This isn’t a debate, it’s shooting fish in a barrel. Why not whip out gay marriage or flag-burning next? Use your head.

If she heard the comment, then I can’t see her doing business with a guy who would help Hatter be in a better position to molest young girls (I could see her robbing him blind, though), let alone not *doing* anything about Hatter. If she didn’t hear it, then it kind of makes her look stupid.

I’m not saying that there is absolutely NO context in which a story about rape or pedophilia could be appropriate, but so often rape/pedophilia is used as shorthand for “Yeah, this guy is JUST. THAT. DEPRAVED. Aren’t I edgy! ?” It just reads as lazy storytelling with very little real appreciation for the realities of these all-too-common tragedies. So I’d just as much rather people not write about them.

@Matthew M-

Ladies and gentleman, I give you the poster definition of the logical fallacy known as reductio ad absurdum.

Seriously man, I know it’s much easier to treat everyone who raises the idea of some level of storytelling decorum as the second coming of Wertham, but it doesn’t really contribute to either side of the debate.

That or he’s just decided that the best way to spice up the pedestrian Batman stories he comes up with is to include a shitload of “edgy” sexual content and innuendo. It worked for Simone on Secret Six, why shouldn’t it work for him too?

Sullen teenagers? Seriously? The super-hero comics industry ISN’T built sullen, bitter middle-agers who desperately want to recapture their youth?

it’s something else entirely to argue that a writer should not write about a topic, regardless of context.

stop it, just stop it. all of you.

So a Bat title goes into “Law & Order SVU” territory. Don’t like it? There are plenty of other Bat titles. Maybe the conversation sets up a future story. I think it was an interesting intro to “The Broker”.

Dini gave us that excellent “War on Crime” over-sized Batman story with Alex Ross. I will buy any Bat story written by Dini.

Thanks for the historical refs that alluded to Hatter possibly being a pedo in Bat:Madness and AAsylum. But, the rest? Way too long for a whole lot of nothing. Edit, edit, edit.

Why are you so surprised? Since the comics industry has decided to build its flagging fortunes on the backs of sullen teenagers instead of little kids, you should expect this sort of thing.

Logically, murder should be the worse crime, but realistically more people find child molestation morally repugnant. Probably because of the loss of innocence in represents. I know that if pedophilia became a recognized characteristic of the Joker, I probably wouldn’t pick up another Joker story ever.

As far as super-hero comics are concerned, I guess what I’m saying is that we want villains who are EEVILE, but who still have standards. Even with the Joker, who’s basically the living embodiment of chaos, it’s difficult to imagine as a pedophile.

Does anyone want Winick to write about pedophiles in the DCU? I hope not.

@Allen:
I can guaran-damn-tee you there is at least one pedophile in the news right now, but we don’t have to worry about him anymore.

and DCU is far the perfect world
it has alien invasions
hell trying to come to earth
a band of manazons attacking the UN while the amazons attack Washington
secret sects of villains dressed like snakes trying to provoke the apocalypse, not mentioning the brother blood sect and the bible of crime sect
+ super villains and evil geniuses trying to take ver the world

and you expect that the problems like child molestation, slave sex traffic, drugs, etc,etc,etc doesnt

ok now im not gonna say that it should be done but i can be portrayed on a much better(maybe discrete) way than this

the thing that makes superheroes such a powerful storytelling tool is that, despite all the wonder and ridiculousness, there are reflections of our fallibility in there, too.

children are raped and murdered. human beings, men and women, rape and murder children. it’s part of the reason our world feels so ugly. but it’s also part of the reason that hope and heroism resonates. fictionally or otherwise.

(i’d suggest leaving off the television. there may be pedophiles on the local news.)

First I want to say that I’ve read your article and I see where you are coming from. I can understand that reading a comic book and finding pedophilia, child-rape and other similar crimes in their pages can be very disturbing to some readers.

However, I wouldn’t want Dini to censor himself, especially if he has good reasons and points behind it. I’m sure someone as gifted as Dini will have good reasons for his uses of these crimes in the Batbooks. I’m worried that if we start pressuring our writers to censor themselves that we’ll be back to the comic code days. Where would we draw the line? When Johns wrote recently of Superman’s trauma dealing with the death of his dad, it was very touching, but the subject is a hard one. From what I understand, Johns’ sister was killed tragically, maybe this is his way of demonstrating how he grieved and able to move on. Maybe Dini has a message as well.

May I recommend that you try reading different Batbooks? I think it is great that there are a lot of books out there by different writers. Perhaps you may find something there that is more to your liking.

But considering the Reverend Dogdson’s own predilictions, it would be historically accurate.

If this is just a one-off line, and we don’t know that it isn’t leading to a larger story down the line, I don’t know that I would necessarily go to pedophilia first. I havn’t read Sirens yet, but as far as that single panel goes, there’s nothing inherently pedophilic about that line. It’s in “Storybook Park,” and I recall at least story where Tetch was experimenting on children because they were easier to control.

If I had seen the panel in the proper context, I probably would have thought, “He’s the Mad Hatter. He’s probably looking for an Alice.”

But I agree with your main point. Even in this age of “realism” in comics (and why in the world anyone would want realism in stories about a millionaire who dresses like a bat and beats up psychotic clowns), there are still lines that probably shouldn’t be crossed–at least not with any regularity.

And as far as the Superman comment goes: Superman can’t be everywhere and I’m sure stuff like this isn’t as big of an issue in Metropolis.

And Alexa, it’s not like the heroes (Batman et. al) aren’t trying to prevent things like this but they have to deal with all types of crime and supercrime. Cut them some slack.