Marvel’s agreement that the presence of a gay character requires a “Warning” of any sort is deeply offensive. Regardless of one’s politics or views towards homosexuality, gays do in fact exist. That a “Family Values Coalition” believes that children need protected from this idea is troubling, but unsurprising. That Marvel would kowtow to their delusional worldview is sad. Hopefully the poor children being raised in these psychotically Christian households will see the MAX label as a way to rebel, and buy the books specifically for that reason.

A friend of mine is trying to get hired on the “Teen Avengers” DVD and I can tell you it’s not based on Young Avengers. It’s a different story.

I think this is a disgrace. Do we know if this is a policy that Quesada himself has implemented, or is this something that has been passed down from “on high?” (Marvel’s board of directors, etc.) Once the guilty party is established, comicdom assembled should begin a letter writing/petition signing campaign to express that this is *wrong,* in the strictest sense of the word. This is the equivilent of not having characters in comics that are Jews because you don’t want to offend Nazis (or Mel Gibson).

Again, Joe says the policy revolves around the RAWHIDE KID: SLAP LEATHER mini-series. I haven’t read this; I thought I’d heard that it was less a series about a character that happened to be gay (a change in the character that set some people on edge, since it seemed to come out of nowhere), but a story that focused on the character’s “gayness” (for want of a better term).

Clearly, Teddy and Billy (Hulkling and Wiccan) *are* gay; however, that’s an incidental fact in the story, more than a focal point. Perhaps that’s where the difference lies.

And I would think a book that was focused on a character’s heterosexuality would be a MAX book as well.

negative press, eh?

For the longest its been my suspicion that the real reason the comics industry and particularly Marvel Comics took such a hit in the nineties was because of the 90s version of this: Northstar outing himself as gay

I dont know if anyone else remembers but THAT whirled up a Real ****storm in the media. Rawhide kid came out during a time when homosexuality has become somewhat ‘vogue’ with so many celebrities coming out and tv shows with homosexual themes… but it wasn’t like that 10 years ago.
Especially considering that the average comic reader during that time was in his teens or younger can you imagine that middle american Moms would want their little boys in in comic shops that sold…..
homosexual comics

The fact that the Northstar cover in question had him screaming like he was taking up the arse definitely didnt help the cause

They should have countered by expressing comics aren’t for children.

Bending over backwards anymore to right wingers may result in more rules like the comics autority before.
The best writers and stories came from England in decades past because they didn’t have the code. V for Vendetta would never be published in the States back then.

Yeah, I gotta say The Advocate responding to something Quesada said 3 years ago is kind of wonky to me. Nonetheless, the policy doesnt seem to be implemented often really. And id point out Young Avengers as an example of this. Even if the homosexual angle isnt a main focus is a really big part of whats great about the title, diversity. Im glad Quesada apologized, but this seems like something that came down from the higher ups and not implemented by Quesada. Dont shoot the messenger is what im tyring to say I guess.

“The Advocate is responding to a report posted on GayLeague.com from this year’s Wizard World Chicago.”

About something Joey Q said 3 years ago.

To those lauding DC in place of Marvel, I don’t think DC has gay character that has their own solo series right now that I’m aware of. I love DC, too…but we can’t give them credit for something they haven’t really done yet. They have supporting gay characters, just like Marvel.

“Funny how DC can have gay characters without warning labels but Marvel can’t.”

Marvel have gay characters without warning labels. Young Avengers and Runaways?

The issue comes in (apparently) when the character is the starring character, and I don’t think Marvel or DC have any books like that right now.

Stuff like this is why I find it hard to understand how anyone can debate that DC is the best of the two. They’re simply ahead of Marvel in every way that counts. Cop excuses for Marvel all you want.

Regarding the DC vs. Marvel side of this debate… you could very easily use DC’s editorial interference and their forced “toning down” of the Midnighter & Apollo’s relationship as an argument against DC being more “accepting”… DC is just as guilty as censoring or giving gay characters a “warning” label as Marvel

as for the comment itself… if a character’s sexuality (straight or gay) is the sole focus of a story or mini-series, it SHOULD be labeled with a warning… because, though the medium is mainly patronized by male readers in their late teens through their 40’s, comics still SHOULD be acceptable for all ages reading… and a focus on the sexuality of a character isn’t exactly literary fodder for children to digest… as evidenced by the difference between the Rawhide Kid mini being a MAX title and the relationship of Hulkling and Wiccan in Young Avengers… one story focuses on the character’s sexuality while the other has that sexuality in the peripheral

That DC pulled back the presentations in The Authority does not mean their policies are equivalent to Marvel’s. There are plenty of DC characters of the LGBT stripe running around in books without warning labels. That materially makes DC’s policy different from Marvel’s.

Compare DC’s comments to the press on Batwoman, a character who just appeared in 52 without a warning label, to Quesada’s comments at Wizard World. Check out the gayleague’s site and look at the difference in representation of the LGBT community in DC vs. Marvel.

I was at the panel that he made the comments about gay characters. I assure you he ment no ill will. He, and Marvel for that matter, is stuck in a horrible position. You try to present real life issues and get blasted for putting them in “children’s literature.” I don’t think anyone here would say comics are “just for kids,” but that is NOT how the rest of the world views them. They really do think like Fred Wortham thought in the ’50s. This is what Marvel has to deal with. This is what our industry has to deal with. And until that thought process is done away with, issues like extreme violence, religon, and sexuality are going to be handled with, sorry for the pun, kid gloves.
You might like to know that Quesada commented on Spidey and the possibility of a divorce and said “He will never get a divorce. What do you think middle America would say when they picked up the paper and read ‘Spiderman gets Divorced.’” It falls in the same category.
Joe is doing amazing things with the post Jemas era of Marvel. Civil War is a perfect example. Give him some credit here.

And Marvel has Hulkling, Wiccan, Karolina, Northstar (both 616 and Ultimate), Ultimate Colossus and many others running around in books without warnings too… neither company is any better when it comes to their mainstream diversity… (although until recently, the best selling comic to prominantly feature gay character just happened to be at Marvel with Young Avengers)

plus… DC slapped a Mature Readers tag on the Authority before you even so much as saw A & M kiss on panel, much less lie in bed together… so yes… DC did no better than Marvel when it comes to putting warning labels on any comic that explored the homosexual sexuality of a character.

I’m just tired of this “company X is better than company Y because…” bullsh*t…

both of them have some stupid editorial policies and neither of them is better than the other when it comes to this…

homosexual characters are perfectly fine in all ages comics… stories that are blatant explorations of said sexuality are NOT fine for all ages comics… the exact same is true of hetero, bi, trans and all other sexual persuasions… sexual exploration stories should be labeled with warning labels and reserved for mature audiences and not for little johnny to pick up right next to his Teen Titans GO! comic… they aren’t meant for 8 or 10 or even 14 year olds… they are meant for people mature enough to understand the story as more than a “porn” comic

How many times do you think it’ll need to be pointed out that Marvel DOES HAVE gay characters in their non-mature reader comics before people stop bashing them for this failing?

No one said Marvel has no LGBT characters. The point being made is that Marvel has a policy stated by their person in charge that all representations of LGBT persons must be labelled and DC does not.

Another distinction you might notice is that the decision to label Authority happened over 6 years ago, under a different editorial leadership, and Quesada is speaking now as the person in charge.

Who, today, has the more progressive policy, DC or Marvel?

“DC is putting out a Midnighter comic in the fall, and to the best of my knowledge, it won’t be a Mature Readers title.”

I think it is.

“There is no inidication that it will be “exploring” Midnighter’s homosexuality. If the focus of the book was on Midnighter’s homosexuality and featured a bunch of graphic sex, then sure it should have a Mature Readers label, just as any comic featuring a bunch of graphic hetero sex scenes should also have a Mature Readers label.”

first of all… you can “explore” a character’s sexual preference without it including graphic sexual acts…

“Another distinction you might notice is that the decision to label Authority happened over 6 years ago, under a different editorial leadership, and Quesada is speaking now as the person in charge”

no, it happened 3 (maybe almost 4) years ago, as the Eye of the Storm titles didn’t appear until late 2002 or early 2003. the Authority didn’t get a label until the Eye of the Storm era titles. And Paul Levitz is still there (the same person who Millar has publically stated edited and censored his Authority and told him to “tone down” A & M’s relationship), so it is STILL the same editorial leadership. even if some of the leadership has changed, the actual individual that made that particular relationship an issue is still there.

Additionally, if Marvel has the policy that all representations of homosexual characters should be labeled, they are doing a pretty p*ss poor job of enforcing it, since we saw Ultimate Colossus and Ultimate Northstar go out on a date together and it was stated as that. And Kirkman has been exploring that dynamic in the main title with the friendship of Nightcrawler and Colossus.

Neither company is any better than the other… neither have prominantly featured characters of diverse backgrounds, and their recent efforts at doing so have seemed (at best) forced… and in only 1 case has Marvel labeled a title because it prominantly featured a homosexual character… and that was because of the substance of the story (and not the subject matter itself)… the subject is something that’s shown quite often in the books, the actual substance has been labeled as Mature Readers in 1 case… granted, that makes it DC 0 - Marvel 1… but it’s not exactly like DC is all that much ahead of the game ehre either…

plus, the whole Batwoman thing just seemed as big of a PR stunt as Marvel did with both Rawhide Kid and Arana when they were introduced

Maybe I should not have used the word “explore”, but that doesn’t change the point I was making.

I also think that it’s incredibly hypocritical that Marvel won’t put out a solo gay character without a MR label, but they will allow them to be prominiently featured in team books. Doesn’t seem to make sense.

And also, I don’t know that you can even put The Authority’s MR label in the same group as what Marvel is doing. That book was part of a line-wide change. All of the WS books that were launched at the same time were MR, this wasn’t a reactionary label put on a book because characters were gay.

Another thing is that, from what I understand, the Rawhide Kid book wasn’t in any way graphic. It seems the ONLY reason it was published as a Max book was because he was gay. I don’t remember reading anywhere that the Rawhide Kid was in any kind of actual gay relationships. In fact, what I do remember reading in reviews when the book did come out was that it was just a few instances of innuendo.

And it seems to me that the Quesada quote, ragarding the western titles they were putting out, was that the very mention of Rawhide Kid being gay was going to mean a MAX label.

And another counter-point: no matter what the general public sees WS as, it is well supported by DC, much better supported than MAX. None of the Eye of the Storm books set the charts on fire, but WS still ordered a second “season” of Sleeper because they really liked the book. I read a recent interview with Ed Brubaker in which he said that Jim Lee basically convinced him to keep going on the book, even though it wasn’t a terrific seller.

When was the last time Marvel gave a MAX book that kind of support?

Did Joe ever apologize for taking anything Andrea Lafferty says seriously?

You left off this quote from Quesada in the Advocat article, which proves he’s not a homophobe, just someone who has to uphold a policy he doesn’t agree with:

Quesada said he hopes for a positive change in the future and looks forward to a time when the political climate creates a less controversial environment for gay and lesbian characters in their own books, adding, “I hope it changes next week.” (The Advocate)

This is a “damned if they do, damned if they don’t” situation.

If they do put gay characters into comics, they’re accused of an gay agenda or pushing something sinful in a supposedly kids medium. See the first 3-4 lettercolumns in Young Avengers where every letter was a debate about this. Then most of the time, when they do put a gay character in a comic, it’s just a minor part of the character that you either forget about it because they don’t explore it, or is so insignificant you wonder why they bothered in the first place.

If they don’t, they’re accused of not being realistic or being a homophobe.

BTW, is the new Blue Beetle gay?

Jeff wrote:

>Did they have to make “Rawhide Kid” be the gay western character

You’re right: they should have used Kid Colt instead. Then they could have used some “Hung like a horse” jokes.

Like it really matters which Western character of days gone by (probably never to be used again anyway) they had decided to make a bit limper in the wrist? Let’s be honest: this sort of a complaint isn’t really “Why did they have to use *that* character?”, or even the favorite “Why couldn’t they create a new character for this?”, but rather “Why did they have to do this at all?” It’s a pig smeared with lipstick, trying to hide phobic disgust.

What led me to believe that Young Avengers has gay characters was, in truth, this article. I should have left out the word ‘otherwise’; that’s what happens when you try to squeeze in a quick post while at work!

But cool, I’m a plant. I always wanted to get into the business! :0

Hey, Beetle, you got kids?

Shadowrogue wrote:
>The purpose of my post was state my support of a rating system that lets me know at a glance the content of a comic, so that I can determine whether or not it’s appropriate for my child, according to MY FAMILY’S belief’s, not yours (and what I intended to say in my original post was that I would not have known that Young Avengers had gay characters in it if I hadn’t read this article). A rating system SHOULD NOT be used to control content. Ever. I firmly believe that if there’s a market for it, print it. Just let me know what I’m getting beforehand.

Shadowrogue… Wow, pressed a button, huh? Given that I never once voiced my opinion on homosexuality, on Quesada’s view on the matter, on the policy- on anything, really, other than your post -I’m not sure how you can say I’m ‘forcing’ anything on you and your family. Nor did I namecall; I may have suggested flaws, but I was reacting to the content of your post, and what you put out there. I can’t help that you misrepresented what you were supposedly trying to say. In fact, even had you left that ‘otherwise’ out, your post STILL makes no sense whatsoever.

Your statement in the original post points out that you’re thankful for a ratings system because it alerts you that there’s inappropriate, homosexual conduct in a comic. But now you say it’s this article that did that, and not the ratings system, and that THAT is what you meant… Which means the content of what you said is even more nonsensical.

But yours was a predictable and laugh out loud kneejerk reaction (two of them!) and I thank you for that.

And actually, I didn’t outright say you were a plant. I was pointing out a statement in YOUR post that made zero sense, and suggested that you were commenting on a subject you were entirely uninformed of, and then I suggested reasons for it. If you found that offensive, sorry, but this is how you paint yourself.

I really don’t care how you raise your family. I was asking questions because, logically, what you’re saying makes no sense. Sure you should be able to guide your children into and out of what you find appropriate. But I can’t imagine that letting your daughter see a comic with a gay kid in it is going to scar her psyche, especially if she’s aware that this alleged uncle of hers likes guys. Unless what you’re saying is that homosexuality shouldn’t be represented or acknowledged in any medium that isn’t aimed at someone over eighteen? Again… I can’t help the lack of clarity in your posts. That’s on you.

Speaking of, if you’re just supporting a ratings system, you’re still missing the point of the discussion. Nobody here was arguing against a ratings system. The point of disagreement is that many don’t think it’s fair that there’s a policy in place to say ‘a gay character can’t star in a Marvel comic unless it’s under the MAX banner’. And re-read your post, where your main point is this:

“As a father, I’m tired of every time I turn around having gay issues presented in material that my kid is exposed to. Yeah, I know that she’ll be exposed to gay people in her life, but while she’s an underaged minor, sexuality issues aren’t really something that she should have to deal with. Marvel isn’t saying ‘NO GAY CHARACTERS’, they’re just putting some info out there for parents with underage kids that help us keep our kids from reading something that they really don’t need to be dealing with before their teens. Stuff that’s going to do nothing but confuse them. I applaud comics for providing a ratings system, simply for information purposes. ”

Not sure what sort of material your not even a teen daughter is exposed to that’s filled with “homosexual issues”… Spongebob? Harry Potter?

There are no “homosexual issues” in Young Avengers. There are two guys in a loving relationship together. That’s not a homosexual issue any more than Kitty Pryde loving Pete Rasputin is a heterosexual issue. It’s people who love each other. And just like the characters in Young Avengers, any comic featuring a homosexual character won’t necessarily revolve around “homosexual issues” Except, y’know, for the people who think gays are a problem or, at the very least, shouldn’t be able to see themselves recognized in an unsegregated media.

The ratings system doesn’t tell parents what’s in a book… which I suspect you can probably figure out. It suggests an age guideline. It doesn’t differentiate between ‘over eighteen because Punisher feeds people to sharks’ and ‘over eighteen because the main character is a chick who dates other chicks’. So, again, another of the fallacies riddling every inch of your post.

How would a kid being around homosexuals, fictional or real, ‘confuse’ them? Isn’t it rather more confusing to introduce the notion to them later? And what if that kid -is- gay? Heck, it’s even more confusing! And this isn’t me trying to impose a lifestyle on you; it’s me saying ‘hey, this is a group that exists, and pretending they’re not out there or somehow more CONFUSING than heterosexuals’ doesn’t make any sense from my perspective, nor do you express how it’s confusing in the least. Ironically, you’re the most confusing part of this entire thread. At least the one poster who was an outright homophobe clearly identified what he was trying to say.

C’mon, admit it. You just wanted to play the ‘I have a gay brother’ card. Heh.

And, by the way, what does it matter if I have kids or not? Other than mine might grow up with open minds and hearts to differences in people because I don’t lead by the example that people are more or less scary based on who they date?

Umm, no, I didn’t judge anybody. Still can’t figure out what the point was.

And, no nerve touched… Sorry you can’t respond to anything I asked you. Hope you have better answers when your kids ask.

Okay. Got it. You win. Ya sure showed me. Lesson learned. You have proven your superiority. I am awed.

@Shadowrogue
Ignoring for a moment that homosexuality is _not_ a lifestyle choice, IKEA furniture is, your position is nonetheless nonsensical.
Because, if there’s a homosexual lifestyle, surely there’s a heterosexual lifestyle, a Christian/Muslim/Buddhist/atheist lifestyle, a Republican/Democrat/Libertarian/Green lifestyle, a meat-eating/vegetarian/vegan lifestyle and so on. Per your desire to control the kind of lifestyles your kids is exposed to, there would have to be content warnings/ratings system for each of these.
Of course this leads straight into nonsense, but it’s the logical conclusion from a “restrict exposure to lifestyle X” policy. Unless of course you admit to thinking homosexuality is somehow special, which unfortunately means admitting to bigotry.
Otherwise, you are (and should be) restricted to doing what everyone else does: check the material before handing it to your kid. If that is too much, why not seek out a third-party service that does the work for you and alerts you to the “lifestyle choices” _you_ find objectionable.

Hi, JK,
Thanks for correcting the source of the original article and giving Michael credit. Here’s a link to my follow-up editorial.

http://www.gayleague.com/forums/display.php?id=413

Thanks again!

Joe Palmer

[/i]
You think a [b]Garth Ennis[/b] written series about [b]Midnighter[/b] who has a tendency to punch [b]thru[/b] people [i]isn’t[/i] going to be labeled for mature readers?

And there’s a difference between a character in some unknown subline, and someone who teams up with Spider-Man.

When DC says they’re going to publish a Batwoman series, then you can compare it to a Marvel U series.

When the Northstar comic came out, there was such a press focus on it, Marvel freaked and zapped all potentialy controversial stories. Ask Peter David about his X-Factor abortion storyline some time.

Marvel and DC are not in the business of promoting social issues. They’re in the business of pleasing their stockholders. And if Focus on the Family decides to start burning Spider-Man comics, that’ll cause problems for all those folks who’ve invested big dollars in next summer’s Spider-Man 3 and so on.

Not to mention that first FotF would be getting your local DA to shut down the comic store where the comics could be bought.

JoeQ didn’t say he wouldn’t publish a series about a gay character. He said it’d have to be labeled as mature. Don’t blame him for being a responsible industry leader who has to look out not only for his company, but also all of the comic stores who are far more vulnerable to those with agendas.

And on DC, don’t look at them as this bastion of gay rights. The new Batwoman is as much a postivie representation of lesbians as it is when WWE has it’s Divas make out on RAW. She’s a Penthouse version of a lesbian. (Even down to earth Renee Montoya is now apparantly sporting a Bat Wonder Bra).

Let’s see….the industry has limited interest in comics to 40 year old mal-adjusted geeks…how else can we shrink the reading audience…I know lets make every other character homosexual…that ought to do it. Why does everything have to be about sex…can’t the industry just write good stories with out kissing the ass of political interest groups? I say clean it up…expand the audience.

Going too dirty will alienate readers(1990s anybody?), but staying too clean will never allow the industry to grow. There should be plenty of room for all kinds of characters in any comic book universe. To have half the amount of comic book characters become gay sounds a bit far-fetched, and it would be silly to do so since only an estimated 10% of the country is indeed gay, but just because you’re a minority doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be able to relate to a character or hero any level. One of the major reasons X-Men became such a success over the years is because of the ability for any minority group to relate to their cause. DC Comics is currently in the midst of their plan to diversify their superhero lineup racially (Blue Beetle, The All-New Atom) and people seem to be pretty okay with this, so why is it a problem to diversify sexually as well?

Sorry, for the double post…trouble with flagging…

Francois makes a good point…America seems to be the only country I’ve heard of that has a real problem with being so sensitive to homosexuality, as well as other things, appearing in media. Francois gave a nice picture of the industry in France, Japan has plenty of Yaoi manga, more and more of which seems to be making it to the manga shelf of my local Books-A-Million, yet neither countries have experienced a sudden outbreak of homosexuality or moral decay, so why are Americans so paranoid?

1) The original article didn’t bash Marvel or Quesada on their policy, it simply reported on it. There was no editorial comments made about the policy whatsoever, and I really wish people would stop claiming that there was.

2) To Shadowrogue: you say you don’t want your daughter exposed to homosexuality in comic books. But then why is it okay for her to be exposed to heterosexuality in comics? After all, she is, as you said, an underaged minor. And if innocuous homosexual relationships are bad for her, then innocuous heterosexual relationships should be as well. Why do you make the distinction?

if you were to replace to “good old days” stories of Superman and Lois Lane or Spider-Man and Mary Jane with stories about Superman and Jimmy Olsen or Spider-Man and…I don’t know, Steve

C’mon, Kross, it’s Flash Thompson who clearly shares that Lois/Clark dynamic with Peter Parker. The guy was clearly over compensating.

A “right wingers beware” label would amuse me so greatly, it’d actually get me buying more comics.

Um … okay.