Luke Cage is pure A-list and very much an Avenger, he's had a load of minis but nothing solid.Rigs83 said:
Here's hoping he gets a Heroes For Hire book with Rand soon.
Though Luke Cage Noir is excellent.
Do Racism and Comic Books Go Hand in Hand?
- Thread starter Logan Westbrook
- Start date
Here's hoping he gets a Heroes For Hire book with Rand soon.
Though Luke Cage Noir is excellent.
I doubt anyone is going to bother to listen to me, but the bottom line is that I consider statements like the one spawning this entire thread to be akin to hate speech. Stuff like this results in more damage and bad race relations than all the KKK rallies in the world nowadays as it basically attempts to provide fuel to a dying fire that just needs to be let go. I'm one of those like Bill Cosby, and a few others, who seem to believe that racism is pretty much over with as a mainstream phenomena, and now we're dealing with the hard part of blacks needing to make something of the oppertunities in their hands, not looking for any excuse to show that "the man" is keeping them down so they don't have to try.
The fact that you can generate massive traffic or interest by implying that ANYTHING is racist doesn't help either.
As a believe in free speech I don't exactly believe in censoring this kind of thing, but I think it needs to be handled far more carefully.
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As far as the issue itself goes, one has to consider that no matter what anyone wants to think, Blacks are a minority group. As a result "equality" does not in any way mean a 50-50 split between Whites and Blacks.
One also has to look at the interest involved. Like it or not Black America has simply not been interested as a whole in comic books. This is not due to a lack of black comic characters but due to the racial subculture as it exists now. Nothing prevented Blacks from breaking into music, sports, and other areas that they were generally interested in. However off the top of my head I cannot think of *ANY* black comic writers or artists. Yet I can think of plenty of white ones, and decent numbers of asians (and you'll notice asian characters are increasing in western comics in proportion to the artists and writers involved).
One of the other issues involved is the so called "Blackitude" which frankly does not work well in comics on a lot of levels. Understand that today we're dealing with the problem summarized as the "Get Rich Or Die Trying" mentality, which pretty much insults anyone who is content to be a normal person as being unworthy, or "not black enough". Reading and school learning are actually looked down on.
Not only does this affect the audience, but frankly any character that is going to represent the values of a song like "What A Thug's About" is *NOT* going to be very heroic. Even as a dark hero. We're talking a bloody villain here.
Attempts to make properly "urban" black characters tend to result in a group of whiners who try and make a racial issue out of everything (think of Luke Cage's "WTF" speech comparing the Pro-Registration movement in Civil War to slavery). Again creating a problem rather than a real solution.
Characters like "Storm" who are black and *DON'T* have this kind of racial chip on their shoulder mentality, are also not considered black enough. Some have even joked "What, Storm's Black? I never would have guessed based on how she acts".
Simply put I think a lot of it comes down to the point that the American Black Culture itself needs to change before it's really going to find much in this genere/medium. It's not really that anyone is keeping them out, but as much that they have no real interest.
Other issues change, you see a general cultural acceptance of fitting in spread, greater education, and similar things as oppertunities are embraced, and your going to see more Black writers and artists moving into fandom of all sorts (fantasy, science fiction, comics) and with them they will of course bring black characters. Right now you've pretty much got a situation where there is no racism involved, your simply dealing with two elements (comics and black culture) that are out of context of each other.
The thing to consider is that MOST popular black characters like John Stewart (Green Lantern), Rhodey Rhodes (Iron Man), Storm, and others by being relatively normal and holding fairly mainstream attitudes and values are not considered "black enough" or "sell outs" or however you want to put it. Look at the movies and escapism produced for Black America *BY* Black America, your basic so called "Ghetto Lit" and "Gangsta" movies. That's the popular version of a "hero", and in comic book terms that's the dude a super hero clobbers and sends to jail because he beat up or swindled a bunch of people, if a black hero does that he's just alienated 90% of the black escapism base. They are going to buy a copy of a book with a title like "Thugalicious" instead of a comic book with Storm on the cover or whatever.
I guess what I'm saying is that this is a sociological "problem" that can't be addressed directly. Rather it's something that will change as other variables in society do. When you see black comic writers and artists coming into the industry in greater numbers you will see their creations appearing in similar proportion to the population. You can't recruit them directly, they have to pretty much come about on their own and go through the trials, tribulations, and competition of all the other creators. The same thing happened with Asians, and while you don't see asians jumping out of every comic they DO have an increasing prescence in western comics, not to mention the influance Manga has had on western comics as a whole.
Disney isn't going to solve the problem, all they can do by trying to "address" it, is make it worse and raise political contreversy, making something seem racist that isn't. The correct move is to just keep things going as they are now, the oppertunities are there, eventually someone will embrace them and you'll see lasting change. Not today, not tomorrow, maybe not even in another bloody decade, but as other problems are addressed it WILL happen.
Such are my thoughts, apologies to those who are offended (though I suspect most just figured TL
R and didn't get this far anyway).
The fact that you can generate massive traffic or interest by implying that ANYTHING is racist doesn't help either.
As a believe in free speech I don't exactly believe in censoring this kind of thing, but I think it needs to be handled far more carefully.
-
As far as the issue itself goes, one has to consider that no matter what anyone wants to think, Blacks are a minority group. As a result "equality" does not in any way mean a 50-50 split between Whites and Blacks.
One also has to look at the interest involved. Like it or not Black America has simply not been interested as a whole in comic books. This is not due to a lack of black comic characters but due to the racial subculture as it exists now. Nothing prevented Blacks from breaking into music, sports, and other areas that they were generally interested in. However off the top of my head I cannot think of *ANY* black comic writers or artists. Yet I can think of plenty of white ones, and decent numbers of asians (and you'll notice asian characters are increasing in western comics in proportion to the artists and writers involved).
One of the other issues involved is the so called "Blackitude" which frankly does not work well in comics on a lot of levels. Understand that today we're dealing with the problem summarized as the "Get Rich Or Die Trying" mentality, which pretty much insults anyone who is content to be a normal person as being unworthy, or "not black enough". Reading and school learning are actually looked down on.
Not only does this affect the audience, but frankly any character that is going to represent the values of a song like "What A Thug's About" is *NOT* going to be very heroic. Even as a dark hero. We're talking a bloody villain here.
Attempts to make properly "urban" black characters tend to result in a group of whiners who try and make a racial issue out of everything (think of Luke Cage's "WTF" speech comparing the Pro-Registration movement in Civil War to slavery). Again creating a problem rather than a real solution.
Characters like "Storm" who are black and *DON'T* have this kind of racial chip on their shoulder mentality, are also not considered black enough. Some have even joked "What, Storm's Black? I never would have guessed based on how she acts".
Simply put I think a lot of it comes down to the point that the American Black Culture itself needs to change before it's really going to find much in this genere/medium. It's not really that anyone is keeping them out, but as much that they have no real interest.
Other issues change, you see a general cultural acceptance of fitting in spread, greater education, and similar things as oppertunities are embraced, and your going to see more Black writers and artists moving into fandom of all sorts (fantasy, science fiction, comics) and with them they will of course bring black characters. Right now you've pretty much got a situation where there is no racism involved, your simply dealing with two elements (comics and black culture) that are out of context of each other.
The thing to consider is that MOST popular black characters like John Stewart (Green Lantern), Rhodey Rhodes (Iron Man), Storm, and others by being relatively normal and holding fairly mainstream attitudes and values are not considered "black enough" or "sell outs" or however you want to put it. Look at the movies and escapism produced for Black America *BY* Black America, your basic so called "Ghetto Lit" and "Gangsta" movies. That's the popular version of a "hero", and in comic book terms that's the dude a super hero clobbers and sends to jail because he beat up or swindled a bunch of people, if a black hero does that he's just alienated 90% of the black escapism base. They are going to buy a copy of a book with a title like "Thugalicious" instead of a comic book with Storm on the cover or whatever.
I guess what I'm saying is that this is a sociological "problem" that can't be addressed directly. Rather it's something that will change as other variables in society do. When you see black comic writers and artists coming into the industry in greater numbers you will see their creations appearing in similar proportion to the population. You can't recruit them directly, they have to pretty much come about on their own and go through the trials, tribulations, and competition of all the other creators. The same thing happened with Asians, and while you don't see asians jumping out of every comic they DO have an increasing prescence in western comics, not to mention the influance Manga has had on western comics as a whole.
Disney isn't going to solve the problem, all they can do by trying to "address" it, is make it worse and raise political contreversy, making something seem racist that isn't. The correct move is to just keep things going as they are now, the oppertunities are there, eventually someone will embrace them and you'll see lasting change. Not today, not tomorrow, maybe not even in another bloody decade, but as other problems are addressed it WILL happen.
Such are my thoughts, apologies to those who are offended (though I suspect most just figured TL
R and didn't get this far anyway).
If you look at his filmography, you'll realize this guy has talent. If there is a black guy in a video game or cartoon, it's usually Mr. LaMarr playing him. He also played Marvin in Pulp Fiction, although that character is only known for being accidentally shot by Vincent (Travolta).Treblaine said:
I've gotta say, I thought comic books were steadily improving in terms of not being racist.
I mean, it makes sense that American super heroes are for the most part, white, because there's a lot of white people in America.
Of course, they probably should've had a few Latin super heroes and villains (and I'm pretty sure they do) and they've got black super heroes and villains.
Pretty sure I've seen a few Native American ones, too.
But really, I think making someone a race for the sake of it is pretty pathetic.
The way it should go is like this: Think up the character's personality, think of what political, economic and other factors would make that personally, find a country with those factors and make your character a realistic person based on logical factors like parents, political atmopshere, etc.
That is to say, build the character around his/her/it's backstory, not the backstory around the character's race.
I mean, it makes sense that American super heroes are for the most part, white, because there's a lot of white people in America.
Of course, they probably should've had a few Latin super heroes and villains (and I'm pretty sure they do) and they've got black super heroes and villains.
Pretty sure I've seen a few Native American ones, too.
But really, I think making someone a race for the sake of it is pretty pathetic.
The way it should go is like this: Think up the character's personality, think of what political, economic and other factors would make that personally, find a country with those factors and make your character a realistic person based on logical factors like parents, political atmopshere, etc.
That is to say, build the character around his/her/it's backstory, not the backstory around the character's race.
Shouting "I'LL DIE AND MAKE ALLAH PROOOUUUD!!!" is not really intelligent or tolerant? I mean, by saying that, she almost turns into a suicide-bomber.Bloodeye said:
About better Muslim characters - aren't some of the Assassin's Creed people Muslim? I mean those that are allies of Altaiir, not the ones we kill. They fight for a good thing, a bit too violently, but... yeah.
are there racist comics?
Off course, like every other media.
Is the fact that when you're audience is predominately white males, they associate the most with white males, and thus buy those comics, racist?
Nope. That's just natural. We want to associate ourselves with our heroes so we pick ones who are like us, only better. That is not racism, it's pandering. Which in my opinion, is the biggest problem with comics.
Off course, like every other media.
Is the fact that when you're audience is predominately white males, they associate the most with white males, and thus buy those comics, racist?
Nope. That's just natural. We want to associate ourselves with our heroes so we pick ones who are like us, only better. That is not racism, it's pandering. Which in my opinion, is the biggest problem with comics.
Someone has probably said this already, but I'm not going through three pages of comments to make sure, so if so, sorry, Interweb.
Isn't the biggest problem the fact that for most of the medium's history, white American males (and Jewish American males trying to sell comics for white American males, to white American males) have been the artists behind comics? Whether the fan base is racist or not doesn't matter. If your writers are all one ethnic group, or at least convinced they're trying to market to one ethnic group, they're going to have a tendency to "white" things up. If the industry instead hired more non-white artists, which it's beginning to do now, then you'd get more non-white characters who WERE WELL-CONCEIVED AND WRITTEN. Like we're beginning to get now.
Seriously. As fondly and ironically as we may regard Luke Cage, there is a reason he's the biggest racial stereotype in comics' history: he was created by two white guys forcing themselves to make an "urban" character. If comics are indeed racist and we're interested in fixing this, we can't blame the buying public. We have to blame the industry.
As a white male fan, I think I'm more than qualified to say that I, and most other buying fans, don't give a crap about the ethnicity of a character. We will buy a good book about a good character. And if white writers can only write good white characters, then what choice do we have?
Isn't the biggest problem the fact that for most of the medium's history, white American males (and Jewish American males trying to sell comics for white American males, to white American males) have been the artists behind comics? Whether the fan base is racist or not doesn't matter. If your writers are all one ethnic group, or at least convinced they're trying to market to one ethnic group, they're going to have a tendency to "white" things up. If the industry instead hired more non-white artists, which it's beginning to do now, then you'd get more non-white characters who WERE WELL-CONCEIVED AND WRITTEN. Like we're beginning to get now.
Seriously. As fondly and ironically as we may regard Luke Cage, there is a reason he's the biggest racial stereotype in comics' history: he was created by two white guys forcing themselves to make an "urban" character. If comics are indeed racist and we're interested in fixing this, we can't blame the buying public. We have to blame the industry.
As a white male fan, I think I'm more than qualified to say that I, and most other buying fans, don't give a crap about the ethnicity of a character. We will buy a good book about a good character. And if white writers can only write good white characters, then what choice do we have?
It's not racist, just true. Comics are a business. Why write a comic that hardly anyone reads? Make a list of history's most successful comic book super heroes in order from most books sold to least. Who comes out on top?
Most people tend to like shows, books, characters etc who are like them in some way and that deal with situations and ideas that they can relate to.
Tell me, is cable TV's BET channel, which has shows in which almost every actor is black, racist? How about Telemundo and Azteca America where the only non-hispanic actors are the ones on American movies that are dubbed into Spanish? Are they racist?
If it's okay for "minorities" to have something that is exclusive or almost exclusive to them, then why is everything that is mostly "white" racist?
Most people tend to like shows, books, characters etc who are like them in some way and that deal with situations and ideas that they can relate to.
Tell me, is cable TV's BET channel, which has shows in which almost every actor is black, racist? How about Telemundo and Azteca America where the only non-hispanic actors are the ones on American movies that are dubbed into Spanish? Are they racist?
If it's okay for "minorities" to have something that is exclusive or almost exclusive to them, then why is everything that is mostly "white" racist?
Ok I've just now looked at the link with that in it so I get where your coming from. With that said, that guys talking so far out of his arse and that frame is so far out of context(She's actually fighting the devil there, making the reference to Allah understandable),that its rather ironically made him the thoughtless racist by basing his entire opinion of a muslim character on a single pannel. As someone who's actually read the comics I can assure you that she is actually a well rounded character. I guess it just goes to show you can make anything look bad with the wrong presentation.Abedeus said:
Apu Nahasapeemapetilon? (Darn, he's Hindu, my bad)(But you are right, there are a pitiful number. Perhaps it's because most westernised Muslims aren't that different from the blacks rappers they're emulating or the whites they're living among. Eastern muslims are only just getting to see comic books.)Abedeus said:
(There's also the idea that a lot of the big bosses (Stan Lee, Jack Kirby) are Jewish, so you can perhaps understand a reluctance to celebrate Muslim identity)
Arabian radio is still emulating the Goons to be seen as "anarchic".
And as for Marvel Comics being racist - http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/88523-Obama-Your-Friendly-Neighbourhood-President-Elect
(Just checked up, there are 20+ Muslim characters in the comic books, but Dust is possibly the most famous. He's also a Sunni Muslim.)
