Posted: 8/13/2002 3:17:18 PM EDT
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These are not the kind of comic books I read when I was a kid. I guess they want to teach them young. Green Lantern Fights Gay-Bashing Aug 13, 6:40 PM (ET) By VERENA DOBNIK NEW YORK (AP) - The comic book company that created Superman and Batman has a cutting-edge new story line: a gay teenager is the victim of a hate crime. DC Comics'"Green Lantern" No. 154 hits newsstands in September - with main character Terry Berg beaten almost to death on a street. Terry actually emerged as a gay character in 2001 in issue No. 137, which was cited by the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation as the year's best comic book. Terry is a sidekick to Kyle Rayner - aka Green Lantern - whose emerald ring gives him supernatural powers that keep New Yorkers safe. "Terry came out because he had a crush on Kyle. Who wouldn't? He's tall, with all those muscles," says cartoonist Judd Winick, who created the gay character at the suggestion of DC comics editor Bob Schreck, also responsible for the "Batman" series. Schreck "knew I'd be pretty sensitive to gay issues," says Winick, 32, who is married and lives in San Francisco. He was a cast member of MTV's "Real World," a documentary-style show that detailed the lives of a group of people living in the same house. Winick's "Real World" roommate was Pedro Zamora, a nationally known AIDS activist who died in 1994. Their friendship inspired Winick's comic-book story "Pedro and Me." If there's a lesson in dropping gay issues into "Green Lantern," one of DC's flagship titles, "it might be that it would be great for young people to see that the Green Lantern doesn't care that Terry is gay. He's a person," says the cartoonist. "Terry represents acceptance. And now, in this hate crime, we're discussing the worst side of the gay issue." In issue No. 154, the teenager and his boyfriend are walking down the street when three men start yelling out a derogatory anti-gay word and chasing them. They catch up with Terry, who's brutally beaten. Though he's a main character whose gay lifestyle is a running thread in the comic series, it's not the first time the comic book industry touches on gay issues. The 1993 coming-out of Marvel Comics' Northstar, of the Canadian X-Men group Alpha Flight, was a sensation. X-Men characters Mystique and Destiny had an implied lesbian relationship, and the Green Lantern features lesbian [url]apnews1.iwon.com/article/20020813/D7LCOLM00.html[/url] |
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The funny thing is the accusations of Frederic Wertham in "The Seduction of the Innocents" in the 1950's that comic books led to juvenile delinquency (and homosexuality Batman has a young boy who lives with him, the dress in tights etc blah blah) led to the Senate Subcommittee that led to the Comics Code Authority, that was a little logo on comic books that said "CCA" in a logo that looked sort of like a postage stamp. I don't think any of the comic book companies abide by it anymore. I heard Marvel (Spiderman, Hulk etc) dropped it, I'm not sure about DC (Superman, Batman etc). Comic Code Authority article [url]http://www.sideroad.com/comics/column12.html[/url] the original comic code authority rules [url]http://www.comics.dm.net/codetext.htm[/url] This logo used to a bit of assurance to parents that they could let young children read the comic without running across material that parents would find objectionable. Although children may be more sophisticated about sexuality (for better or worse), I still don't think most parents would want their elementary and junior high school age children reading comic books that portrayed homosexual relationships between teen age boys as acceptable (and I guess fashionable by having the hero involved in one). I guess comic books are as anxious to appear "cool" and "PC" as the rest of the media now. |
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Quoted: At least the comic book is real to life and shows the fag almost beaten to death like what sometimes happens in the real world for no other reason than because you are gay. When exactly was the last reported case? I'm sure if someone as much as looked at a gay person angrily the press would be all over it. Seems this is pretty much a non issue these days. But I'm willing to listen to the arguments. --LS |