Spider-Man: Gwen Stacy's Brush With White Supremacy

[Revolutionary_Jack]

https://www.cbr.com/spider-man-gwen-...ite-supremacy/

Spider-Man: Gwen Stacy's Brush With White Supremacy
by Brian Cronin – on Aug 25, 2019 in CBR Exclusives

This is a feature called "A Political World," where we spotlight 20th Century comic book stories that came out back when comic books were not political at all, unlike comic books nowadays.

Today, based on a suggestion from reader Jack E., we look at how Gwen Stacy's anger at Spider-Man led her to inadvertently become caught up with a white supremacist!

Everything really started in Amazing Spider-Man #90 (by Stan Lee, Gil Kane and John Romita), where Spider-Man is fighting with Doctor Octopus when a piece of rubble is knocked down into the street and is about to crush a little kid when Captain George Stacy heroically throws himself in front of the boy...

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And of course, right as Stacy dies, he lets Spider-Man know that that he knows Peter's secret identity!


This disturbs Gwen Stacy a lot, as you might imagine, and, like every other character in Spider-Man's life, she has decided to blame Spider-Man for the death of her father...




She hates Spider-Man so much that she goes to visit Sam Bullit, an old police colleague of George Stacy that is now running for District Attorney. He and Stacy never saw eye to eye on things and so he loves the idea of Stacy's daughter actually wanting to help get him elected because of his promise to take down Spider-Man...



Bullit parlays that into an endorsement from J. Jonah Jameson, which aggravates Robbie Robertson...


Bullit starts to rail against Spider-Man in all of his public appearances. He has some of his thugs lean on Peter to try to get information about how he gets Spider-Man's photo (they assume he knows Spider-Man). Spidey then goes to his apartment, only to find Gwen and Bullit both there!

In the next issue, Spidey pretends that he was following Gwen and he "kidnaps" her...


Iceman then steps into the scene (he happened to be nearby) and "saves" Gwen from Spider-Man. Bullit uses this to help his anti-Spider-Man campaign...


However, when Bullit goes to visit the Daily Bugle, he is shocked to find out that Jameson has found out that behind his "law and order" rhetoric are really the ramblings of a white supremacist! Robbie Robertson has been aware of Bullit for a long time and he has the receipts, everybody!



Naturally, Bullit tries to have Robbie killed to suppress the information, but Spider-Man and Iceman (after Spidey managed to convince Iceman that he was not a bad guy) save the day and Bullit is revealed as a criminal...



We're never shown how Gwen handled the fact that her hatred of Spider-Man drove her into the arms of white supremacy.

Welp, I guess I am what you call, internet-famous.

[Redem]

Well that was probably worst than sleeping with Norman Osorn, Gwen

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Well that was probably worst than sleeping with Norman Osorn, Gwen

Yep that's the real skeleton in the closet. And it's all Lee and Romita approved.

[AngelJD]

Recently during Clone Conspiracy how it ended the last we saw of CC Gwen was just her jacket (and in media if you 'don't see a body...'). Now the people that was resurrected by science/cloned (body different body but same soul according to Doctor Strange for Billy thus possible for the others) and with memories not tampered with it feels like an opportunity to go back and have Gwen rethink her life.

To see things both from her perspective from what she knew and grieving back then and then with new insights and time to rethink presently. For Gwen she can like many people think about past actions and have regrets of how one acted.

Gwen might be ill informed of who she was working with and was suffering which infuncance negatively her judgment and acting hasty. This isn't a new situation for folks to react emotionally and unwisely when in great pain and to humanely react in 'fight or flight' or the fact other people will see people in pain and instead of actually caring they see opportunity to use them.
On Earth-65 Aunt May reacted the same way blaming Gwen which allowed Earth-65 Jameson the ammunition to have Gwen become hunted when Peter died due to how she was hurting but in time when she started to heal Aunt May became clear headed and regretted blaming Gwen.

On Earth-616 the same happening with the human reaction of 'fight or flight' and in this case it feels like 616 Gwen reacted in greif toward 'fight'. Needing somebody to fight due to her pain which in turn made her incorrectly blame Spider-man and backed (whom she might not of known as it seems the general 616 public at the time didn't on Earth-616 till the Bugle reported and Bullit men attacked showcasing proof) the bigot. Afterwards still hurt (and maybe if having a flashback showcasing Gwen discovering that Bullet was a Supremacist was shocked and made her feel guilty that she supported him causing her to dive further into depression and pain) Gwen reacted with then the other 'Flight' going to London (which proved to be a better alternative as it allowed time for Gwen to grieve properly in time, rethink a bit questioning things, and come back in a better state then she left).

Afterwards Gwen/CC Gwen rethinking her life and now due to having factual better info of everything with Peter being Spider-man (which to be honest the 'role' Peter was acting aggressively stating he was HUNTING HER and acting like a spiteful villain to protect his identity did no favors to the visuals and supporting to Gwen her distrust to him) and time to think about everything. I can see her regretting her choices and actions and vowing to be better (if she does come back that is it opens a door for such a issue just like how Mary Jane has had 'past' issues that altered things). Having past guilty expenses that she can feel guilty but also shape her actions and motivations to learn from and to be better moving to a character development towards a Gwen that can work better for this present culture and period yet do so naturally and humanly. To be flawed yet work to be better than before.

[PCN24454]

I always felt that this was exaggerated. You just don’t like Gwen.

[Mister Mets]

Someone backing a political candidate shouldn't be responsible for what comes out about a candidate later, so this isn't that big a deal. Jonah also backed Bullit and he wasn't a traumatized teenager.