Comic is reflection of society. Every era comic deal with social issues, problems, and social norms. 1960's was no exception, during the 60's United States was going through many events such as Vietnam war over see and protest against war in the United States. Also, it was time of hippies movements and fighting against drug. In 1960's hippies and drugs were the biggest social issues in the united States. Therefore, comic could not ignore these issues. In the Amazing Spiderman talk about the drug uses of Spiderman's best friend being addicted to drugs. The reason of drug addiction was to forget about his problems in life, such as girlfriend, and many other things in his life. Just like many people take drugs in the 60's to forget about life and to ease the pain in life. Spiderman and other comic stories reflect what was going on in the 1960's.
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.
Comments