Brian Michael Bendis & the debasement of Tigra: conscious or unsconscious misogyny?

[kali921]

This week continues to be emotionally mercurial, as the discussions of racial and cultural blind spots in fandom continue around LJ, JournalFen, and the larger blogsphere - I'm tempted to call this Jewgate 2007 - and I do have more to say about it, but today I need to write about something that's been on my mind for over a week

Comments

[soldiergrrrl]

Oh. My. God. That's horrid.

I'm not sure what else to say. I'm not a comic fan and I think it's horrid.

[kali921]

Yes. Us Tigra fans went from having so much hope for her in 2004 after her wonderful miniseries, where she was shown with her usual moxie, brains, and general awesomeness, to THIS travesty.

They're not the same woman. They just aren't. And Bendis, unless he's seriously fucking deluded, must know it.

[soldiergrrrl]

I actually wandered over to read some of the comments in the other post, and it got a discussion going with my husband.

It's amazing that people will put up with things in comics, or role-playing games, that they would never stomach in real life. I understand that we read/play to get away from real life, but there are some things I disagree with so vehemently that I can't divorce myself from them when we play.

Slavery and torture are the two biggest I'm come across recently.

The folx saying she deserved it, or that she had it coming would, more than likely, not agree with beating the daylights out of a woman IRL. Actually, reading some of the comments, they might, but I find that too distressing to think about.

[kali921]

For whatever reason, your comment has reminded me of this: I'm a member of a ninjutsu mailing list that has members from around the world, but was started for members of a certain dojo in San Francisco, a very well respected dojo.

And one day, we got in a heated debate regarding a news story about a man that had fought off an attack barehanded by a wild bear that was starving and sick, had prevailed, and killed the bear. Someone on the list posted the story to our forum with the general sentiment of "awesome, and this is why we study martial arts, so that we can learn to NOT FEAR IN THE FACE OF BEARS," and waxed on with a bunch of macho bullshit having to do with killing bears with your bare hands. He wasn't kidding; he was deadly serious.

I pointed out that the death of a sick and starving animal (it was thus classified after an autopsy) isn't a great victory of courage and capability, it's fucking sad. Yes, the dude fought off a very dangerous animal and survived, but this isn't a moral victory of any kind

[soldiergrrrl]

Wow. There's a conversation I'm glad I haven't had.

You always make the think of things I might not otherwise think of.

Thanks.