked in the groin with the guard, and with out, I can tell you, they make quality armour that does the job of keeping your parts isolated from the other person’s attacks.]
- That the sexy is so important it involves see how much anatomical detail of a women’s crotch area you can put into the art work as a challenge (eg Huntress’s navel (I haz link! YAY! Well, yay for the link, not the content of the link. Seriously.
don’t have the links to the art handy. Commenters? If you could be so kind)
- The sexy is the reason books are selling to young men, and young men are getting their access to the sexy via the drawings of older men.
- The sexy totally justifies the thought process that goes into thinking that the purpose of a comic book is to sexually arouse teenagers.
- The sexy totally justifies selling soft core porn to underage markets in the guise of action hero and crime fighting. It’s really, not a comforting thought to know that female characters are intentionally drawn as masturbation fodder for teenage and preteen boys.
- The sexy is totally not connected to the sleaziness of the above two statements. It’s the sexy, and it’s sexy and it’s okay because it’s the sexy and that’s totally not creepy territory to think of commercial exploiting the developing sexuality of teenage boys.
- The emphasis on the physical characteristics of the complainant and the dismissal because it wasn’t made by someone who qualifies in the narrow interpretation of “the sexy”.
- I sure as hell am not the sexy (do not take this as a call to tell me I am. I’m not. My spine supports loads and it can’t form S, and I have internal organs. I am not the sexy)
- I sure as hell am complaining about the sexy
- I sure as hell had my complaints and my opinions dismissed by Misty Lee’s sweeping generalised statement.
- Wow. My opinion invalidated and made invisible.
- You know, I have a really snarky comment to make here about the fact that’s not supposed to happen to me, since I’m male and privileged. I just won’t get to be able to put the right level of dripping sarcasm on a text medium.
- I will say, one of the beneficial aspects of this gig is experiences like this, where I’m made to feel invisible or discredited or non existent. It helps with the reality check in the rest of my white male power privileged life. I know what I feel here is nothing compared to what people go through in their lives, but as a “hey, Steve, keep it in check and keep it in mind”, it’s a good reminder. When something like privilege is is so pervasive, I get to see it by its absence more than its presence. Right here, right now, this debate? Male voices don’t even seem to get a courtesy STFU, let alone the rebuttal that’s aimed at the female voices.
Well. I hope I pass the audition. Thanks to Thomwade for the post o’ membership recruiting and to all the people who’ve said I could be part of the club, and whoever it was who was brave enough to transcribe that section.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to rock the suburbs to regain some lost ground.
Apply for membership in the club by stating your claim here at the G-W forum
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Comic books would like to remind you that they target specific markets.
Citizen Steel is demonstrating which part of the young male market that certain publishers think is the most valuable to target.
Thank you for your continued cooperation in this matter.
I have been told that cheesecake sells, and the promotion of sexualised women is a financially viable commodity. I usually disagree with this point, but, assuming that this is correct, and cheesecake is a financial viable medium, why don’t more men produce their own comics? The word is that there’s a market for it. I’ve heard comic book bloggers and forum members say there’s a need for it. It’s been said to be profitable. Why don’t more men show the Tony Stark sort of entrepreneurial get go to get their own slice of the (American) pie?
Competition, reduction of competition, and a market opening
If you’re into comic books for the breasts and dollars, would it not become in your interest for Marvel and DC to be moved out this arena? You could motivate yourself with a burning dissatisfaction about the smallness of PowerGirl’s breasts by creating your own comics where you would be able to provide a commercially viable product for the market that seeks hand drawn women, drawn by men (and women), for other men (and women), in male pleasing sexualised poses.
You’d be able to make your Powergirl’s breasts as big as you pleased. Plus! With an upsurge in non sexualised comics, Marvel and DC would have taken those annoying comic book fans who want art and story and characterisation and all of those other problematic elements that relegate breasts to second place out of your way, and left you with a massively profitable market of men and women who just want sexualised content.
So, for the male gaze crew who promote the incorporation of sexualised women in mainstream comics, why not go make your own comics?
I’m told it’s profitable, right?
Discuss this on the G-W Forums
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Fred, over yonder at Slacktivist, makes the point on tolerance
About here, inevitably, someone will chime in with what they seem to think of as the trump card for the religious totalitarian perspective. Aha! they will say, so what you’re saying is you’re all for tolerance, except when it comes to people who are intolerant!
Well, yeah. And also, duh. Antonyms are incompatible. Opposites are opposed. That’s not a particularly noteworthy observation, so I’ve always been baffled as to why this bit of adolescent wordplay was regarded as meaningful.
Not directly on comics, but associated with a lot of the attitudes that come with the territory of trying actually improve the lot for a wider range of people than those currently benefiting from a given situation. Sometimes, one of the problematic issues of being the good guys is that we’re not allowed to go and silence those we are in disagreement with, even if those same people would have no qualms about shutting us up and shutting us down.
But somedays, tolerating the intolerable isn’t an option - particularly when it’s the reason you’re protesting, putting forth an alternate view or saying “Hey, I don’t want this”. By opposing whatever it is, from the cover of H4H to the Mary Jane statue to the first, last or next issue, you become an opponent to what was created that bugged the hell out of you. It’s how the language codes it, the system scores it, and reality works.
Telling me that if I want to be tolerant, I have to tolerate intolerance is like telling me that in order to diversify my interests, I should narrow them down. Broaden the diversity of my superhero team by reducing the membership to only white male heroes to prove that we’re so diverse, we can have a monoracial single gender team.
Yes, random abstracted thought is a by-product of me working late nights and tinkering with wiring on things yet to be released on the world. Speaking of which, anyone know where I can get a supply of vibranium? E-bay is proving recalcitrant.
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