Comments | strannik01: Starfire controversy and how to write the "ethnical slut" characters

strannik01

Starfire controversy and how to write the "ethnical slut" characters

Sep 24, 2011 01:19

Since Wendesday, the American comic book fandom has been at an uproar over the first issue of DC Comics Red Hood and the Outlaws series. The comic featured Starfire, a character who's been part of various versions of Teen Titans/New Titans/The Titans team. If non-comic fan know this character at all, they'd probably recognize her from Teen Titans ( Read more... )

sexism, sexuality, comics, feminism, society

Comments 2

skybreak_seeker September 24 2011, 06:47:19 UTC

+1

I'm more familiar with the version of Starfire the animated Teen Titans, and am not that up-to-date on her comic incarnation aside from what I looked up on TVTropes and Wiki.

That said, it always makes me a little sad to see any charactr used as a sex object. If you wanna have her sleep with multiple partners that's one thing; You can do that and still be a compelling character. But sleeping around without any characterization to justify is is quite another, especially if the character has an established history.

I've always thought of this as a failing with comics in general. Some writers always seem to take established characters and turn them into what -they- want them to be without much thought about their history.

empressvv September 25 2011, 20:31:29 UTC

"The problem is that the version of Stafire that appeared in Red Hood is that she was a sexually available woman with no personality at all." <--- Or it's just forms of personality and agency that you don't agree with. There's a page dedicated to her point of view, she says she can barely tell the guys apart, she talks about how she's on the planet even if the planet doesn't want her. She has facial expressions, she corrects every single one of Roy's assumptions about her. Roy bores her, she tells him. She acts casual, she acts pleased, she acts happy. She describes her companions as being able to make her laugh. These are evidence of personality that YOU chose to ignore in favor of focusing on her sexuality.

"They are allowed to be smart, funny, good at their job, skilled in something, etc. But when female characters sleep around, the act of sleeping around tends to become... not even their sole defining trait - their only character trait..."<--- You are the one that has singled this out as her defining trait. Via Jason, the writer ( ... )