Wednesday, August 22, 2007

One more thought on Birds of Prey #109

(EDIT: Read Part One of my Birds of Prey #109 thoughts here.)

Something about the dialogue that hit me, but which I almost forgot as I hunted and scanned images...

Barbara Gordon: "It's my business to know that stuff, Dinah. He fathered Connor with that ninja woman, for starters."

Dinah Lance: "Shado shot him and drugged him. Ever wonder how he felt about being raped?"

Am I the only one who sees a certain level of irony in Barbara Gordon and Dinah Lance - two women who were both, in the late 80s, physically assaulted in a manner which suggested rape - speculating on how a rape victim feels?

23 comments:

  1. but then, hasnt every female DC character been raped or experienced bondage and torture at one point or another?Rape is a bonding experience for them :(

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  2. Actually, whatever arguments may be made about the percentages, Dinah and Barbara are two superheroines who haven't been raped. Horribly assaulted in a mental scaring way, yes, but there was no actual physical rape.
    That's the irony I'm refering to, here.
    *sighs* Why do I get the feeling I'm going to get the infamous "Scott" posting on my blog by day's end?

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  3. who is this Scott? THE Scott?
    as for rape, i was going with the broader context of physical abuse and mental/psychological rape

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  4. Ah. Point taken. There is more than one idiotic Scott out there.
    In this case, I was refering to Mad Thinker Scott, who is currently embarking on a pointless crusade to prove mathematically that there have been just as many men raped in comics as women, and therefore any female comic reader complaints about rape are pointless.
    It doesn't make sense to me either.
    As for the broader context, I get that. That's why I drew the line between physical rape and mental degradation. Both women's assualts did have sexual elements to them and were quite traumatic mentally and physically - but neither was physically sexually assaulted.

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  5. hehe, I thought of Scott K u r t z in the post above, but it didn't make sense in the context...
    where has any man been actually raped in comics?

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  6. Well, off the top of my head...
    Oliver Queen - raped by Shado while he was drugged. (This is referred to in Birds of Prey #109, in fact, but it occured sometime during the events of Green Arrow, Series 1, #10-12)
    Jack Knight - raped by The Mist II, in Starman #12.
    Dick Grayson - raped by the female Tarantula, in Nightwing #93.
    Thor - I know he's been mind-controlled into having sex by The Enchantress at least once, but my Thor-Trivia-Fu being fairly weak, I can't quote an issue number.

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  7. coming to think of it, wasn't the Hulk kinda raped in the Giffen Defenders?
    And Thor was again mind-controlled into being Moondragon's (sex)slave in an Avengers storyline...
    why does a man being raped feel less important?

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  8. Probably because it is rarely, if ever, actually referred to as rape and is frequently done in circumstances where the person has no memory of the event happening or the consequences aren't dealt with.
    Ollie, for example, was doped to the gills when Shado raped him and had no idea that he was the father of Shado's child when he met the boy later. While Ollie went through therapy for the trauma of killing someone and being nearly tortured to death over the course of the series, the subject of him being raped never came up and indeed many took the absence of the R-word to mean that Ollie had willingly had sex with Shado.
    Jack Knight was similarly knocked out - and when we woke up naked and with the daughter of his dad's arch-enemy taunting him, he was a little more concerned about survival than why he was naked. He too had no idea that Nash had raped him and had his baby until she sent him a letter in Starman #29, confessing to the deed. After that, all of Jack's thoughts regarding the incident regarded the son he would never know and not how he had been taken advantage of.
    Nightwing - well, I stopped reading even before Devin Grayson took over the book and wrote that storyline but I've heard nothing but bad things about it and the supposed nervous breakdown Dick Grayson had that lead to him being used by Tranatula. Reportedly it is unclear how much Dick remembers of that period now.
    And Thor - well, both Moondragon and Enchantress easily could have had Thor forget about what they did...

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  9. No Worries, L2dS
    ::*sighs* Why do I get the feeling I'm going to get the infamous "Scott" posting on my blog by day's end?::
    Mad Thinker Scott only picks on women, b/c he thinks they're weaker than him, and he can bury them in his mountains of bogus Faux Noize "commentary".
    Best,
    Tim Liebe
    Does wanting to slap some respect into a patronizing misogynistic white male bully in love with the sound of his own voice make me a bad male feminist...?

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  10. Further to my last post....
    All the women in the blogosphere are perfectly capable of defending themselves in a verbal fight w/opponents who make up their "facts" and shoot ideologically-motivated intellectual blanks, like the self-monickered "Mad Thinker Scott".
    It's just that, when they don't bother to respond they aren't awed by his brilliant eloquence - they're just ignoring him and moving on to something constructive.
    Best,
    Tim Liebe
    ANOTHER patriarchial white male in love with the sound of his own voice.... ;)

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  11. He's everywhere lately. :\ I wonder where he gets the time XD

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  12. Yus :\ When a man is raped it seems like it's not a big deal. Never shown as a truly traumatic experience and stuff. :\
    And it seems like when a woman rapes a man it's cuz she rly likes him and he just doesn't like her. :\ But rape is about power, but for women it never seems like that, it seems more like they want to be smexed, not that they want to break the hero.

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  13. Oh! Also... while ACTUAL rape may not happen everywhere, the threat of sexual violence against female characters is WAY WAY WAY more prevalent than men. Not just in comics. How many times has a captured female character been threatened with forced marriage with the villain, or kissed forcibly and the infamous "in time you will grow to love me" line? Or lackeys guarding her decide to touch her against orders. Or bad guys generally just groping or touching her?
    Occasionally you get the villainous seducer, but a) usually the male is somewhat receptive and in fact takes control during smex (Bond) or b) she just wants smex and is slutty. >.>;;
    But it's not the same as "I am going to do horrible things to you and break you heh heh heh"
    In fact, I'm not sure if the comparison in this society can EVAR be the same. Or if men actually UNDERSTAND how scary the thought of sexual violence IS to women. :\ And maybe men dun care about seeing it done to their heroes, but it is freaking unnerving to us!
    I guess the only comparison is rape by another straight man for a man (which as somebody points out is how men often get raped, rape is about power not about sexual attraction). What if Zod raped and broke Superman? Or if Batman was raped by the Joker? You wouldn't stop hearing the fanboys howl then. =_=

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  14. No kidding. I work a job in public service where I'm allowed to surf the Internet (and vis a vis, blog) when things are slow and I don't seem to post as much as he does.

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  15. Re: No Worries, L2dS
    Does wanting to slap some respect into a patronizing misogynistic white male bully in love with the sound of his own voice make me a bad male feminist...?
    If so, then you and I are both bad male feminists.
    But I content myself with the knowledge that the women are more than capable of slapping him on their own behalf without me playing The White Knight.
    Besides... Ladies First! ;)

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  16. Re: Further to my last post....
    And that's the OTHER reason I don't engage him in the Internet equivalent of a High Noon showdown. While there's a small chance he might take my opinion seriously on account of the fact that I have a penis, to do so would give him legitmacy.

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  17. Well, that was certainly the case for Shado. Her entire motive for raping Ollie was because she wanted a piece of him because he knew that he loved Dinah too much to ever leave her. There was also the somewhat noble idea that she wanted to give Ollie an heir of sorts, since Ollie had told Shado that Dinah didn't want to have children but he did... but what Shado did was pretty sick any way you slice it.

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  18. Exactly. That's why I commented on the irony of Black Canary telling Oracle to imagine what being a rape victim is like.
    Neither woman ever has been raped - though both have gone through traumatic, physically painful situations where sexual violence was enough of a possibility for many people, 20 years later, to think that rape was part of the equation.
    And this type of thing happens ALL THE TIME in superhero books...

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  19. Re: Further to my last post....
    Ppl like RMM and MTS and others, I just ignore. They're ppl who think they're absolutely right, refuse to see another POV, and talk right past you.
    So what's the point? XD
    I just satirize them on my blog :D

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  20. Re: Good Point :)
    I didn't think that for a moment, Tim. And I think anyone who goes after you for sexist behavior is skating on thin ice while juggling anvils.
    Believe me - as someone who was raised with chilvaric ideals by a Feminist mother, I'm a little conflicted about how I should respond to these yahoos too. I've decided, on-line at least, that the best answer is to just ignore them unless it's a personal attack on me.

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  21. Re: Further to my last post....
    There's an old Texas saying I find fitting of most Internet flame wars.
    Never try and teach a pig how to slow dance. You'll only get yourself dirty and annoy the pig.

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  22. Re: No Worries, L2dS
    Apparently he doesn't pick on ME either XD
    >.>
    I dunno what that says about me <.<

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  23. Re: No Worries, L2dS
    You are very lucky?

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