Why Does A Culture of Harassment Persist in Comics -- And How Do We Fix It?

[Iron Maiden]

However it is also true that it can be REALLY hard to say something about harassment. A lot of the time people react badly to being called out.

Yeah, I've had that situation and sometimes you don't want to make a scene. If it happens at a bar, one sort of expects that. It's sort of situational. If it happens in the workplace then that's different.

[Cold Water]

Perhaps, but is it fair to call a six-foot tall guy with a chiseled chin "Charming and witty," but a 5 foot, six guy with a big nose saying the exact same things to be guilty of harassment?

Perhaps? There's no perhaps about it. What makes you think that women call harassment based on looks???
Wow.

If some dude said unwanted things to me to intentionally make me feel uncomfortable or to exert some power over me, I don't care how physically attractive he is, he's harassing me.

[Kieran_Frost]

Perhaps, but is it fair to call a six-foot tall guy with a chiseled chin "Charming and witty," but a 5 foot, six guy with a big nose saying the exact same things to be guilty of harassment?

Harassment is harrassment; the looks of the guy doing it is immaterial. You think it's only ugly guys who cat call? You think women only get offended by cat calling when the perpetrators are ugly? Don't be silly; it's the unwarranted, unwanted, unnecessary HARASSMENT by strangers that is offensive, not the visuals of the lips uttering them.

Plenty of sexy, buff jocks cat call; last I checked the universal consensus on that isn't a flattering stereotype depicting them

[skyvolt2000]

There should definitely be harsher consequences for those who are reported and proved.
It is nobody's damn right to make anyone feel uncomfortable or unsafe.

You can have all the rules and consequences that you want.

Who will enforce them?

See it's easy to have those rules when you don't know the person or the person is someone you want to get rid of-what happens when it's your friend?

Or to use comics what happens when it's someone who makes you MONEY?

And as seen in a twitter conversation about what is going on at a certain company between Illidge & a guy-how far does a fan go to show support or not?


https://twitter.com/TheLegendBooks/s...14063934627841

Sum it up the guy was not going to support that company anymore.
The reply was that is not the answer and is that fair to Afua Richardson-who is doing Detective Comics.
The guy replied he'll support her other works.
The reply was Detective Comics was her most high profile gig.

Pretty much the idea is do you punish everyone for the actions of one?

[Cold Water]

You can have all the rules and consequences that you want.

Who will enforce them?

See it's easy to have those rules when you don't know the person or the person is someone you want to get rid of-what happens when it's your friend?

Or to use comics what happens when it's someone who makes you MONEY?

And as seen in a twitter conversation about what is going on at a certain company between Illidge & a guy-how far does a fan go to show support or not?


https://twitter.com/TheLegendBooks/s...14063934627841

Sum it up the guy was not going to support that company anymore.
The reply was that is not the answer and is that fair to Afua Richardson-who is doing Detective Comics.
The guy replied he'll support her other works.
The reply was Detective Comics was her most high profile gig.

Pretty much the idea is do you punish everyone for the actions of one?

Obviously, my reply there was quite generic. In an ideal world we could make the consequences harsher, but no, I don't know the "how".

As a customer, I do what I have to.
As for the latest incident, all my family's DC pulls have been cancelled (I wasn't personally pulling any DC books, but my loved ones made the decision on their own).
If that is making all suffer for the actions of one, so be it. Sorry.

[Malvolio]

Harassment is harrassment; the looks of the guy doing it is immaterial. You think it's only ugly guys who cat call? You think women only get offended by cat calling when the perpetrators are ugly? Don't be silly; it's the unwarranted, unwanted, unnecessary HARASSMENT by strangers that is offensive, not the visuals of the lips uttering them.

Plenty of sexy, buff jocks cat call; last I checked the universal consensus on that isn't a flattering stereotype depicting them

I wasn't talking about cat calls. I was talking about the workplace. Tell me that the attractiveness of the guy asking out a co-worker at the water cooler doesn't factor into whether she thinks he's charming or creepy, regardless of what he actually says.

[Cross]

this in reference to the former editor of whatever of DC?


and malvolio, no its the demeanor and approach of the guy in the work place. there are a lot of factors. if it's unwanted its unwanted despite how the guy looks.

[Cold Water]

I wasn't talking about cat calls. I was talking about the workplace. Tell me that the attractiveness of the guy asking out a co-worker at the water cooler doesn't factor into whether she thinks he's charming or creepy, regardless of what he actually says.

Prrrreeettttyyyyy sure that you already know that the looks of the guy has nothing to do with whether or not she claims sexual harassment.
Since I've already explained that to you.
But, since you are not looking for answers, you skated right over my reply to disregard and ignore me since I'm a female, and my opinion as a woman to the situation is not valued by you.
We're not talking about the rare occasions false accusations might be tossed around. We're talking about an article that addresses sexual harassment in the workplace (specific to the comics industry), and how to come up with solutions to end it.
So, your claim that women will claim sexual harassment based on looks does not really apply to this thread.

[dancj]

Malvolio has a point.

An attempt to chat up a woman could be welcome if the woman is interested in a man, but considered creepy if the woman isn't.

[ed2962]

Malvolio has a point.

An attempt to chat up a woman could be welcome if the woman is interested in a man, but considered creepy if the woman isn't.

But if I'm not interested in you for whatever reason and you persist, then it can get creepy. The fact that it's taking place at work makes it worse. And the thing is, some people will use their position at the job as an excuse to continue such behavior.

I think the issue is more complicated than, "Yeah, and those good looking guys get a pass while us regular looking guys get reported"

[Baseman]

Malvolio has a point.

An attempt to chat up a woman could be welcome if the woman is interested in a man, but considered creepy if the woman isn't.

Thing is.Statements like that don't really help the discussion unless there us actual data presented to prove it.

Take Coldwater response.She claims that she isn't bias on a persons looks. Which while commendable doesn't mean that the majority of women aren't. Its just means that she isn'twhich M can point out.At which point this thread devoles to arguing about generalizations.

Prove is needed to back M's claim before it can be helpful is all I'm saying

[Cold Water]

Thing is.Statements like that don't really help the discussion unless there us actual data presented to prove it.

Take Coldwater response.She claims that she isn't bias on a persons looks. Which while commendable doesn't mean that the majority of women aren't. Its just means that she isn'twhich M can point out.At which point this thread devoles to arguing about generalizations.

Prove is needed to back M's claim before it can be helpful is all I'm saying

This thread is about sexual harassment. Not whether or not a woman is going to claim sexual harassment based on LOOKS.
I am not biased on looks, you're right.
I'm also not a liar or a criminal who would report a man for sexual harassment because he asked me out at the water cooler, but I felt he was ugly.
AS MOST WOMEN WOULDN'T. Because that's absurd.

[t hedge coke]

People, in general, excuse those they like for things they wouldn’t excuse other people for. That goes for inappropriate sexual conduct in a workplace or if they’re cheating on their taxes, sneaking soda into a cup for water at a fastfood joint, or they robbed a liquor store, but that doesn’t stop the rules from applying to all those things. Rules and laws, generally, aren’t concerned with whether someone makes excuses for the perpetrator.

By placing this on women, and by conflating all instances of unbidden harassment or sexual statements in any situation under the banner of “chatting up,” it oversimplifies the range of scenarios and levels of inappropriateness or bother, while more or less criminalizing women for not responding to all men exactly the same way in all given situations.

This runs the risk of being simplified even further to a notion that accusations of sexual harassment boil down to the man not being physically attractive enough for the woman to “forgive” or indulge, as if the natural and correct state of things would be for women to do so.

The reason for a culture of harassment of women in this field and fandom is not because they don’t find their harassers good-looking enough. If women aren’t appreciative of you shouting after them on the street or trying eagerly to get their phone number while they’re working, your physical characteristics aren’t probably even in the top ten reasons they’re not happy with the situation.

By suggesting that the deciding factor between harassment and friendly conversation is simply how chiseled a chin is, is insultingly unfair. And, potentially stands as an excuse for all kinds of egregiously abusive behavior because it can be handwaved off as the woman lashing out or being impatient because his chin isn’t what she wants it to be, not that he’s inappropriately engaging with her at work and making her feel threatened or actively keeping her from her job, which is why she’s there, at work, in the first place..

I’m not even sure, as far as men, how any men could believe that’s remotely common, having spent any kind of actual time in the company of women outside of trying to chat them up.

[Breaking my unofficial break from posting, because this is slightly more important than where Batgirl's name will or will not be appearing in three months.]

[CliffHanger2]

I’m not even sure, as far as men, how any men could believe that’s remotely common, having spent any kind of actual time in the company of women outside of trying to chat them up.

[Breaking my unofficial break from posting, because this is slightly more important than where Batgirl's name will or will not be appearing in three months.]

I think this stems from the idea that any type of flirting with a woman especially a strange woman is wrong. So if a guy does it and is successful people think it's unfair.

[ed2962]

I think this stems from the idea that any type of flirting with a woman especially a strange woman is wrong. So if a guy does it and is successful people think it's unfair.

The people who think it's unfair are many times guys who were unsuccessful at it. But again, that's a different situation than being harassed