Sexist moments in Marvel Comics

[Frontier]

I don't know if the Tigra beating was sexist, but the way it was staged was definitely creepy. The Hood and the guys jump Greer and knock her around. Then there's a slow pan close up on Hammerhead who's filming all this. As we get closer, we see HH giggling ( story-wise he's laughing cuz Tigra beat him up earlier but still...)

I don't think just the staging and handling of it in general was just a little skeevy, especially since Bendis never resolved it himself (like with Wanda).

What was the resolution in The Initiative ?

If I recall correctly, Tigra exposed The Hood to his family, showing them who he really was.

The Wasp may hold some kind of Marvel record for these moments, because even after the other Silver Age heroines were experienced super heroes, writers were still writing Jan as a useless ditz who couldn't stop thinking about clothes even when the world was in danger.

Attachment 52982

I don't think she really broke out of that until a Marvel Team-Up story by (of course) Chris Claremont toughened her up a bit, and that was in 1977.

She's certainly got her priorities .

[Graphic Autist]

I don't like we're bringing up rape. That definitely can fall in the sexist category, but on a WHOLE other level than what I intended.

Which was spoofing a different thread. Glad I didn't make the corresponding one in the DC forum...we'd be going over Sue Dibny.

[JoeWithoutFear]

I don't like we're bringing up rape. That definitely can fall in the sexist category, but on a WHOLE other level than what I intended.

You just wanted the happy, self-righteous finger pointing, Buzzfeed kind of sexism, right? ;-)

[Punisher007]

Black Widow during Ed Brubaker's last arc in the Winter Soldier comic.

Basically everything that Bendis did with Scarlet Witch.

[Agent Z]

Kevin Smith's handling of rape in Evil That Men Do (especially the part where Felicia is shown participating in victim blaming). An argument could be made for the current Wueenpin direction though that's mostly how Slott handled it.

[Alpha to Omega]

Going back to Marvel, we do have Cyclops as mentioned by dragonmp93, Captain Britain (who was once held prisoner with the intent of making him a sex slave, even if it wasn't said out loud), Wonder Man (who was ambiguously assaulted by a maddened Scarlet Witch way back in the day, though the jury is apparently still out on whether or not it was supposed to be heavily implied rape), and probably others I haven't thought of or recalled yet. (Maybe someone else can.)

Thor was raped twice, first by Moondragon during Shooter's Avengers run and again by Lorelei in Simononson's run.

[Huntsman Spider]

You have to read between the lines to get it, but there's an 80's issue of Kazar where the female bad guy coerces him into having sex. It's obvious that it was something he didn't want to do and afterwards she mocks him for feeling bad.

Thor was raped twice, first by Moondragon during Shooter's Avengers run and again by Lorelei in Simononson's run.

Kevin Smith's handling of rape in Evil That Men Do (especially the part where Felicia is shown participating in victim blaming). An argument could be made for the current Wueenpin direction though that's mostly how Slott handled it.

Thanks, this is getting to be a pretty long list of how rape has been (grotesquely) mishandled in comics, especially if it's female-on-male.

And yes, Agent Z, I would argue not just the handling of Felicia's character during and since her heel turn, but also how Cindy "Silk" Moon was depicted in her introduction, which was part of the same arc. There was the pheromone-based attraction between her and Peter/Spider-Man (pheromone powers usually being utilized by villains to rape people), being catty to Anna Maria Marconi when she thought Anna Maria was trying to get between them, and at the beginning of Spider-Verse, trying to leverage said pheromone-based attraction to get Peter to leave New York to her, then trying to see if she could trigger it with any of the multitude of other Peter Parkers she was surrounded by when the A/U Spider-Men and Women assembled to figure out a game plan against the Inheritors. Really, that was one of the worst (and most sexist) ways to introduce and depict a new character.

[Darrin Kelley]

I'm going to drop one bomb here. One that effected and offended me pretty badly.

The whole Spider-Woman relaunch where Jessica Drew got pregnant. I view that as one of the most sexist things I had seen in comics in a long time.

[rant mode: on.]

Anyone who portrays a woman as baby obsessed and unable to function without one is severely selling women short. Babies are not the end all and be all of a woman's life. A woman is not supposed to be condemned as 'just a baby factory'. It encourages a rather sick stereotype and disrespect for women to portray them that way.

But how was Jessica Drew portrayed in that? Her IQ went to single digits. And her sense of right and wrong, and responsibility went out the window. The writer took an otherwise extremely intelligent, extremely experienced woman. And stripped her of all common sense. Treating her like an absolute ditz when the baby entered the picture.

Yes. I call that sexist.

[rant mode: off]

[Rogue Star]

I'm going to drop one bomb here. One that effected and offended me pretty badly.

The whole Spider-Woman relaunch where Jessica Drew got pregnant. I view that as one of the most sexist things I had seen in comics in a long time.

[rant mode: on.]

Anyone who portrays a woman as baby obsessed and unable to function without one is severely selling women short. Babies are not the end all and be all of a woman's life. A woman is not supposed to be condemned as 'just a baby factory'. It encourages a rather sick stereotype and disrespect for women to portray them that way.

But how was Jessica Drew portrayed in that? Her IQ went to single digits. And her sense of right and wrong, and responsibility went out the window. The writer took an otherwise extremely intelligent, extremely experienced woman. And stripped her of all common sense. Treating her like an absolute ditz when the baby entered the picture.

Yes. I call that sexist.

[rant mode: off]

I can see your point. I missed the explanation of why she suddenly needed to have a baby. I think it was meant to be an empowerment message but it really just feels half-baked to me.

[Bukdiah]

I'm...not sure if I even wanna post moments now but I read John Byrne's She Hulk a while back and she just looked like a model all the time.

[Rogue Star]

I don't know. If it was a male character we would probably just get a laugh out of it or call it sexy.

[Drops Of Venus]

There are some interesting cases of sexism towards men (and straight-up misandry) with the origin of some characters like Thundra and Superia. Although Thundra has learned to be more accepting and respectful with men over time. The recently revealed 10th norse realm, Heven, is also a very sexist society, and it was interesting to see how that affected a M>F transgender person who was born there. And I say interesting not because I agree with those ideas, obviously (I'm a man, after all), but because I feel like the creators of those concepts (who were all men, too) wanted to raise a valid point of how things could look for men if gender roles were historically reversed in society.

[Agent Z]

I don't know. If it was a male character we would probably just get a laugh out of it or call it sexy.

I doubt they'd do this with a male character.

[Agent Z]

There are some interesting cases of sexism towards men (and straight-up misandry) with the origin of some characters like Thundra and Superia. Although Thundra has learned to be more accepting and respectful with men over time. The recently revealed 10th norse realm, Heven, is also a very sexist society, and it was interesting to see how that affected a M>F transgender person who was born there. And I say interesting not because I agree with those ideas, obviously (I'm a man, after all), but because I feel like the creators of those concepts (who were all men, too) wanted to raise a valid point of how things could look for men if gender roles were historically reversed in society.

This type of thing has been common in fiction written by men. And it has always been a false equivalency. You do not need to "flip the script" to show how sexism is bad by making men the victims. All that does is take attention away from how sexism has affected women both in real life and fiction and basically feeds into the false image of sexism as oppression of men. You only need to look at the time periods in which Thundra and Superia were created in, the age of some of these writers or even the Avengers story involving the Enchantress mentioned in this thread's first page to see what I mean.

[Rogue Star]

I doubt they'd do this with a male character.

You doubt who would? Marvel? I don't see why not.