Edited 13 March 2008 12:25 CDT: Noticed some strange grammar errors/missing words on my local copy and wanted to make sure they weren’t present on the net.
I’ve been aware of (and disgusted by) this Mary Jane “Comiquette” for about a week, and meaning to post on it, but I kept putting it off. I’m not including the actual image in this post because looking at it for more than 30 seconds makes me cringe and more than a little angry. Aside from that, it’s just not something I want displayed on a site that amounts to my primary presence on the entire Internet.
Fandom seemed to be doing an excellent job of vocalizing our collective outrage. As a warning, some of the links on that page lead to pages written by very pissed-off, if not highly eloquent people, so there might be a spot of profanity. I link to it not because I want ya’ll to read all of it, but because I want you to get an idea of how many people are talking about this across the comics-oriented part of the blogosphere. At first, I didn’t feel I really needed to add to the discussion, as so many eloquent people, some of whom I have the honor to know at least tangentially, had taken up the challenge with wit, intelligence, and well thought out critiques. If you’re not into comics but want to know what all the fuss is about, I’d suggest this short entry from one of the founders of Girl-Wonder, a network of sites dedicated to the positive, empowered depiction of women and girls in the comic industry.
But as the week went on, I thought more about it, and came up with some things about this that bother me that aren’t being mentioned anywhere else (that I’ve seen) or that I’d like to expound on. Then, I turned on MSNBC this morning and saw that the whole thing had finally hit the news–I first saw it at 11:25AM CST, and it’s been repeated several times throughout the day. One of the “experts” they had on, a comic book store owner, basically said the statue was okay because it was a) a very expensive statue aimed at adults and b) corresponded to Mary Jane’s current self-image, as she’s a supermodel/actress. So, apparently, according to this guy, it’s okay so long as children don’t see it, and also, for those of us who didn’t know, Mary Jane’s self-image is not that of a Vogue-class model and Broadway actress, but is somewhere closer to stereotypical hypersexualized trailer trash, which is all you can logically take away from this statue without a certain measure of delusion coming into play. Given the fact that Spider Man and Mary Jane are the Marvel equivilent of Superman and Lois Lane, this is an absolutely terrible excuse.
Needless to say, my anger, which had boiled down to exasperation, was re-ignited, and I’m writing this as a catharsis as much as anything else.
Why This is Important to Me
There are a few reasons why I’m taking the time to write all this. Most immediately, the statue doesn’t represent the character of Mary Jane I’ve come to appreciate as a Spider-Man fan. For that matter, I can’t imagine Peter ever expecting her to dress that way. Secondly, this is symptomatic of the larger sexism and mysogny in the comic book industry. There’s a reason I feel slightly embarrassed about being comic aficionado, and it has nothing to do with the stories and everything to do with the fact that this sort of display is entirely too common and I’d rather not have to deal with people looking at me like I’m reading porn when I happen to be caught with an issue of … anything. This statue just happens to be so egregious in its offense that it managed to make the national news. Still, it provides an opportunity to express dissatisfaction with this sort of behavior, as many of its flaws (e.g.: dumping logic and established characterization for the sake of hypersexualization) are endemic of the industry at large. I’m not sure what the solution is, as money talks and too many people are willing to buy this sort of trash for the content creators to be fiscally motivated to commit to positive change, but I do know that spreading awareness must be part of that solution.
One of the big justifications I frequently see for this sort of hypersexuality is the assertion that comic book women aren’t real, so whatever’s done to them or however they’re dressed doesn’t matter. But the thing is, comic books, movies, and television are pervasive enough that they may influence how (some, especially younger) readers perceive reality and expect it to be. In this context, I do not believe I need to explain why this statue sends an undesirable message. Those that argue it’s for adults not children don’t seem to realize that if a young person were to see this in an adult’s collection–and make no mistake, at 130 bucks this thing is meant to be displayed–they would assume it was an acceptable thing to have around. That’s not a message I think anyone should even potentially be sending. You could argue that the solution is to not let kids see the thing (or anything like it) but if it’s not something you want a child to see because it’s inappropriate, what exactly is it you’re selling if not a sexually exploitive piece?
Let me make a quick inductive comparison. The person on the left there is Doreen Green, otherwise known as Squirrel Girl. She’s one of my favorite (and also sadly underused) teenage superheroes, and happens to be 15 or 16 years old–it’s hard to be exactly sure with comics. Now, with her age in mind, try to picture her in a pose similar the one presented in the Mary Jane statue. You’re likely left with some level of unease and distaste. Why, if according to the manufacturer there’s nothing wrong with this sort of thing? It’s inappropriate because of her age, which can only be the case if it’s an explicitly sexualized pose, even if it’s not necessarily pornography. The Mary Jane statue is therefore not simply aimed at adult consumers in terms of price range, as the manufacturer suggests, but deals with adult subject matter, and should be either acknowledged as such, or preferably not sold at all. It should not be represented as the mainstream view of this character, as this gives a wrong impression not only of the comics but of those of us who read them that find this sort of thing offensive.
That’s pretty much my argument in a nutshell. There are some individual points I want to address for those interested, but I am aware that not everyone will want to read more about this, as what follows will be a closer examination of the incongruities of the statue itself and the coverage it’s received in the news, so I’m placing the rest of this entry under a cut.
[tags]comics, comic books, spider-man, spider man, mary jane, mary jane watson, statue, sexism, misogyny, marvel, msnbc, news media, statuette, Sideshow Collectibles, squirrel girl, censorship[/tags]
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