Skip to main content

Why blame comics for societal failure?

By 1945, the Second World War had ended, bringing the world to its knees and America to a new standard. Over the next few years, positive attitudes and a solid economy kept the United States on top. The comic book industry also reached a record in sales around the same time, with everyone from children to soldiers reading scores of superhero and horror stories. However, there was something to fear with in the new postwar America, with the threat gone and the debt owed to the country. With the threat dissipated, comic book creators worried that their readers would vanish as well. The demand of superheroes had the potential to decline rapidly, which posed a huge danger to the 90 percent of the industry that featured them. Wartime heroes like Captain America, the Sub-Mariner, Green Lantern, and the Flash were on the brink of cancellation by 1949.

After a while, writers found a solution in product diversity. Many superhero titles were dropped and replaced with genres like romance comics, jungle heroines with progressively less clothing, and a lighthearted comedy focused on a teen named Archie. The most outstanding response, however, came from the crime and science fiction comic spectrum, growing increasingly graphic each month. Surprisingly, the adult themes seemed to attract younger readers, which would let the comic book industry thrive, until certain people started seeing the results.

In the reading “The Comics…Very Funny!”, Dr. Frederic Wertham bombards the reader with various crimes completely committed by adolescents, and points the blame directly at the comic book industry. He suggests that the comic books are setting the example for children’s recently unruly behavior, although similar science fiction has been around since the creation of comic books. Being a certified M.D., Wertham already holds this intellectual power over the citizens. The “evidence” he displays in the reading could only solidify what he was trying to prove. His seventeen points made the comic book writers out to be evil men themselves, although they only wrote about them, and treated the kids who read them similar to addicts that needed to be rehabilitated.

Because of the times, there were many issues besides comics that could have contributed to the children’s wild behavior. The war prompted many fathers and brothers to leave home, and mothers would go work at factories all day, often leaving Superman, Batman, Captain America, and the villains they faced as the only available role models. Unfortunately, that gave the otherworldly horror stories with more gory artistry into their mindsets as well. Radio, schoolwork, and playing outside was the only other entertainment, to a degree. Other media, along with a child’s vivid imagination, could easily take things out of hand when there is no supervision.

Nonetheless, a code for the comic book industry would surface in 1948, 1954, and even in 1989. Each of them had severe differences, from gross content to religious matters, sexual restrictions, and racism. The largest changes to the industry, however, were the emphasis on crime scenes, making them almost unrealistic and redundant. The only reason that such codes appeared and resurfaced was because of the additional influence comic books held over the younger generation. In my opinion, although they were not the purest of sources (unless they read Superman or Batman), comic books were not the source of all the trouble. The negligence of the adults, both writing explicit comics and allowing children to buy them, was a resounding factor as well. Comic books were the largest fad at the time, and therefore became the easiest thing to blame.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Mythology and Superheroes in Comics

Ohhh my goodness... When I decided on trying to analyze the mythological origins and references in superhero comics, I had no idea the can of worms I was opening up... On the one hand, it was awesome to see just how many connections there were between superheroes and psychology/mythology/philosophy, but all the information also made it terribly difficult to distinguish what I should be using and how to tie it all together. When I was talking to one of my sorority sisters about it she said, "Oh yeah, well, research essays are kind of like putting together puzzles..." and I think that really sums up what writing this paper was like for me. Fortunately, I was really interested throughout the whole process and I very much enjoyed writing the paper. Being a psychology major, I was especially interested in reading about the Jungian archetypes that had a lot of parallels with major modern comic books superheroes. I was also able to incorporate Joseph Campbell's "hero cycle&

Why blame comics for societal failure?

Why blame comics for societal failure? Society blamed comics for the societal failures because it was a fairly new industry, and as things seemed to go “wrong” they figured it must be comic books. When a child grew up during the war, his father was probably killing people and the military and his mother was probably making things in factories to help kill the opposition. The only things kids had to “babysit” them was comic books, and they read many different kinds. So when kids starting acting differently in this new generation the figured it must be the comic books. Society didn’t want to believe it may have been the internal and external scars war causes on the soldiers and their families. Also the fact that young unattended children are reading these comics may not be able to differentiate between fantasy and reality. When society fails it always needs a scapegoat then it was comic books next it was rock and roll. Society naturally resist change.

#FUTURES: Tomorrow Idris Elba will be the Last Man Standing

There is some bad buzz around Pacific Rim on the web. I suspect the possibility of a giant robot movie being awesome is too much for some people.  The internet is full of dark corners, but until we see the movie we won't know the box office.  What we can tell right now is that Idris Elba is doing his part to make the movie a success. A standout performer, Elba has made a name for himself in countless productions .  He achieve wide recognition for his turn on the big screen in films such as Thor and on the small screen in the BBC's Luther . Of course, the open question about actors of color in any film is whether not they will help or hurt the box office.  Will Smith recent disappointment with After Earth opens the door for this conversation. His lack of success sparks the question who will be the next "bankable" star of color. There can be only one! See what I did there:-)  These sentiments reflect a Hollywood centric approach that ignores Nollywood