Tim O’Neil asks, “Has Achewood Lost Its Groove?”: He doesn’t answer the question, just asks it, and ends up with an interesting post that deals with Charles Schulz, Nick Gurewitch, Aaron McGruder and Chris Ware as well.
Is it just me, or does it seem like there’s a superhero or comic book gallery exhibit being announced at least once a week now?: The University of Oregon is having a two-day conference on superheroes Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art’s fall exhibition “Faster than a Speeding Bullet: The Art of a Superhero.” The LA Times blogged about it here, you can learn more about the conference here, and more about the exhibit and the other neat stuff going on around it here.
How Matt Fraction made it: Speaking of the LA Times, they also have a profile of Matt Fraction that’s well worth a read.
This is what I want for every birthday from now on: Australian food blogger Johanna baked an awesome-looking comic book sound effect-shaped birthday cake for a niece’s superhero-themed party. You can see a picture and read a bit more about it here, and I suggest you give the post a look. That way you’ll know what to get me for my birthday.
Wait, what?: This dude thinks the fact that Tom Brevoort said “whenever your leads are white American males, you’ve got a better chance of reaching more people overall” means comic books are “institutionally racist” and that what Brevoort said was “a pretty damning statement.” I think it’s a pretty big jump—like, of the sort The Hulk makes to get around—to take from a simple statement along the lines of “the facts say this” to “the facts say this, because white men rule, everyone else totally sucks.”
September 7th, 2009 at 9:42 am
re: Tom Brevoort’s statement and The Escapist’s response
First, let’s define institutional racism:”“the collective failure of an organization to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture, or ethnic origin”(Stokely Carmichael, via wikipedia)
It probably does apply in the broadest sense, but I think it’s important to note that this does not imply bigotry in this case. It’s just a sort of cultural vacuum which, taken optimistically, means that there’s an opportunity to develop new characters.
Of course, if you read this site, you probably know that there are already strong (and growing) multicultural elements of nearly every kind in comics beyond the mass-market facade of the lunchbox and t-shirt heroes.
September 7th, 2009 at 3:45 pm
I don’t think that it’s such a leap to have that interpretation of Brevoort’s statement. It’s important to remember that institutional racism is insidious, but not actively malevolent. In this case, it’s maintenance of the status quo and acquiescence to the idea that white men can’t relate to anybody but other white men. It’s self-sustaining exclusion of different points of view to keep the customers that already exist (and are dwindling in number) rather than questioning why other customers don’t exist.
September 7th, 2009 at 5:13 pm
glad you liked the cake – my niece was excited by it too!
September 8th, 2009 at 1:29 am
As the guy who asked the question on Marvel.com (username: NewChad. FYI – I’m a Chinese/Australian who lived in the UK) Tom’s answer made perfect sense and calling it a racist statement is absurd. He’s talking about the logistics of selling product and I applaud Marvels efforts to diversify and keep giving these books a shot, AND Tom’s honesty in answering.
If there is racism at play, it’s not in the institutions, but in the buying public.
September 8th, 2009 at 4:49 am
Actually Brevoort was saying that people of ALL backgrounds in the US are more likely to consume entertainment with majority figures in the lead.
September 9th, 2009 at 8:36 am
Chad, the linked article isn’t calling Tom racist but saying that it reveals the institutional racism (and institutional sexism) in the American comic book business. Elvee is exactly right, saying the American comic book business is institutionally racist does not imply conscious bigotry on the part of individual creators and fans.