WHY KAMALA KHAN SHOULD BE OMITTED AND APOLOGIZED FOR (Sort Of…)
This is (fingers-crossed) the last thing I’ll have to say on the Batgirl TG-outrage topic, but I really feel like the point can’t be driven home enough about the dangers of art/lit apologists and the slippery slope it evokes. I’ve said plenty about my main ire, with the creator apologies. Before those, trolls were just being themselves, until Stewart and Co built them a bridge.
That said, I found myself going full-guns in a convo throughout the past weekend about the whys and wherefores of the controversy with a TG person and her supporters, wherein I got this inventory of why the apology was due to the offended, reiterated by numerous articles and such:
The fact that Dagger Type exhibited any form of gender-bending whatsoever is open to being misunderstood by the average reader as being transgender and therefore it COULD cause someone to see TG people as someone worthy of violence.
If someone is not offended, the apology doesn’t apply to them, and they should have no opinion of it if it doesn’t support the aggrieved (echoed to me in a chat with Cam Stewart, might I add).
TG history is so mired in violence and the like that any concern, whether provable by quantity or not, is valid.
The cisgendered cannot possibly understand this situation, and ergo should realize that any dissent from the opinion of the complainant is the product of that entitlement.
Even though the trope in the issue is related in some fashion to the real (Ed Gein, spawning Buffalo Bill, Norman Bates, etc…), and bears homage (Dawn Davenport in John Waters’ Female Trouble, auteurs like Nick Zedd, David Bowie, etc…), it is no longer acceptable as now TG folks are the trickle-down of all negativity aimed at the issue.
It is too soon for a character like this, given the lack of positive images of the TG community in comics.
In a nutshell, we have numerous dog-whistle issues here. Not one concrete iota of slander whatsoever, but as it says in there- it doesn’t matter- if people decided their feelings were hurt, they are worthy of being heard, apologized to, and amends should be offered. OK. I’m going to go with this logic part-and-parcel. I will concede 100% and accept that this scenario played out as it should. I’ll even say that the calls some have made for the trade of the arc to feature changes to fortify the apology should be made. Consider me sold. I have one caveat for the vocal group within the community that feels this way- they need to agree that G. Willow Wilson, and her colleagues owe an apology to every friend and family member of the victims of 9-11, the veterans and their friends and family of all Middle Eastern wars, and the victims, families, and their friends of all acts of global Fundamentalist Muslim terrorist attacks for making a hero out of a Muslim. By the volition of the complaints against Stewart and Co., it is highly logical, maybe even more-so that this attempt at reparations is made. I saw many on boards and such complaints about the Muslim Ms. Marvel, and they were shouted down for being racists and intolerant Islamaphobes, but when we jury this by the notion that any and all heterosexual or non-TG folks are suspect as physically violent jerks looking for an excuse to kill a TG person, or might become as such by comic-book indoctrination, then we have to admit that bashing these folks is a severe double standard…
The fact that Khan is shown as being a hero at all could sway the average reader from the notion that a number of followers of Allah are, in fact, brutal killers, castrators, and torturers of Gays, Women, Jews, and Christians, and it COULD cause readers to believe that is permissible, given the elevation of the title character.
If Khan’s persuasion doesn’t bother you, the solicited apology doesn’t apply to you, and you should have no opinion of it if it doesn’t support the aggrieved.
Victims world-wide are so mired in violence and the like that any concern, in this case actually verifiable by quantity or even when it’s not, is valid.
Non-GI-related and civilian victim-related folks cannot possibly understand this situation and ergo should realize their dissent is the product of that entitlement.
Even though the trope of the non-Fundamentalist peaceful Muslim is real, it is not an acceptable narrative with the plight of the Jewish, Gay, and Christian victims who are the most affected by this representation.
It is too soon for a character like this in light of the atrocities of the 9-11 attacks, various skirmishes, and the recent events in Syria, Australia, and various other global locales.
There. Now we can start mapping out how to go forth in this brave new world of comics, where sensitivity and empathy for anyone who is upset with the implications of fictional characters is worthy of tailoring for their sensibilities.
What’s that you say? The First Amendment? You enjoy this title so this isn’t a problem? Not the same thing? Oh, it is. It totally is. Are you going to tell me that the blood-stained lives of the people I mentioned in the second lot are less important than the complainants of the TG case? Gonna tell me the people in the towers, churches, and deserts weren’t innocent victims, like those befallen anti-TG violence? You say that you as a fan shouldn’t suffer a change in the narrative to appease someone else’s complaint that stems from their perception of how it impacts further acts of violence? Gonna tell me it’s not insulting to supporters of the book when they hear that the work they enjoyed and the creators took pride in was rife with error, maybe worthy of reparations, making it look like they supported a bad thing? If anyone was nodding a defiant yes to list one and was horrified with list two, you just MIGHT be a big old hypocrite. If I see a schism between points A and B, it’s that gender dissidence is non-elected, but a religious faction isn’t, even with cultural markers and as such can be defected from, so there’s that. The choice is that the individual lives by their standards, but the analogy here is about victims, not sects. It’s about the assumable evil of non-Transgender people who are mislead and prone to hate and murder and that naive tolerant people who might slide down the path to radical Islam, or fall prey to it by not smelling the smoke; the notion that we must proof comics from the stupid-potential of the impressionable reader. I realize some might say one book is demonstrating tolerance and the other isn’t. Sorry, but the behavior of the vocal crowd against the Batgirl book exercised zero tolerance. Telling the outer crowd that if they weren’t offended that they were wrong (even in some cases members of the TG/Cross-Dressing communities who weren’t upset) is the antithesis of tolerance, so there’s not a leg to stand on there, ergo, those victimized by Islam terror-acts are just as allowed to see a threat in a character connected by doctrine to the perpetrators and called out as dangerous with that very logic. Given that it has now been written that the apology shouldn’t be accepted and the error stands (a GREAT message to tell young impressionable readers- “Stay a victim FOREVER” or “How to Alienate Vital Support Bases 101), the anti-Kamala crowd should be vigilant. Perhaps even a Sharia Law backlash against MM is justifiable by members of the hardcore Islam faith for showing an empowered infidel, as undoubtedly they would be offended and offense is justified to the affected party and so worthy of consideration. If that comment stung, you likely had it coming. Again, if you support the claim against Batgirl/Dagger Type, you MUST agree that Kamala Khan is a big mistake.
Some of you just might be realizing now that you could be supporting something for the vogue-outrage of it and not the content. That, or you might think even that you are somehow better, more worthy of being heard, or even ENTITLED than thousands of people who have suffered the world over. Wow. You just might have some work to do, it sounds to me like.
For the record, I think both Ms Marvel and this Batgirl run so far have been smashing, and I don’t feel a damn bit conflicted in saying that. I enjoy bold visions, fun storytelling, classic-style art, not to mention thinking for myself. When I don’t like a comic, I do this amazing act of rebellion against it- I don’t BUY it. For instance, when DC whipped out Extraño, a swishy AIDS-victim-witch, I couldn’t EVEN. Now, I could say that he was exactly the kind of character that a redneck ‘fag-basher’ could get riled over, the character being a hero in the perp’s manly ol’ comic, and granted I was living in KENTUCKY at that largely-less-visible time, but I don’t live in a world of dog-whistles and self-victimizing what-ifs. I also didn’t and still don’t expect a creator to stop and cow-tow to me, as I realize that I, like a lot of people, am just not that damn important, and that hyper-considerate writing is going to drag us back to the days of the Comics Code Authority, only with vastly more expensive titles that have been sanitized for our ‘protection’. With that, some advice- if a comic makes you feel ‘safe’ or ‘unsafe’- you maybe should stop reading them- sounds to me like you’re doing it WRONG.
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