Which cover is illustrator, Dave Dorman describing here?
It seems that in today’s desperate-for-sales comic book market, nothing is sacred. In the midst of world-saving adventures.. What a wholesome, family-friendly image!
I find this image offensive, not only for promotion of a comic book, but specifically for a comic that Brian clearly states that he would like to see today’s younger generation pick up and read as he did when he was kid. Rather than a family-friendly heroic saga, this promo art is telegraphing to the world that it’s a series I cannot share with my 7-year-old son.
Is the comics industry really so dead that they have to stretch to these desperate, shock value measures to incur readers? Really?
Pictures below the fold. (Warning: seriously rapey picture below).
Is it the picture above that Dave Dorman drew for an adult comic book or is it the picture below drawn by artist, Fiona Staples, also, for an adult comic book?
If you guessed the breastfeeding picture is the one that Dave Dorman finds so offensive then move ahead ten spaces because the world is going backwards.
The rest of the story can be found here on Ouyang Dan’s blog.
I’ve found that these fanboys tend to yell “I’m offended!” when women use mediums that men think is exclusively theirs (e.g. comic books) to portray heroines as something other than sex objects. They seem to think that “inserting” feminist politics into comic books encroaches upon the sacred norms of the medium. If Staples had shown the breastfeeding heroine in a skimpy leather ensemble, with her body contorted to flash both her butt and her breasts (a predominant pose for super heroines) flying in the air with her legs spread apart, Dorman probably wouldn’t have minded the breastfeeding much.
Totally.
and now i might go buy a copy of Saga, if the comic book store has it.
OH MAH GAH…..! I am a spluttering mess. What is wrong with people??
Oh. my. god.
My brain just exploded all over my computer from the…from the…complete jackassery of this. What the ever loving hell?
Dave Dorman is the epitome of male chauvanism. What a pig.
I’ve spent the last couple of days, off & on, reading your blog & I’m LOVING IT. Thank you for the awesome reading.
That’s all I can comment because I’m utterly speechless (wordless? typless?) about this one. I can say that I’ll go out of my way to buy the Fiona Staples comic despite the fact I’m not a comic book reader. And I’m going to read it while nursing my 3 year old in public.
Funny how he seems to have deleted the blog post in question.
Hurrah for Fiona Staples – that’s awesome art, and for such a simple image of family life to have the power to turn MCPs into screeching apes is a testament to its power.
As for Durman, pfffffft.
Chauvinism and privilege and stupifying, rage-inducing, rants aside…
That baby is *adorable.* Look at those little horns!!
the first one is appalling. appalling in too many ways to list.
i wanna read that comic
how dare a comic book portray a woman’s breast for any purpose other than (twisted) male fantasy!
unreal.
Sputter, sputter, sputter. You know, if that mama is dressed in typical comic-book-woman attire, you can barely even tell she’s breastfeeding. She could just be holding the baby near her gold-nipple-shield-covered nipple. Fail.
In uplifting news, yesterday I stopped mid-grocery-shopping to feed my 7 month old in the cafe area of the grocery store. He turned out to be much more interested in looking as passersby than actually eating, so I ended up sitting in the cafe for nearly 10 minutes with one boob out, nipple showing and everything since there was no baby attached. Several people walked by, noticed, smiled, and were completely pleasant.
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Unreal. I am a new mother to a 3-month-old boy, and nursing is something we really had to work hard at for the first 4 weeks. Now that we’ve got it under control, I love nursing and do it wherever, whenever, however we need to. No one has ever confronted us, and I have gotten so much support from other mothers who notice, nod and smile. One older woman even came up to me and said, “Good for you, honey.”
I wish more women felt comfortable nursing in public. I make it a point to always give a smile, nod and gesture to other mothers I see nursing…but it doesn’t happen very often!
Excellent blog. Just subscribed.
Crazy fool that man Dorman.
By the way – I nicked some of your breastfeeding pics – the roller hockey and motorcross for a post (which – to be honest – is mainly about your blog) – it’s to be found here
Yes, Mr Dorman, I am very worried about your little boy, but it’s the values *you’re* passing on to him which worry me, not the rather lovely artwork you’re huffing and puffing about.
(Bonus fail – your incorrect use of “incur”, I guess you’re an illustrator so correct use of english is often moot for you, but if you don’t understand your own language you might slip up in the illustrating department sometimes.)
I didn’t realise he drew that first picture!
The post has since been deleted and on his twitter, he says that he will write another post to clarify.
Another tweet of his :”What I find offensive is that this is a promo image for a book that is supposedly all-ages. Marketing fail”
Ok, I can get on board that if a book is supposedly for all-ages you’d want the cover to reflect that but seriously? You can’t explain to your 7 year old kid that babies get nourishment from breasts? How can that second pic be anything BUT family friendly?
What a disgusting pervert. I hope he gets raped by a machine someday while my grown-up son is somewhere cherishing his beautiful breastfeeding wife and infant and not making a living drawing pictures of women raped by machines.
I can understand your disgust, but I don’t think that rape should be wished on anybody.
Spot on with this write-up, I absolutely feel this site needs much more attention. I’ll probably be returning to read more, thanks for the information!