We all know Japan is much more enlightened than that - they've got women as refrigerators!

^^It goes without saying that they are welcome to enjoy it. Negative criticism does not mean "you cant enjoy this" nor is it a personal attack of any sort.

That is cute and all but is your female refrigerator a Zombie?
http://multiversitycomics.com/columns/the-short-report-black-lan terns-in-refrigerators/

Comic you so crazy! Her Black Lantern ring was a magnet. Satire at it´s finest.

________________
I also read EU/US comics and am a librarian.
Manga-Masters, My ANN-Lists + Imdb

The "women in refrigerators" concept has got to be one of the dumbest things to ever be bemoaned over.
So it's basically violence against women, right? Like offing a female character?
What's wrong with that, exactly? To create quick tragedy and revenge plots, you always kill someone.

Like all those widowed female detectives out there on tv,
not to mention the ones with dead boyfriends.
Three quick examples come to mind:










________________
Hrodulf and Bjornolfr, you will not be forgotten.

And if the world were black and white,
you would be my rainbow in shades of grey.

Click 'n Play!

If I had a fantasy self, it'd be a tentacle monster.

Sorry Nightswan you are in the wrong here (but Dexter S.1-4 + 7 are good).
Superhero tales / comics in general were famous for female characters abused just to create drama for the male leads. I love the medium but even i can´t deny that. I have read all the books on the history of comics / manga but more importantly have followed both mediums since the mid 90´s and have read comics that are over 100 years old.
First a history lesson: http://wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Moulton_Marston
That man came up with Wonder Woman who in is inherently a bit problematic but also a feminist icon. His tale, involves the Polygraph Test, BDSM and his age gap polygamous relationship with 2 bisexual women. We already started on a high note so on to THE comic death and can you guess the gender?

The Death of Gwen Stacy (1973) is my favorite Spidy tale after Kraven´s Last Hunt (where the script was written for Batman) as its showed the price of being Spider-man but she actually died because editorial though that the unavoidable marriage would age him too much and they couldn´t resolve it otherwise. Then the Sins Past ( 2004) ret-con happened where i got to learn that she fathered fast growing twins with the Goblin month earlier to make the death more "edgy" and the daughter who looks about 18 but is about 5 tried to get frisky with Peter too. I even so got to see Norman Osborn´s cum face. This comic is worse when Spiderman sold his marriage to Satan later and Marvel went bankrupt in the 90s due to comparable stuns (and Iron-teen is later linked).

The Rape of Ms. Marvel (1980) http://geekinsider.com/on-the-rape-of-ms-marvel/
If you think that it was ok that the writers decided to have their Wonder Woman analog raped by her own "son" while the Avengers stood by and smiled on in an all ages anniversary issue then all is lost on you. Can you imagine her upcoming film series to do any of this as Mr. Mickey Mouse certainly can´t.
Equality famous is Supergirl´s good death in Crisis on Infinite Earths (1985-86) as she needed to die because her existence made Superman less unique which is the worst reason to kill a character bar none.

Batgirl(s) Begins: http://io9.com/the-long-and-terrible-history-of-dc-comics-mistreatin g-1694768031 DC editorial knows how to pick scandals and i was furious when they turned Batgirl No.2 Cassanda into a murder after 70 issues of character development in her title because Robin 3´s comic needed a new villain. Barabara Gordon is the OG flavor and was was crippled in "The Killing Joke" (1988) because editorial wanted here gone but it needs to be acknowledged that her father was tortured by the Joker also and the comic is a masterpiece of modern literature (and Alan Moore's hatred of it only makes it better as he worships a snake god in RL).
Her character-saving and frankly defining transformation into Oracle in Suicide Squad later was a saving throw out of nowhere by Kim Yale and John Ostrander. He especially is a hero of the publishing world as he also created Amanda Waller who is the original black Nick Fury but more badass. It´s was pretty anti-feministic of DC to de-age and have the formerly obese woman loose her weight (John Ostrander was not amused) for the New 52 but at least they left the core character alone. I like both New52 versions (the darker first take is better) of Babs but one can also be too "correct" and she needs to get back into the wheelchair as harsh as that may sound as her paraplegic 10 years older pre New52 version became an icon for this female reader with Muscular Dystrophy: http://newsarama.com/7777-gail-jill-and-babs-a-conversation-abou t-batgirl-oracle.html
DC accidentally did something heroes are supposed to do with Oracle without planing. Inspire and set an example and Gail Simone even explains again how her Women in Refrigerators blog came about while acknowledging the Killing Jokes strengths. The disabled fan also mentioned a then recent mini series (part 1 is in the link too) i also liked. It had a scene of her washing herself and the internet was "angry" back then how DC dared to sexualize a crippled women but the creative team did something very different. They showed how much of a struggle daily tasks would be for her and her own book Birds of Prey had similar scenes with zero problems but NO thinking is hard and being offended by tasteful nudity in a preview page is easy as they didn´t bother to read it.

Green Lantern No. 4 Kyle Rayner is the the trope maker with the death of his love Alexandra DeWitt: http://toplessrobot.com/2008/06/the_10_worst_women_in_refrid gerators_ie_cases_of_v.php?page=2
That thing will and should never be forgotten as it also came right after the previous Green Lantern Hall Jordan went insane after his city was nuked and proceeded to become a mass murderer. He died, got better 15 years later and was even de-aged but Alexandra stayed in the fridge as her death was character defining for the then new Kyle. Even his next girlfriend Jade died but she is as Superhero so she came back. Alexandra also got one final go at Kyle in the form of a Zombie fridge as you see in my previous post.

A lot of 90s comics need to be closely examined by future generation so trash like it will befall us again as everyone wanted to be Watchmen without understanding that Watchmen villefied such shit but it was the time of Spawn (the first 50 issues + the HBO toon are good) and Rob Liefeld = RAGE. The whole thing is a bit sad as the author Ron Martz who broke the camels back by throwing a fridge on it then fathered a critical acclaimed 8 years long Witchblade run that made the character (and the Darkness too) relevant for the first time. He even came back last year to write her tales again to big success as the follow-up writers weren´t bringing it. Even his long GL run isn´t trash.

Now to the last 10 years as we didn´t quite stop during the 90s when we all finally had enough: http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100104084159/marvel_dc/i mages/d/dd/Sue_Dibny_raped.jpg
Sue Dibny was raped by Doctor Light (a Teen Titans joke villain) in the Identity Crisis (2004) crossover because editorial thought that the story wasn´t as "socially relevant" in it´s original form as the Marvel comics from that time. Well Marvel´s awesome 17+ "Alias" (soon on Netflix) had both anal sex and later (psychosexual) rape so let´s do both they said! She was "only" burned alive (while being pregnant) in the original script and i can live with that but NO they back engineered a rape subplot that went nowhere and made Dr. Light unusable too.. 2 dead characters at once! He then became a serial rapist as one must in the follow-up book "Final Crisis: Revelations" (2008-09) where the Spectre (a biblical spirit of vengeance) turned him into a human candle. That happened just before he tried to rape 3 women he forced to dress up as Donna Troy, Raven and Starfire. What did i just write... but that comic is a good horror/noir that stars 2 lesbians detectives and a black ghost-cop so you go and show me a mainstream manga that does that!
Identity Crisis caused a shit-storm (as probably intended) that has never died down but it is also a recommendable 7/10 tale. See it´s complicated. The narrative brought the heroes to a street level like barely anything before so the original intent was fulfilled and the story itself is actually sad. Especially if you love the Justice League International as i (and most OG readers). The problem with this PG13 crossover is that a lot franky makes ZERO sense because the editorial department shouldn´t be last minute backseat writers and should just let the (award-winning) people they hired tell the story they were paid for originally. This is actually the problem here or with Spidy´s divorce as most of these writers are respectable but poor time-budgeting and upper management stunts are a mind killer. No sane writers-for-hire will ask for such a legacy but the are adults.

Or the universe destroying Ultimatum (2008-09) from Marvel. On screen cannibalism in a PG13 Avengers comic, a premise based on twincest and more?
Jeph Loeb wrote it after his 16 year old son died of cancer: http://toptenz.net/top-10-worst-moments-in-marvel-comics.php
Examples from before also shows up and i am more angry at Marvel as his loss of coherence is understandable and i know of more tales (by women too... poor Nightwing) where they worked through personal tragedies by writing (all ages) big business owned comics that one would find at a random train station but really shouldn´t.

Mark Miller´s Ultimate Avengers http://itsjustsomerandomgeek.wordpress.com/tag/red-skull-throw s-baby-out-of-a-window/ or his comic version of Kick Ass 2 are 100% indefensible in the use of violence against women (+ children) and that comes form a man work likes about 2/3 of his work. He even distanced himself or ret-conned some tales when Hollywood comes knocking. What sort of morals are these?

Then we have Daredevil´s girlfriend who were ALL murdered, became drug addicted porn stars with AIDS (thx Kevin Smith) or were driven insane while being blind to begin with. These were all good tales but Karen Page´s (what will Netflix do wit her?) journey through all circles of hell on fast forward in a PG book was a mistake. Frank Miller (300 + Sin City) further made Catwoman into a SM prostitute during the 80s.
His Born Again + DKR + Year One are all classics but come on!

All these characters (and there are male examples too as our favourite Green Lantern was also raped in the 90s - a form of commentary?) http://https://p.dreamwidth.org/93a0c3cae71b/i229.photobucket.c om/albums/ee220/tigraorigin3/kyleraped-2.jpg were abused not because the story needed that content but because editorial wanted these characters gone, to create "drama" for the male leads of the books and of courser to one-up the completion. There are many books and docs on this.

James Bond´s dead wife for example is another well known version of the trope or watch "Goldfinger" (1964) and see Sean Connery rape the lesbian rape victim Pussy Galore into becoming heterosexual. The produces though that this was cool for a PG movie but they nearly changed her name to Kitty to not "offend". See how unproblematic Craig´s behavior in "Skyfall" (8,5/10) suddenly is? That franchise moved on from being high octane misogyny to only being morally questionable and it took no longer then 50 years .

This is why we need to question what the hell we consume and the WIR blog 100% changed the industry for the better even if big changed were already underway a decade prior and you won´t find any executive, publisher, editor or professional writer worth their salt who will disagree as Co-Publisher of DC Comics Dan DiDio + Jim Lee are big fans of Gail and gave her an exclusivity deal.
Violence against women in fiction isn´t and shouldn´t be inherently problematic though as Disney now owns the Punisher Max where a psychotic Vietnam veteran fights sexual child slavery it the unforgettable "The Punisher: The Slavers" which is still in print and ends with Frank beating the female ring leader against a safety window till her body is in pieces. Well i own 4 separate pieces of Punisher clothing and i would never question what Garth Ennis or Jason Aaron did. Why? Because this was a 17+ book that took these elements and treated them as main plot while trying to be as intelligent as possible. If you take the baby murder, (child) rape and nihilism out of their series then the narrative will lose it´s brain + heart as it won´t have anything to say about the world anymore.
If you take the darkness (towards women) out of American Psycho (the book is darker), Berserk, I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream, Kiss and Never Cry, Ode to Kirihito, Mars, Precious, Suicide Island or The Walking Dead comic then these tales will also loose all meaning or purpose. If you take the darkness out of the rest of my examples or Übel Blatt (rape as service + bestiality) or Boichi´s , Kazuo Koike´s or Oh! great´s writing or MGS V: Ground Zeroes (45 min. long but has a 15 min. long rape scene on tape) or even Jenny´s tale in the amazing Forest Gump then these narratives suddenly become better and more logical.Why? Because these stunts are shock value trash with no meaning besides a quick adrenaline rush (or retarded). Like jerking off so are you a monkey or a (wo)man?

You can hunt manga yourself to see how japan compares (Amber Alert) but these were the exceptions and became rarer and rarer as we moved on so don´t lose hope after reading as i love comic (or books, games and ...) as they are an art-form with room for error. Fresh voices as Amanda Conner, Fiona Staples (read Image´s Saga now), Gail Simone who grew up with this nonsense and others talent of all genders and orientations (Marc Andreyko) turned the ship around, made the old guard notice and are setting new standards and values. Most importantly of all they proved that they wouldn´t shy away to show the content they chose to criticize but they did it with their brains turned ON.
Gail´s 15+ DC comic Secret Six has: alcohol/drugs, cannibalism, (child) rape, gore, incest, infidelity + lesbian polygamy, prostitution, slavery, SM and torture as main or subplots that all paid off. It starred Bane whom she rescued form becoming a sham and turned back into the A-Lister who broke the Bat. Deadshot was reviled to need to kill every so often to be able to breath when John Ostrander came back to co-scrip and King Shark is human shark. Ah lesbian polygamy. The lead was the immortal Scandal Savage (think female Wolverine but X23 also exists who is a teen clone of him and a former SM prostitute - don´t ask as editorial did this but she isn´t bad) who married both her believe to be dead lover and a replacement goldfish stripper who looked like her.
The LGBT community liked that and so did i. The comic sold respectably, starred a gender balanced cast of psychopaths and none complained about the content. The comic sites ate it up and were sad when it ended after 50 issues due to the New 52. Devoted fans continued to stay vocal though, keep it in print and didn´t accept the vapid replacement Suicide Squad. The market thus spoke and her comic relaunched 2 months ago and now starts the bisexual Catman as the lead and no changes in content. A happy ending.
The current DC event comic called "Multiversity" is further about Quantum Theory and stars Captain Carrot(Buggy Bunny X Superman), Barack Obama as Superman and a Nazi Superman called Overman who is the adopted son of Hitler!
http://behindthepanels.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/multivers ity003.jpg
You only need to read 500+ issues of back-story to get the basics and the included Watchmen remake needs to be read forewards and backwards while the prequel Final Crisis had parts you needed to look at with 3D glasses but that is nothing right?
Writer Grant Morrison once took all the drugs at a convention and retold how he was abducted by Aliens after he reached enlightenment. Well he is my favorite author, a self made millionaire, was honored by Queen Elizabeth II in 2012 (and Patton Oswalt is a fan). He also wrote some very dark tales (against women) which all got acclaim and if you think that KLK and so on are strange then think again and i would love to see a mainstream manga that offers such diversity. One Piece is tamer and Nyaruko and equal moe animu are neither strange or mainstream (or good). Japan isn´t the bastion of crazy as you might think it is is my message here. Or read Alejandro Jodorowsky!

Money talked and bullshit walked and my Euro/US fridge of horror is mostly empty as people are now angry about something as insignificant as a rare variant cover while 2 separate Ms. Marvel comics are on the market. One of them is a Pakistani American and the better Spiderman book has a Black Hispanic lead. Marvel´s Princess Leia comic is off to a strong start and how good female led mid-budget games have come out in the last 5 years? Like a lot so go and support Life Is Strange, Dreamfall Chapters or go and buy a Batwoman trade. Why? Because you have never seen art like this:
http://bleedingcool.net/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/batwoman13 3.jpg

Nothing is lost on manga too as male targeted Attack on Titan, Terra Formars and Tokyo Ghoul sell without selling their souls. Ghost in the Shell ARISE is back, Ore Monogatari!! is getting a Madhouse anime and March Comes in Like a Lion won the Tezuka last year.
I have further seen sales data on the recent borderline-H anime. Less came out and the numbers went down (but we may get a market collapse soon so who knows). Pick up a copy of Sailor Moon Crystal and company when they come to your territory and demand better. You can even write your own stories as none need permission to become an author. Fuyumi Soryo and J. K. Rowling never asked and E. L. James + Stephenie Meyer are borderline illiterate but they also put in their time (to have their wiki articles locked - Lol). You can make crazy amazon money with E-publications so do your worst and find out if the market approves of you or you values and i can´t believe that i got a chance to write a novel about Women in Refrigerators on the web @work.
Edit: Batman became a more interesting after being ret-conned as a rape victim by Talia who drugged him to father Damian Wayne but Morrison wrote that and he has so much creative freedom now that WB was ok with their billion dollar cow being slaughtered. They probably don´t even know but rape can work with the right writer.

Last edited by residentgrigo at 4:07 am, Apr 6 2015

________________
I also read EU/US comics and am a librarian.
Manga-Masters, My ANN-Lists + Imdb

Actually she's right. While superhero comics have undoubtably had issues with sexism in the past, it doesn't follow that there is inherently a problem with killing off a female character.

The truth is that killing a minor character to have an impact on a major character is just part of storytelling. It's going to be a feature of almost any story that deals with death in any way whatsoever. The one problem that comics had wasn't that female minor characters got killed off - plenty of male sidekicks, parents, and friends have been killed too - it was that women tended to appear only in minor roles. If the most high-profile female characters are side-characters in others' stories, then this apparent problem is one of the symptoms.

However, the solution is simply to have more female leads in comics (and in other media). It doesn't mean you can't have a female character die to drive the story forward.

As I said earlier, the Women in Refrigerators phenomenon is a symptom of most primary Superhero protagonists being male leaving females as the side characters, most Superhero comics running for several decades under dozens of writers, and the constant need to "change things up" by removing love interests, replacing sidekicks or just starting new stories.

It's definitely a recurring theme, having female characters becoming victimized, but it's very much an intersection of two issues: that being a side character in a comic means you will get hurt or killed eventually, and that females are generally not in the starring roles. And it's not like being the title character doesn't stop you from dying either.

I mean, nowadays its literally impossible to point at any character in a long-running Superhero comic that hasn't been seriously injured or killed at one point, and most of those are tied up in stories that are utterly forgettable (remember when Superman died? Which one? Doesn't matter, they were all just as meaningless).

The deaths or injuries that actually have profound and lasting effects in the story are quite few and far between. Gwen Stacy is one of the few notable permanent deaths of a female character that has actual impact, while characters like Jean Gray and Barbara Gordon had death or serious injury used to bring them out of other characters' shadows. And on the male side, you have characters like Jason Todd or Bucky who are still basically defined by their deaths, even after they've come back.

@residentgrigo
I'll try to address your multiple points coherently, but you sure love text blocks.

Killing minor/supporting female characters in superhero comics:

Look, I don't read western superhero comics, so my only knowledge about them is random wiki reads and superhero films/cartoons.
But like I said before, I don't see a problem with killing off anyone, and I stress, anyone to promote plot. If you have a heterosexual male character, who undoubtedly has relationships with women, it's pretty logical to assume that the loss of his female companions will have an affect on him. Why is it so wrong?

I'm not saying there's no bias at all, but the people who write comics have their own preferences and if they come up with dumb ideas and reasons to kill off female characters, it's their problem. It's fiction and they're writing it. Why does it matter? Are you really going to argue that "it shapes the minds of kids to hate women and see them as disposable" or something? So ok, they suck at writing women and that's a problem... But if you claim sexism, you claim they deliberately want to see women suffer and die. Which is complete nonsense.

I'm not saying these are great ideas, or that we should collectively enjoy them or anything, but neither should we go crazy and shout wolf at every damn thing.
That's how it is with any medium. You have to sift through a lot of shit to get to the good stuff, but like Andy Dufresne, you'll come out of the other side a winner.

Like @Bafflement said, the solution is to create more female leads and make it less disproportional. But that's up to the people who can draw and write comics.

Killing minor/supporting female characters in movies/on tv:

You know what? I will not watch Goldfinger, because I hate the James Bond movies.
They're completely ridiculous to me. And when you have a character named Pussy Galore - all bets are off. So what's your point here? Yeah, Bond is a sexist character. It's become better now, right? Well, good.
Raping a lesbian into becoming heterosexual sounds more like homophobia to me, which was way more prevalent back then. Good thing times have changed, ever so slightly.

You go through all that trouble, only for idiots like Stephanie Mayer (who was influenced by her religion, btw) and her ilk to come up with terrible stories. But guess what? They're popular. Some girls are that dumb and it's on them and their parents. Fortunately, most girls outgrow such crap. Either that, or they find some asshole to marry. Which also happens. But you know, life isn't perfect.



Oh yeah? I don't think so.
To me it seems that it helped the likes of Anita Sarkeesian gain popularity and flare a wave of rabid feminism.
Now you can't even say a word without somebody shouting "MISOGYNY!"

We need to question what we consume? No we don't. Why should we? I don't want to question what I enjoy reading or watching or even fucking fapping to. Because you know what? I know the difference between fiction and reality and I don't care if somebody wants to bludgeon a woman to death and skull fuck her for the sake of shock value. I'll even watch it, because I like gore.

Much like with any sensationalist argument a la "violent video games cause violence" - it's simply not true because people know how to distinguish between a game (or a novel, a comic book a tv series, what have you) and reality.
Those who don't - are screwed up. But it's not inherently a problem.

Look, I'm not saying everything's perfect, but it's not some crazy, world conspiracy-scope problem.
In the end, it's all about selling a product.

Extra:

In the last paragraph you write about titles that "haven't lost their soul"... Haven't lost their soul? To what? Really now? You're really going to say that?
These are action driven plots with lots of gruesome deaths... Some might argue that it's normalizing violence. And didn't we see that guy's mom get eaten by a titan in the first ep/chapter in Attack on Titan? But she's a woman!



Stream stream stream, that's the magic word!



You know what? Go and buy Revolution 60, because you've never seen art like this.

________________
Hrodulf and Bjornolfr, you will not be forgotten.

And if the world were black and white,
you would be my rainbow in shades of grey.

Click 'n Play!

If I had a fantasy self, it'd be a tentacle monster.

@NightSwan

This are the times I would love for MU to have a like buttom I agree with nearly everything you said


I´m not as eloquent as you guys so this might be a bit confusing:

TBH I don´t really see a problem, for a simple reason: genres.
Most sexist (and what´s sexist or not differs a lot from ppl to ppl so let´s just leave the term a bit ambiguous) mangas are target to specific audience. And you create what your audience buys. In the end I say let the market decide and let all niches exist, everything has the right to exist, as long as ppl respect the Golden Rule: "Its FICTION" we can do everything in it, becasue it´s NOT REAL

________________

The WIR blog wasn´t about what was done to random love interests and more importantly A-List characters (in all ages books!) it was about very specific cases and Gail has spoken out herself against being randomly angry that female character X was abused and whatnot. This would be the other example: http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Sexual_assault
Nightwing had the same thing done to him by a female writer (also from WIR) as you see so you don´t need to be a man to suck and a lot of it was done with NO foresight.
When DC killed Supergirl in the 80s (who just had her movie released) they also closed a revenue stream as her book in the 90s lasted 80 issues. Hups.
Most cases were met with hard backlash and ignored soon thereafter. Many writers are even regretful as to what they did and i mentioned that Alan Moor apologizes for the Killing Joke but i still like it and Chris Claremont (Marvels top writer at that time) was furious at the Ms. Marvel disaster and ret-conned it hardcore to never speak of it again and...
My examples on the top all fill worst ever list (but remembering them was fun!) but the one later won the awards and sold well. All are dark stories but the point is that one needs writers worth their salt and less editorial nonsense and that content will go over just fine. Maybe even change industry at the core as the Walking Dead did and as long as i know that top level executives @ DC, Marvel and more importantly Indie´s like Image agree i will live just fine as this type of content isn´t really published anymore.

A final word form wiki on Gail: "inducted into the Friends of Lulu's Female Comic Creator´s Hall Of Fame - in 2010 and 2012, Simone was nominated for a GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Comic Book through her work on Secret Six - was awarded the first ever True Believers Comic Award for Roll of Honor/Comic Excellence at London Film and Comic Con." And the market spoke so her voice was needed. She is like a modern (demographic free) 24-Gumi to speak in manga language. She is also only one if many and google "Dead Men Defrosting". From WIR: Power Girl (depowered, magically impregnated, made vulnerable to unprocessed natural materials... like sharp sticks) - LoL.

Comis actually have too many character of all creeds and coming up with new one isn´t a solution as diversity has been reached long ago. We need better executed (and less!) books and what they are doing now are all sorts of experiment like the new Batgirl book that is written for the blogosphere audience (or the new Black Canny sister book). It´s good BUT the numbers have gone down so you never know and Superhero books are now more of a breeding ground for movie and tv/game ideas as the market moved there. Arkham Knight will move consoles so that is fine but i don´t want to read one Hollywood sales pitch every Wednesday after another as half of the independent books are now pre-made storyboards. Just like manga .

Revolution 60 looks like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ReBoot to me, Twilight is harmless, streams are proven to not make money as of now and Bond became good when they rebooted (but Goldeneye is fine too).
I am not sure how one could get more gender neutral and empowering then Titans / Claymore as the story is well plotted and executed so all the dark content is needed and not shock value nonsense (and i don´t even find the books to be that dark).
Anita Sarkeesian further has good points 50% of the time so i am a subscriber. She is too radical and thus over stretches while harming her arguments but "in December 2014, The Verge named her as one of "the 50 most important people at the intersection of technology, art, science, and culture" is also true and market thus needed her too or she would be yesterdays news. Grabbing game footage without permission is her cardinal sin to me but the backlash against her makes no sense to me as she does is speak (and get money for it) so go on Kickstarter if you are angry and see what happens.

Question: Why do you stick to manga and not branch out more as international comics aren´t that different from manga. You woudn´t stick to one country only for novels right?

Last edited by residentgrigo at 9:53 am, Apr 3 2015

________________
I also read EU/US comics and am a librarian.
Manga-Masters, My ANN-Lists + Imdb

Personally I stick with manga cause the size of the Marvel and DC universe sorta scared me, like I felt I would never be able to read all the canon all the cool stuff so I went on to a different type that didn´t really so much on the same set of characters, but I am open to read almost everything

________________

Ugh....Why can't you feminist types focus on real women's problems instead of whether or not there might be sexism in stuff like manga and video games? You don't like it? MAKE YOUR OWN.

Last edited by zblueshell14 at 11:04 am, Apr 3 2015

Again, all of your posts ignore the fact that most comic book storylines are terrible. In manga, at least, you can dig through and find the 10% of series that are good. In the major comic franchises, you have to find the 10% of arcs that are worth reading, because most storylines are bad, and characterization goes all over the place.

The comic book industry is one where dozens of writers will be given control over a franchise, which leads to characterization that has no consistency, blatant favouritism of the author's pet creations, rewriting of characters they don't like, killing of characters that the writer wants to be rid of.

You talk about killing Supergirl and having Ms. Marvel raped, like it's only the female characters that have dumb writing that needs to be fixed years after. I mean, Supergirl came back, just like every other superhero that's ever died (which, again, is all of them). And Ms. Marvel isn't the only character to have a rape retconned. Such as Batman. Raped by Talia Al Ghul, got a son out of it...whole thing was retconned to make it more consensual.

Not to mention entire story arcs that are best forgotten. Like the entire Clone Saga in Spiderman, which spanned two whole years and is something the fans and Marvel itself would rather forget about entirely. Or in recent years, the One More Day arc which is widely reviled for being completely stupid (while destroying decades of Spiderman story), or the Civil War arc which was an utter failure of writing and characterization.

I mean, what's the point of picking out the times a female character was mistreated when the storyline that it happened in was garbage in its entirety? Bad writing is just bad writing.

I de-railing this but non-reader opinions are interesting as such a discussion would look different on a comic site and comic sexualize men too: http://bleedingcool.com/2015/03/03/competing-buttocks-dick-gra yson/ Supid sexy Nightwing.
Ah shared continuity and why it is important to NOT mess with characters like a madman as we need them later: http://wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero_Hour:_Crisis_in_Time
Highlight: "the timeline was recreated anew, albeit with subtle differences compared to the previous one" and "triggered a new Big Bang". 8 years old me was really "amused" by all of this and Power Girl even had her magical pregnancy to top it off (think Star Treck: TNG). The art is nice but 2 (good) events were needed to ret-con the ret-cons.
You will further need to read 2 separate analysts blogs and know the author´s biography for my darling Multiversity to make sense. If you don´t then good luck as average readers are in their 30´s now. Marvel´s upcoming 100 issues long Secret Wars (Part 3) is a remake of a 80s crossover based on a toy-line on the other hand and wiki is hell already.
I probably won´t last as their last 5-10 years worth of crossovers were mostly .

Independent + web publications to the rescue! Let´s say you want to read Walking Dead but 140 issues and canon games + novels scare you the go for newer works as his Outcast is on issues 6 and ALL of them constantly writes mini series. If you want SJ action but One Piece´s length scares you then go Hero Academia in manga terms. The big two further have original graphic novels as Morrison´s upcoming "Wonder Woman Earth One" that will go back to her BDSM roots to kill the internet. Smaller publishers as Archie or Valiant Comics have my blessing or licensed books as the canon Buffy/Firefly sequels and the new Star Wars line. Games, toons, (toon-) movies and tv shows are the real money makes though. Arrow got good, Flash started good and Agent Carter is about sexism but forget sexism for a minute.
Bigger problems are that we re-boot(-ish) every 2(-ish) years, some books tipple ship a month (thx Disney) but writing itself as never been better. The medium is now going through a renaissance but the print market all over the world is sinking into a toilet so let´s see what the publishing scene will look like in 10 years. I wonder how the piracy numbers only to customers compare. 80% to 20%?

To the rest: A mirror must be held up to society at all times or we won´t evolve, bad writing (not all were bad) excuses nothing, lack of respect (e.g. black face) can be mixed with anything, retcons don´t make the old books go away and i will never get what passed the Comics Code Authority (a dead alternative to government regulation) back in the day. I am willing to say though that 50% of the current US output is of value and a lot of real book/movie/tv writers have joined the fun. The Django Unchained sequel comic is co-written by Tarantino, Brian K. Vaughan wrote for Lost, Marvel´s Stephen King adaptations as the Stand are amazing and DC is famous for publishing non-hero books like Preacher or Sandman. Here is this weeks lists so everyone can look: http://comicvine.com/new-comics/?startWeek=04%2F05%2F201 5

Bruce´s rape isn´t retconned by the New 52, only the original 80s story had consensual sex and Talia is now a better characters as she is out of daddy´s shadow. Crisis isn´t bad but the original Supergirl never came back and the 90s one was an angel who had ONE writer only for 80 issues. The Clone Saga broke Marvel to rebuild it better and Civil War (the good parts are really good and a movie is coming) are hard canon. The Clone Saga got (good this time) sequels recently and Spidy survived even One more day (1/10) as his books have never been better. Superior Spider-Man + Miles Morales FTW and 3 successful female led Spider-Verse book are now on the market.

Todays comics frankly need to have basic value to survive 6 issues as they are standalone in a now very sizable market that is mostly allergic to trash but most manga exist to fill an anthology magazine (i look at these in both form) where they rotate like crazy. A lot are clear experiments or filler so it's impossible to say what percentage of tankōbon fulfill any criteria so i won´t guess and none of the 3 art forms (Bande dessinée) are "the best" so go for all. Solving RL mistreatment is more important, i won´t start an art vs commerce debate and i wrote the 3000 word monster for 2 pm friends and cuz i wanted to see how fast i can write now. Feel free to go back to the original topic as I have exhausted all my opinions. Happy Eastern.

Edit: Again. I have exhausted all opinions. Actually in my post on page 1 but to reiterate: Everyone needs to support what they want and the free market will sort it out but if rampant sexist and other crap wouldn't exist then we wouldn't have this topic every goddamn week on anime/manga, comics, games, movie and... sites. To men too...
WIR retired nearly 15 years ago with contributors becoming acknowledge writers themselves who i will support in the future. It can´t have "an agenda" anymore as the old writers are now expendable work-for-hire, fight on the indie market or stopped as Devin Grayson. So Revolution 62 is next so the market needed it and i don´t care.
Reviewers i trust as Greg Miller or Brian Altano have supported Anita and further such writers as do i and everyone on youtube needs to shut down their comment section as reading Mein Kampf (1/10) was more enlightening that 85% of that trash.
I lastly dislike/ignore "problematic" fictional content not because they are horrible to group X but because they insult my intellect and KaoriNite has the best post on page 1.
We all have waste each others time enough so "Go Home And Be A Family Man".

Last edited by residentgrigo at 4:26 am, Apr 6 2015

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@residentgrigo
Dat stream of thought... K, round 2.

The WIR blog:

Ok, yes, it was a specific case at first, but it's grown since then into something different, and more importantly, something bigger and with a wider scope.

The abundance of publications:

You say we needs less, but there's not going to be less. Another print = another dollar.
And I personally wouldn't want to see the same characters reused into oblivion, like a pair of old underwear.
I know it's a thing in DC/Marvel comics to re-invent stuff, but I'm speaking in a general sense.

Revolution 60:
You should read up on that. It caused a massive shitstorm amid gamers for sucking too much and being designed by a bunch of feminists who apparently think the best "woman-friendly" character is one that looks like a stick with boobs and a giant head...in spandex. Besides being boring and ugly with 90s graphics.

Twilight being harmless:
How can you say that? If you want to combat so called "sexism" in the comics industry, what about crap like Twilight where you basically have a weird, dysfunctional relationship between an older guy and a teenage girl. All she does is cook, clean and wait for her loved one to return. If anything, that's a role model I wouldn't want girls to follow, but it's not less (or more) harmful that what you're describing goes on in comics.

Anita Sarkeesian having good points:

Oh man, that one made me laugh so hard.
What good points? Let's ignore that her entire "research" is bogus, and that she seems to be using footage from other gamers instead of playing the games herself... The points she makes are absolutely ridiculous and have been refuted countless of times. She presents supposedly "negative tropes", only to contradict herself in a different video, saying it's a positive thing and then vice versa. It's quite ridiculous.
One of the fattest nails in the coffin for me though, is that she says she's a gamer in one video, only to claim that she "doesn't play those games" in another.



Radical? Yes. But not in a good way.
And to be honest with you, her getting some award isn't worth shit. Literal, smelly shit.
All she does is promote blind hate and bias.

As for the money she got from kickstarter, it's for her fans to be mad and not me.
I didn't give her any money, but the people who did are still waiting for about 3/4 of the videos she promised. It's been what, two-three years now?

She concedes nothing and in fact disables the comments on her youtube videos.
Sure, you might claim she was getting too much backlash, but don't you think she should take other people's opinions into account, too? Instead of just basking in the rays of fellow feminists who share the exact same opinions.



If you didn't notice, it was sarcasm on my part.
My point was that you can find those "ghosts" everywhere if you look hard enough.
But nothing is gender neutral. Because genders exist.




I don't stick to manga, actually. I read webtoons from various countries and various comics of a pornographic nature. But yes, when it boils down to it, I prefer manga (and also manhwa/manhua) because I prefer the style and diversity.

The reasons why I don't like western comics (I might be generalizing here, but I'm referring to DC/Marvel superhero comics) are such:

-Various authors, reboots, re-tellings and universes.
This is my biggest problem with those comics, is that you don't really even know where to starts and what's what. One author might kill a character, only for the next one to revive it in a different story? I dunno, it seems a bit too much for me.

I'm not a fan of that type of story-telling. It's actually why I've read only a select few of CLAMP's works, despite finding them very interesting in general.

-Rampant superheros
I'm just not a big enough fan of superheros to read entire comics about them.


Stuff like The Walking Dead though... Bring it on!


Letting society have it:



The thing you seem to be missing though, is that the writing reflects the general consensus and time period, instead of influencing it to be such.
Black face wasn't always used as derogatory, btw, but it was eliminated due to respect and improvement in social rights.

Let the market decide what it wants. If it's bad and offensive to too many people, it's not going to sell and eventually die out.


============================

Going back to manga...

So let's return to discussing about manga.
What sexism can you show me in manga?

And not "girl getting killed" or "girl getting sexualized", because the first is completely reasonable and the latter is fanservice which is shared by male characters (6-pack, anyone?).

You'll have to come up with explicit examples of bias against women in multiple titles, through various genres and also show me that bias against men doesn't exist.
Some sort of "bias" is always present, because people look for dynamic stories and not just two androgynous leads staring into each other's eyes.

Don't forget about the target audience, too.

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