maverynthia:thepatches:themarysue:APE IN A CAPE: A Slightly Frustrating...

maverynthia:

thepatches:

themarysue:

APE IN A CAPE: A Slightly Frustrating Thing…

gailsimone:

…about the wonderful http://eschergirls.tumblr.com/ and http://thehawkeyeinitiative.com/ .

I think these sites do something hilarious, something I’ve tried to do my whole online history, which I think of as ‘mocktivism,’ that is, activism by mockery. You showcase how absurd something is, you take away the excuses and the labeling and you nakedly show how ridiculous some things are that desperately need changing. It’s a way of getting at the entrenched nonsense by making fun of it.

Making the egregious laughable.

All well and good, I’m thrilled these sites exist.

But what’s bugging me is that there are still goofballs out there who are taking away the wrong message. The narrative is growing that, contrary to all indications, the people behind these sites are just humorless feminists who hate anything sexy.

GUYS. WAKE THE FUCK UP.

That is NOT what’s happening. These people are exposing something that is intrinsically disturbing, but they are doing it with more humor and wit than the original drawings EVER displayed.

But beyond that…it’s irritating and incorrect to imply that pointing out something stupid makes you anti-sex, anti-sexuality, or anti-sexy art.

Most feminists I know LIKE beautiful women in their comics, they LIKE sexy characters and sexy content.  Every con I’m at, women line up for sketches of women by artists like Adam Hughes, Amanda Conner, and other artists with a gift for drawing gorgeous, sexy pin-ups.

I for one love when a gifted artist draws a beautiful, sexy woman in a comic (guys too, obviously, but this topic is about female portrayal).

It’s just that the definition of sexy isn’t broken-back swivel-torsoed caricatures of balloon-esque underage demi-teens with perpetually frozen sex doll expressions and Penthouse poses. Usually while they are making coffee or turning on the television.

It’s not the SEXY that is at issue. It’s the competence. It’s the lack of understanding of how women work, the lack of concern about alienating huge chunks of the readership. It’s mistaking ‘ugly’ for ‘sexy.’  It’s taking empowered characters and displaying them like a standing rib roast at the butcher shop. It’s making women adornments instead of characters with souls and will and agency.

It’s bad comics. It’s bad illustration.

And most of it even fails on this basic goal…it is bad cheesecake.

No one wants to take away the sexy out of comics. Most would be fine with a lot MORE sexy in comics.

They just want to be included and not actively discouraged, they want to see women treated with the same kind of care and fun that the males are, they want to see good art done well instead of distorted for a market that never grew up.

Making fun of bad art doesn’t take away the sexy. If anything, it encourages artists to do sexy BETTER.

Like it or not, women are going to have a voice in comics. And in this case, that means making fun of stuff that absolutely deserves it.

GOOD.

Ladies and Gentlespoons: GAIL SIMONE. *standing ovation*

Eh? Even if the women were drawn right, that means pretty much EVERY woman has to be sexy all the time and I don’t want that either. If the men aren’t being sexy I don’t want to women to be sexy. It just sends the message still that women are just sex objects. There are times for sexy and times for not sexy.

Wow. No, that’s not what it means at all. What the hell?

I’m addressing something very specific, which is the charge that the sites like these want to ‘take the sexy away’ and other such nonsense.

I specifically said how ridiculous it is to have these hyper-sexualized women doing everyday things like making coffee.

I talked about the sexy thing to address a specific bit of crap that has been leveled at those sites. I have no idea where the idea would come that that means ALL poses of ALL women have to convey sexuality.