Monday, January 10, 2011

Oh do go away

Also from the Golden Perfect story arc, this time it's JLA issue 64.

This was the only reference to sexism made in this story, sexism didn't seem to be part of Jarhanpur's culture so it seemed like this was thrown in to a) rile up Wonder Woman, b) set him against the heroes, and c) show how much of a bad guy he is.   A hint - decrying sexism within your comics is most effective when you decry all sexism, and not just when it suits you.

I'm guessing that Jarhanpur is meant to either in the Middle East, or in Asia somewhere.  It's not entirely clear what country it is modelled on.  Which is part of the problem.  America gets to be defined as America,  Britain and Western Europe get fairly distinct identities, but as soon as you get past the old iron curtain, or head into territories not dominated by white folk, superhero comics seem to put each culture and society into one giant melting pot and you end up with generic ex Communist country or generic non white country.  Characters become caricatures and the creators seem to have done absolutely no research on said country.

It's depressing and more than a little racist.  Because hey, they are all the same over there.  Not like us.  And their evilness can be shown in just a few offhand statements that us in the enlightened West would never ever think, no sirree.

Bah.

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