issue i: becca sorgert's article

Women in Comics

This past summer I was finally convinced and decided to give the world of comic books a try - something new that I thought I would never enjoy or comprehend. Soon, I found myself at Paradox Comics, a strange, new environment that instantaneously made me feel like an obvious outsider. Where to begin, I had no clue. I looked around dumbfounded for a long period of time trying to find out how the comic book order was within the shelves. Spending hours in libraries, I could make no sense of the order. In desperation to find an item, I went home with Girls – a comic book with the epitome of male dominancy that many don’t see and I have no idea how one could not.

Next was The Plain Janes by Cecil Castellucci and Jim Rugg. Although the comic is feminist to a certain degree and the authors have integrated community action and activist art, the writing is juvenile and ending is centered around male action and success -- too adolescent, not what I wanted.

Then, I discovered Alison Bechdel’s glorious graphic autobiography, Fun Home, only by stumbling upon it at Zandbroz. Bechdel’s feminist, lesbian voice narrates her work by focusing on her relationship with her father, growing up, and learning to accept one’s identity and familial history. Fun Home puts hope in the comic industry. But is the comic book industry accepting of this literature when you can not find this within a comic store?

Excited beyond belief to find more feminist work after Fun Home, I returned to Paradox to inquire about female authors. I did not realize such in inquiry would stump the staff -- their suggestion: read a comic written by men that has a wide female audience. I settled with Y: the Last Man. Although trying at times, it proved itself as quite a feminist piece, but not written by a woman. This field is exclusively by men for men.

Looking further into the male dominated authorship of this field, Gail Simone’s Women in Refrigerators theory exposes the double standards of male and female heroes an their endings. Women in Refrigerators focus is on shedding light and to change the fate of women in comics, for women superheroes die a more brutal death and injury without full recuperation, without revenge, and are less likely to return after death. Simone has collected a list of over one hundred female characters affected including Stephanie Brown or Spolier’s fate of rape and torture by drill (Cochran 34).

To further this theory, Perry Moore has recently compiled the destruction of around forty gay identified characters. For example, a character many can picture, Batwoman is “reveled as a closeted lesbian, kidnapped [and] tortured” (Moore 27). Mathew Bakko, doing his own research about his identity within comics, found that gay superheroes in comic books started as identifying as straight and authors deciding a gay sexual identity later on and issues such as dating, hate crimes, and general safety were becoming prominent then to the character. With physical appearance, Bakko found that gay “males were androgynous; presented more femininely then other superheroes” and that “the only comic book characters that I found that were gay were white, which is an issue” (Bakko).

As for the status of sexuality in comics, Bakko believes that “it is good that sexuality is being discussed, although should be more comprehensive. Gay characters didn’t have much exposure as actual physical sexuality, more of romantic feeling. At least it is a step in the right direction” (Bakko).

One of most exciting comic I discovered was Hothead Paisan: Homicidal Lesbian Terrorist by Diane DiMassa. Hothead’s website says it best: “Hothead and her beloved cat, Chicken, have been providing rage therapy for exhausted devotees since 1991. Hothead is fully in touch with your Inner Societal Rage and gleefully carries out the fantasies you would never act on. Would you?” (Hothead). Read it.

Sexist men in power refuse to let women have an opportunity in this medium. For those of you who may be thinking the field is this way because women do not buy comics, let alone read them, Trina Robins, writer (including a pro-choice anthology Choices: A Pro-Choice Benefit Comic for NOW) and co-founder of the Wimmen’s Comic Collective, responds: “It’s total bullshit to say that girls don’t read comics. Girls read comics when there are comics for girls to read” (Robbins 4). Women comic book writers are clearly under the radar, but recently there has been an increase in women creating graphic auto-biographical graphic books that are being published by fiction presses. Such comics include Fun Home, Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi, and Long Tac Sam by Ann Marie Fleming.

It is my conclusion that women are frequently not published in the male dominated comic field and find themselves self-publishing like Fart Party by Julia Wertz somewhat similar to many radical comics in the 90’s, or being published now by presses that are new to the graphic/illustrated novel. Women are finding a place on the shelves, but not in stores that specialize in their field. Questioning authority’s norms and rebelling in existing, woman (comic) writers are excluded from equal stocking and place within their field and are shown that they need to prove their existence. Seeing relatable images, plot, and voice draws readers to texts because it represents themselves and their place in society. Not having women writers accessible and biasing gay and women comic heroes excludes women and others that are considered a minority from society and each other through this medium and equity.

Works Cited

Bakko, Mathew. Personal Interview. 25 May 2008.

Cochran, Shannon. “The Cold Shoulder: Saving Superheroines from Comic-book Violence” Bitch 35 (Spring 2007): 23-6.

Hothead Paisan: Homicidal Lesbian Terrorist. 2008. Diane DiMassa. 6 July 2008

Robbins, Trina. From Girls to Grrlz: A History of Women’s Comics from Teens to Zines. Chronicle Books, 1999.