anyone know what this is from?
“Judgement Day” by EC Comics. From wikipedia:
The story depicted a human astronaut, a representative of the Galactic Republic, visiting the planet Cybrinia inhabited by robots. He finds the robots divided into functionally identical orange and blue races, one of which has fewer rights and privileges than the other. The astronaut decides that due to the robots’ bigotry, the Galactic Republic should not admit the planet. In the final panel, he removes his helmet, revealing himself to be a black man.
Apparently the Comics Code Authority tried to prevent the author from making the main character black.
Boy did they! It took the writer (and the company) threatening the CCA with a lawsuit and telling the guy to fuck off (literally) to get this thing printed:
Comic Historian Digby Diehl recounted in Tales from the Crypt: The Official Archives:
This really made ‘em go bananas in the Code czar’s office. ‘Judge Murphy was off his nut. He was really out to get us’, recalls [EC editor] Feldstein. ‘I went in there with this story and Murphy says, “It can’t be a Black man”. But … but that’s the whole point of the story!’ Feldstein sputtered. When Murphy continued to insist that the Black man had to go, Feldstein put it on the line. ‘Listen’, he told Murphy, ‘you’ve been riding us and making it impossible to put out anything at all because you guys just want us out of business’. [Feldstein] reported the results of his audience with the czar to Gaines, who was furious [and] immediately picked up the phone and called Murphy. ‘This is ridiculous!’ he bellowed. ‘I’m going to call a press conference on this. You have no grounds, no basis, to do this. I’ll sue you’. Murphy made what he surely thought was a gracious concession. ‘All right. Just take off the beads of sweat’. At that, Gaines and Feldstein both went ballistic. ‘Fuck you!’ they shouted into the telephone in unison. Murphy hung up on them, but the story ran in its original form.[18]
You know, it’s times like this that I am deeply comforted, knowing that history isn’t just everyone being nice and polite and better than the current generation. Sometimes it really is just people bellowing swear words over the phone to get shit done.
And by the same token, the past was not a flat, monochrome landscape of bigotry. This comic came out in 1953. That is a full year before the Brown v. Board of Education decision, meaning not only was segregation the law of the land, but the process of dismantling it hadn’t even begun. Integration wasn’t even a political topic yet, because there was no integration actually happening, and as far as everyone in 1953 had reason to believe, there wasn’t going to be any any time soon.
And yet, in 1953, two white Jewish guys from Brooklyn not only wanted to put out this comic, but were willing to swear at the Comics Code Authority and threaten to hold a press conference – which, by the way, was enough of a threat that the censors did back down; they didn’t laugh and say “Who would care about your press conference?”
And, not only that, but in the end they did put out the comic, this comic that at the time all but explicitly said the United States of the day would not be fit to join the Galactic Republic.
All of which is pretty damn cool.
