With friends like these, who needs enemies? Last week, outspoken proponent of diversity Heidi MacDonald used her platform to belittle and mock some of the biggest meanest bullies in comics: people who want to talk about racism.
How much do you know about the Mahou Shounen Breakfast Club (MSBC) controversy? If it’s nothing, congratulations on living your best life; you can, if you want, catch up on it here. (We’ll wait.) If you are familiar with MSBC, please set aside for the moment your take. One of the few undisputed facts of the whole debacle is that its creators decided not to make their comic anymore. The impetus of MacDonald’s post, as she describes it, was to use her capacity “as a reporter to investigate if their decision was justified.” Well, stop the press, Vicki Vale. Their decision was entirely within their rights as creators, and is therefore justified no matter what you or me or anyone else thinks about it.
I mean, don’t get me wrong. I have a lot of opinions on both the comic (which doesn’t strike me as cultural appropriation) and the creators’ decision to quit (which I find ridiculous). But those are not journalism. MacDonald’s post is what is known as a hot take, and it is made up of her total misunderstanding of both cultural appropriation as a concept and one person’s blog post that went up after the comic was cancelled. Along the way, she asserts that manga appropriated Walt Disney(?) and Robert Louis Stevenson(??), and accuses Jem Yoshioka, the aforementioned blogger, who is of Japanese descent, of being dismissive of Japanese culture. Whatever you might think about all that, it sure as shit isn’t reporting. The fact that the author sees it as such comports neatly with her central claim, which is that champion of equality Heidi MacDonald knows racism, and this ain’t it.
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Anyone can have an opinion. But it’s inappropriate to position yourself as a cheerleader for people from one or more demographics to which you don’t belong, disparage their opinions, displace them with your own, and then act as if you’re doing them a favor. If you do so in your capacity as editor, it is not just distasteful; it is an abuse of power. It is being a fucking bully.
While there are many examples of this behavior in comics, let’s zoom in on a case study from the world of High Literature. If you can even bear to get pulled into another insider-y saga, I’d like to share an illustrious tale about Times Literary Supplement editor Toby Lichtig. About two weeks ago, the Los Angeles Review of Books ran his remarkable essay on gender inequity in the literary magazine milieu. Lichtig wrote with great news for me and my fellow women writers: he has thought deeply about our struggle, and he wants us to know it’s going great.
Hey girl. Just want u to know ur doing great. xo, Toby
Lichtig’s essay, like MacDonald’s post, is inside baseball at its worst. It is, variously, a takedown of a takedown of the London Review of Books; a piece that somehow both denies and accounts for the lack of women in literary criticism; and a wrongheaded critique of one frustrated woman writer, Katherine Angel, and her ilk for writing “casually” about gender (which I guess is what passes for a sick burn in British English). Despite its casualness, Lichtig frames Angel’s writing as a violent attack:
I’d like to make a small case for the magazine at which I work—the Times Literary Supplement—one of the publications so casually attacked by Angel as bastions of androcentricity. I say “casually” because Angel’s main focus of attack was the LRB, and she only offered a sideswipe at the TLS. And I also say “casually” because some of her writing on the subject was indeed casual. (emphasis mine)
Lichtig’s essay also describes a “sort of ‘blah’ that habitually creeps into writing about” gender inequity. By “blah” he means unfair generalizations, which he perceives Angel’s essay and just in general (lol). In the spirit of specificity, Lichtig waxes on about how each and every literary magazine is a super special snowflake (…sound familiar yet?). He takes a close look at numbers that aren’t really so different from one another. He even explains how statistics could never truly account for the True Celebration of Womanhood that was TLS’s recent Susan Sontag issue. Or something?
TL;DR: NOT ALL MEN. But reaching past the essay’s fundamental pettiness, it is a fascinating cultural document. In Lichtig, we have an associate editor of a magazine who elected himself to speak not just on behalf of that publication, but for the experience of all women in the literary world. Standing behind him, we have his employer, the Times Literary Supplement, which (presumably) thought that having him speak in this way sounded like a good idea. And finally there’s the LARB, the publication that deemed it fit to print. The final product is some 4,000 words of egregious mansplaining implicitly endorsed by one of the most reputable literary publications in the world.
It is important to realize that the struggle of women writers is not Lichtig’s real subject. His subject is his misguided opinion on the struggle of women writers, and in disguising that as objective truth he is not altogether artless. His opening paragraphs are a master class in how to put a woman’s exact words into scare quotes. And there is real rhetorical sophistication in his invocation of feminist icon Mary Beard, his TLS colleague, whom he quotes twice. In the world of Lichtig’s essay, it is only women—including Katherine Angel, LRB editor Mary-Kay Wilmers, novelist Kathryn Heyman (whose name Lichtig misspells twice), and Beard herself—who commit acts of sexism against other women. Kind of like saying that someone of Japanese descent is being dismissive of Japanese culture, if you can see where I’m going with this.
What’s really galling about the essay is not Lichtig’s tactics (gross as they are) or his ideas (which are really nothing new), but the patronizing way in which he positions himself as a cheerleader for women in the literary world even as he discounts their experience and opinions:
Portraying the situation as intractable and representing the literary world as a male-dominated monolith against which women can only bang their heads or give up can be counterproductive, leading not to resistance but resignation. Rather than argue that literary editors are “perpetuating” gender disparity, better to look at the historical facts: we have made great progress in redressing “the shocking paucity of women of authority and expertise” in most areas of our culture over the past 200 years, and we should rededicate ourselves to continuing that progress, rather than blaming literary publications for slowing it down.
These words speak to me, not with the message they’re meant to convey, but as an artifact of the time in which I write. Lichtig’s paternalistic pep talk, his complete mischaracterization of another thoughtful essay (on which his own is supposedly based), his half-baked historicism, and his self-congratulation are all too familiar. I see it all the time in comics. (Shoutout to The Comics Journal!) Today, I happen to be talking about The Beat.
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Call them the unwitting supremacists. “Awareness” will always and forever pour forth from the mouths of well-meaning people like Toby Lichtig and Heidi MacDonald. But the inequities they seek to redress by definition demand their thoughts should count less. They require fewer proclamations of “awareness” and more ongoing, concrete editorial action and opportunities to cede the floor to other voices.
Lichtig, for one, could GAF about voices. Wearing the mantle of editorial authority, he only seeks to ease our worried minds. “We [editors] notice the gender divide,” he writes. “We think and talk about it regularly. And it is, I think, this awareness that is key to things changing.”
Reader, I humbly submit to you, here towards the end of an essay that has long since surpassed take-level meta, that awareness is not the key to change. Awareness is an abstraction, or worse, an illusion. Sometimes, as in MacDonald’s piece, awareness is wielded as both a talisman and a weapon—and then it’s closer to a lie. I guess it’d be one thing if it only powered bloated blog posts and ill-considered essays, but the sad historical fact is that it permeates everything from editorial policies to dismissive emails and tweets—all manner of communiqués, public and private, from people with cultural capital who earnestly believe themselves to be proponents of change. It is, to use Lichtig’s word, casual sexism and racism, and it is often culturally and institutionally supported, if not explicitly endorsed.
Back to MacDonald’s post. “If you have been reading my writings for any amount of time, you know that I’m a fan of multicultural diversity, and of multiple viewpoints and creators of every sex, religion, creed, race and sexual orientation getting a chance to tell their stories,” she writes. “I’m also a huge fan of cultural context for stories that examine how the preconceptions of a work of art are reflected in the execution. But I never want to see these criticisms used to PROACTIVELY SILENCE ART.”
Those capital letters are the author’s, and they are used throughout her screed, along with boldface and incredulous subheadings, to convey her utter indignation that people started a conversation about cultural appropriation in some comic she has officially deemed OK. Like Lichtig, MacDonald frequently describes critique as violent attack. She casts critics of MSBC as enemies of good art and bullies who “silenced” its creators. And even as she ascribes to them this incredible power, she mocks them as overly sensitive, irrational people whose claims are no more than “hurt feelings.” This rhetorical hypocrisy will sound familiar to anyone who has a passing familiarity with indie comics criticism. Political correctness is killing comics, or so they say. What it amounts to is a bunch of hubbub that sounds like it’s supporting diversity, but works diligently to protect the status quo. And what is getting lost—and, worse, derided—are the actual voices that were marginalized in the first place.
What is silencing? A lot of people in comics seem confused, so let me be plain: silencing is using your platform to punch down. It involves, in MacDonald’s post as in posts at other prominent comics sites, characterizing conversations about racism (or any given -ism or phobia) as censorship and/or irrational bullying. When someone called bullshit on MacDonald’s post, she said, “We need to do better. If we want to fight the cultural ascendance of ONE viewpoint—the white male cis viewpoint—we can’t let weak arguments define our position.” Then MacDonald said, to another person, “I am an equal opportunity jerk.”
Her language is reminiscent of every comics asshole ever who has refused to examine their own bias. The difference is that MacDonald thinks she’s doing it in the name of diversity—which is, I think, worse. It’s no accident that equal-opportunity offenders always ALWAYS offend certain people. When those people try to then explain where they are coming from, that is not attacking or policing comics. It is straight-up self-defense.
Anyone who has tried to follow the MSBC controversy as it has unfolded knows how difficult it is to see past mainstream coverage on The Beat and Bleeding Cool. To wade through the primary sources is a ridiculous exercise that’s emblematic of the dearth of prominent platforms available to divergent perspectives. Gatekeepers like MacDonald are not yet convinced of those critics’ humanity, instead casting them as anon trolls, proponents of callout culture, or bullies who aren’t even personally invested in comics.
MacDonald got some blowback for her piece, which she acknowledged in an addendum to her post that reaffirms her own imagined cultural awareness. (Har har.) Meanwhile, Jem Yoshioka, the blogger MacDonald mocked and diminished—and whose post, whether or not you agree with it, was respectful, thoughtful, and kind—has received at least one death threat from GamerGate. Such are the stakes of trying to carve out a place for yourself to exist in this crazy world: you’re threatened with extinction, or else laughed at even as you’re imbued with the magical power to kill comics with your thoughts. This milieu is unacceptable and depressing, but not hopeless. One thing I know: downstream voices on Twitter, Tumblr and elsewhere are punching up and speaking out. It won’t always have to be for survival. Someday it will feel like victory.
This is fantastic. Thanks.
I read once, in the introduction to a collection of whimsical articles, that “casuals” are short humorous essays that are meant to seem off-the-cuff and be easy to read, yet be well crafted and thoughtful. Ergo not a sick burn.
If I understand the argument here, I think what you’re saying Kim, is that accusing a piece of art of being racist is a noble act even if you are wrong and the art isn’t racist because you are fighting the good fight against racism by discussing racism.
For Heidi, accusing a piece of art of racism that isn’t racist is an act of censorship- and probably morally wrong, or at least counter-productive to the goal of fighting racism.
You both seem to agree that Mahou Shounen Breakfast Club isn’t racist, so that’s where I see the basic disagreement.
@pallas: I read this more as Kim’s assertion that people like Heidi and herself don’t get to decide what should or shouldn’t offend a minority group to which they don’t belong (and that the accusations of “censorship” are simply ridiculous).
I think accusations of censorship are silly in this case. And I think telling folks not to be offended is generally not a helpful way to go.
I find arguments about cultural appropriation really tricky, though. Artists really do borrow from each other; all artists, all the time. Telling them they shouldn’t for cultural reasons seems like you move to cultural segregation as an ideal, which seems like a bad idea. It’s especially hard for me to see the argument when you’re talking about manga, which is a massive global phenomenon, exported just about everywhere. And while relations between Japan and the U.S. are complicated, I don’t think their history or their present are well characterized by a binary like oppressor/oppressed in any straightforward way.
I think cultural appropriation can be linked to, or enable racism in various ways. Blackface is the most obvious example, but there are many others. It’s not clear that anyone is actually accusing this comic of racism though…or I haven’t seen anyone do that?
I think the issue here is not the use of anime style, which is really very common, but a portrayal of the anime industry in Japan. With a heaping helping of excerpts from the fictional anime being produced. It’s about an outsider commenting on the genre.
As Jem remarks, “MSBC intentionally draws on anime and manga tropes, which can be problematic and reductive in their representation of women, gay men and often focus on specific elements of Japanese culture.”
I think before anyone weighs in on this post, they should read the Shea Hennum’s essay that Kim references, as well as Deb Aoki’s roundup of the actual discussion: https://storify.com/debaoki/do-you-have-to-be-japanese-to-make-manga
Reading these, it’s clear the uproar wasn’t about the comic as much as the authors’ reactions to criticism.
Tumblr only posts anonymous questions if the user responds to them. O’Neill chose to share the criticism that initially stirred the pot with her tone-deaf answer.
Orlesky tweeted about “the cannibalistic behavior of young minority creators, especially on tumblr” – which took two combustible substances (tumblr AND twitter) and lit the match of condescending white resentment.
The narrative “anonymous social justice warrior on tumblr started PC outrage which eventually shut down a web comic” is clearly bullshit. A more accurate, yet still unverifiable, narrative is “authors quit in response to some part of the negative attention drawn by their own social media behavior.”
What bugs me is McDonald read Aoki’s post, yet still indulged a Johnathan Chait/Freddy DeBoer anti-PC rant which ignores a mostly nuanced discussion to rail against extremists who are either imaginary or have far less power than these dramatic polemics pretend.
She dismisses the majority who were open to artists depicting other cultures depending on how it’s done.
This includes Jem Yoshioka’s essay, which McDonald misrepresents as radical rather than saying: “Katie and Toril should be celebrated for their sensitivity here even if you do not completely agree with their reasons…Katie and Toril may decide they are comfortable to set future stories in Japan or feature Japanese characters. I trust that if they do so, they will proceed with respect and sensitivity. Their decision to discontinue MSBC only strengthens this opinion.”
I don’t think it’s extreme to expect a journalist/critic like McDonald to have the ability to recognize reductive narratives and look beyond them. Particularly one from the Fox News mythos. McDonald is kind of embracing the same rhetorical approach and reactionary analysis which informed Fredric Wertham.
“McDonald is kind of embracing the same rhetorical approach and reactionary analysis which informed Fredric Wertham.”
Ouch. Those are fighting words for sure.
I thought I’d seen the creator’s response which sparked some of the anger at them, but I think I missed that quote.
“It’s about an outsider commenting on the genre.”
I feel pretty strongly that you don’t need to be an insider to comment on, or talk about, art. It can be a problem when ignorant folks revert to simplistic prejudice when talking about a genre or a community…but it can also be a problem when you’re seen as illegitimate just because you don’t check certain boxes or come form a certain background (see gamergate.)
That’s my opinion too. I think the cultural appropriation angle to some extent is a distraction from a sensitivity to potential criticism of the genre. The comic was by a woman, featured a harried-looking female voice actor and looked poised to make a thing of the difference between fantasy and reality. The portrayal of the anime industry is what distinguishes this comic from the thousands, not the use of anime tropes.
Yes, Bri, the cut from the anime being ADR’ed to the harried actor was the sign to me that the authors were undercutting the fantasy.
To lessen the fighting words, let me say I think most people are susceptible to acting like Wertham, being so invested in one’s favorite perceived threat one rationalizes hyperbolic/bad faith arguments.
As comic books were positioned as the root of juvenile delinquency (rather than an interesting but non-causational correlation), so are shallow identity politics in online comments positioned as a major threat to free expression (rather than a mostly harmless if vexing side effect of impulsive oversharing).
To me it’s a variant of the eternally fascinating (or annoying, depending) topic of authenticity, which tends to inspire heated discussions when it touches personal feelings and desires about belonging and cultural ownership.
It’s particularly fraught when it involves youthful perceptions – not always chronologically young, but strong ideas we formed in developmental years.
Kind of a tangent: I was an outcast as a kid and one way I coped was imagining myself a sophisticate, being a white person who appreciated other cultures more than my xenophobic peers. As I learned the concept of The Other, I realized I was treating the world as an exotic buffet to be sampled by me, who still enjoyed status as the dominant norm. I get this is a problem, but the connection to a concept which gave solace during youthful loneliness taints my feelings. Discussions of how I can’t fully understand or intrude on some culture feels like an attack even though no one is suggesting I’m not allowed to appreciate the culture, just limit how I express that enjoyment. Similarly, my youthful fondness for Peter Gabriel makes me feel defensive of critiques of his cultural appropriation.
@Aaron White I’ve never heard “casuals” used in that way; that’s really interesting. Since Angel’s essay wasn’t particularly short or humorous, it seems unlikely that’s what Lichtig meant. If that *is* what he meant, I’m pretty sure it was intended as a sick burn!
@pallas Part of my disagreement with Heidi is that I don’t believe in objectivity in comics criticism. Anyway, no, I don’t think it’s noble to make accusations against a work of art. But I think it’s ignoble and dehumanizing to accuse the accusers, or critics or commenters or whatever the right word is, of being irrational or dishonest or bullies even as you imagine yourself to have their best interests at heart. It is also ignoble to paint them as some grave threat to Comics.
Linke drives home a good point: the way Heidi misrepresented Jem’s post is straight-up unethical.
This quote is hilarious and strange: “Katie and Toril may decide they are comfortable to set future stories in Japan or feature Japanese characters. I trust that if they do so, they will proceed with respect and sensitivity. Their decision to discontinue MSBC only strengthens this opinion.”
It says that we will know that these artists are truly sensitive in what they create when they live up to the standards that they set by the works they chose not to create. The benchmark of — or at least a true milestone in — their artistic sensitivity is their silence.
Peter, I’m not sure why that is odd or unusual? Part of art is editing, surely; if you just spew everything in your head…well, then you’re Bob Dylan I guess, and people think he’s great. But their are models of artistry that are about taking a less diarrhetic approach. I’m pretty sure Paul Celan would agree (silently) to the idea that true art approaches silence.
I guess comics is enamored of the put-everything-in-your-head-out-there model as a benchmark of honesty; or at least alt comics folks following Crumb are. But I really don’t think there’s anything weird or odd about saying, “hey, you made a choice not to create this crappy thing; that gives me greater confidence in your aesthetic decision making going forward.”
Just to clarify one thing:
“Those capital letters are the author’s, and they are used throughout her screed, along with boldface and incredulous subheadings, to convey her utter indignation that people started a conversation about cultural appropriation in some comic she has officially deemed OK.”
I never “officially deemed MSBC okay”. I don’t know if it’s okay or not. I read all of the “conversation” I could find, and even Yoshioka’s very useful and well-written FAQ did not explain what it was that specifically troubled her beyond the general set-up itself. Some twitter commenters were more blunt about it, labelling it “weak weeaboo.”
Given the creators’ frantic, ham-fisted and culturally inappropriate fluffling of even the slightest online criticism (it’s always the cover-up and not the crime), it seems certain that they would have messed up the comic in some basic and fundamental ways. It was pointed out in the comments at the Beat that Yoshioka may have had access to additional pages that had been produced beyond the 13 *seemingly* innocuous pages that went online.
I think the nature of the divide between that “seemingly innocuous” appearance and the “toxic” and “hurtful” nature of the 13 pages online is worth exploring. I just wish someone had actually done it.
It’s very well established Tezuka was hugely influenced by Walt Disney. His groundbreaking comic was called New Treasure Island and it was a riff on Stevenson’s themes. (Kurosawa’s Throne of Blood was an adaptation of Macbeth.) This is all historical record and I find it puzzling that so many people have been puzzled by my mentioning this.
Hi Heidi, I’m legit confused. The tone and content of your comment here does not even remotely resemble your post that I wrote about: http://www.comicsbeat.com/mahou-shounen-breakfast-club-and-the-toxic-ever-present-white-gaze/
Of course it’s fine to change your mind, but your post definitely endorsed MSBC and definitely painted its critics as censors and bullies. You also described Yoshioka’s FAQ as outrageous, ridiculous and “infuriating.” (Infuriating!) So I’m very surprised that you’re now saying it’s “useful and well-written.”
I’m also surprised to hear you now say “it seems certain that they [MSBC’s creators] would have messed up the comic in some basic and fundamental ways.” I believe that is what you refer to in your post “as no actual crime, we’re talking total pre-cog here.”
Now that you’re one of the pre-cogs I hope you write a more considered post, or better yet, an apology.
>>>>>You also described Yoshioka’s FAQ as outrageous, ridiculous and “infuriating.” (Infuriating!) So I’m very surprised that you’re now saying it’s “useful and well-written.”
My post does not include the word outrageous OR ridiculous. This is my exact words “this is possibly the most well meaning and infuriating document I’ve read this month.”
And
“Yoshioka seems like a very nice, reasonable person, and I totally dig her art, but…what exactly is the crime here? The comic made Yoshioka feel uncomfortable because…feelings.”
You’ve ascribed a lot of language to me that I simply did not use.
Whatever Heidi. The only word I put in quotes was “infuriating.” Outrageous and ridiculous were how you painted it in general.
You 100% painted Jem’s FAQ as outrageous and ridiculous.
“The comic made Yoshioka feel uncomfortable because…feelings.”
The tenor of this is that Yoshioka is emotion-driven to such an extent that she’s irrational. The phrasing, particularly the “because… feelings,” is snide. If a man had written this sentence, my immediate reaction would be that it’s misogynist. (This sort of statement is straight from the Dave Sim repertory.) As it is, though, I will say that Heidi comes off as portraying Yoshioka as ridiculous. It seems a fair characterization on Kim’s part.
If a commenter (incorrectly) corrects your (correct) kanji I don’t know what kind of tone you’re supposed to respond with other than “well, actually…” And it seems as if the observations about correct usage came in pretty late in the game, that is, the people who took offense at the creator’s response couldn’t read the disputed passage. The culture clash was with Tumblr.
Heidi writes: “It was pointed out in the comments at the Beat that Yoshioka may have had access to additional pages that had been produced beyond the 13 *seemingly* innocuous pages that went online.”
I think that’s a misreading of this comment: “I think what isn’t being addressed here is that Jem’s piece was taking the position that the creator’s had a lot more comic completed that wasn’t yet online that they were looking at when they decided some of the criticism of the first 13 pages was valid.”
Nobody knows where the creators would have taken it but the most parsimonious explanation and proximate cause is that they were in the middle of a social media blowup. Yoshioka weighed in after it all went down, and her post may be polite but it doesn’t find an actual problem with the comic or even do a good job of explaining what the problem might have been.
“MSBC intentionally draws on anime and manga tropes, which can be problematic and reductive in their representation of women, gay men and often focus on specific elements of Japanese culture… It’s fine to use these tropes, but it’s important to take the overall environment into account when writing them as a white westerner.”
The remarks about women and gay men are really left field. I don’t think anybody expected the comic to be flooded with voluptuous schoolgirls and upskirt shots in the next installment. I can see that the comic is heading for a kind of dual-layered gay romantic comedy (the voice actor is a dude) but was anybody objecting to the portrayal of gay people? I can’t tell if Yoshioka fears that the comic would have replicated those stereotypes or that they would have held them up for examination, but that second possibility doesn’t seem like it should be a problem—especially since she says “take the environment into account” but concedes that the creators were doing their research. This is the closest she comes to an actual criticism and it’s way too vague, but it seems like an expression of her own sensitivity about the genre as it exists in Japan.
What bugs me about the dispute that prompted the withdrawal is that there’s no actual disagreement. The kanji was correct. Nobody thinks white people should only write about white people. Everyone agrees that you should do your research in that situation. Everyone agrees that the creators were doing their research. Nobody found a mistake or a problem with the comic. So it comes down to the tone you take.
Setting aside Yoshioka’s essay, my impression is:
(1) Some of the Twitter reactions to MSBC-and-its-creators’-comments, particularly from Iasmin, were angry and aggressive. (Or defensive? It depends on whether Iasmin and others are considered to be ‘defending’ nonwhite creators from white condescension/appropriation, or ‘attacking’ a white creator for insensitive and rude comments.)
(2) In response, Heidi’s essay was also angry and aggressive. (Or defensive? Again, it depends on how you read it: as ‘defending’ an abstract idea of free speech vs. social media shaming, or as ‘attacking’ a nonwhite creator.)
It’s all about tone, and very little about the actual content of the comic. At least that’s my impression.
FWIW I find Yoshioka’s essay questionable when she attempts to speak broadly in the name of a consensus of Japanese-Americans or Asian-Americans; it’s easy to find Asian-American artists & comix folks online expressing a variety of opinions on this issue, pro- and anti-MSBC. For Yoshioka to speak of her personal impressions as an Asian-American, of course, is totally legit, but her essay moves beyond “I” “me” language to claim a broad Asian-American agreement on the issue about which…. well, having not done massive polling I have no idea, but from my personal anecdotal experience it seems to be a sweeping claim. See the online arguments on whether the sitcom “Fresh off the Boat” is offensive, for another example.
To sum up: I think Yoshioka’s essay is strongest when she writes about her personal take as a personal take.
Hi Jason, can you point to the places where you feel like Jem is speaking broadly for Japanese people? I’m curious because I thought she was pretty careful to avoid this. From her FAQ: “There isn’t some magical Japanese people consensus forum where all Japanese and Nikkei sit down to determine what they’ll find offensive and unanimously agree. It’s different for some people than others because we have all lived different lives.
Zan, my post wasn’t meant to be a referendum on MSBC, its creators, or the validity of its critics’ claims. It’s meant to critique Heidi, who is, in that particular post, a bully and a white supremacist.
Still, the narrative you present isn’t exactly right. The creators didn’t cancel the comic in response to that ask about the kanji. (You can read more about that timeline here: http://thisisinfamous.com/legitimate-criticism-mahou-shounen-breakfast-club/). The creators themselves have said they cancelled it because they took the critics calling them out for cultural appropriation seriously.
Now, there are a lot of different ways you can interpret that. Presumably, as creators, they had more knowledge of the comic than the 13 pages that the rest of us saw. It’s possible they perceived in the critiques a validity that applies to the comic as a whole. Then again, maybe not; maybe the creators thought the critiques were valid based on just those 13 pages. Or maybe, as you and Heidi suggest, they didn’t necessarily agree that the critiques were valid and they just panicked because of (relatively mild) criticism over social media. (I wouldn’t call it a blowup. The blowup happened after the cancellation.) Or maybe the creators don’t GAF about the “validity” of the critiques at all, and they cancelled the comic because they can’t stand the thought that their comic might make someone–anyone–unhappy. All of these interpretations are sheer speculation, and I doubt the “real” reason can be reduced to a single “cause.”
Building on Robert’s comment, I’d like to speak up for the validity of “feelings” as a totally valid tool in comics criticism. It’s funny to me that Heidi and other people who frame critique as censorship always describe emotional reactions in the pejorative. Robert’s right that it’s usually gendered.
Of course, Heidi herself expressed a LOT of feelings in her post, including indignation, disgust, disappointment, and concern. Snark is never an objective mode, though it is often mistaken as such.
Jem Yoshioka presents an interesting position when she writes, in a universal statement, that outsiders will always miss some things in a foreign culture even if they understand the language, visit the place, research it, and live there. First, it is not clear this is universally or “always” true, and she makes no effort to offer evidence or argument for this claim. Secondly, this seems to discount the value of outsider viewpoints, which isn’t exactly a defense of diversity or conducive to interrogating the accepted tropes she seems to find troubling. Finally, her standpoint must be either essentialist or self defeating if she is a ‘person of Japanese descent’ who grew up elsewhere as opposed to being born and raised in Japan (and eventually working in the anime industry), because she is also an outsider whose experiences do not match up with the characters or culture in question.
I would have liked to have seen her elaborate upon and defend this rather complex point.
As to when Jem treats it like her views or those of other individual American minorities are absolute or monolithic how about when she says continuing on after a single complaint renders the author a “giant jerk”?
Tavis,
I’ve only read the bits of Jem’s piece that have been quoted elsewhere, but the notion that outsiders always miss something isn’t controversial. Any anthropologist or linguist (or linguistic anthropologist) will tell you that a member of a culture experiences that culture very differently from someone coming from the outside. Note that this isn’t the same as knowing more about a culture. It’s possible for an anthropologist to have the same level conscious knowledge about the rituals and beliefs of a culture as any particular member, yet the insider’s knowledge is qualitatively different because he or she developed it over time, often without consciously realizing it. The upshot is that outsiders and insiders both miss things, but for different reasons. Moreover, and probably more germane to the issue, outsiders will always miss some things. This doesn’t maker her point self defeating. Again, any decent anthropologist will readily admit that they miss some things and make mistakes. This doesn’t mean they can’t be right about many, or even most things.
Robert and Kim,
“Because…feelings” is dismissive, because the “because X” turn of phrase always has that quality. However I don’t think that MacDonald is dismissive of feelings per se as a critical tool. She is dismissing Yoshioka’s specific argument, which literally has nothing to say about the specific comic other that it made he “feel weird” (along with concerns about what other, less enlightened readers might think).
The review’s substantial theoretical framework about culture and appropriation is a frame ultimately is empty in the middle. There is no argument there; “it made me feel weird” *by itself* is not an argument, in part because it is uncontestable, no more deserving of consideration than “it made me feel happy.” When presented as the core of an argument, it deserves the dismissal.
Ironically, the creators’ argument is, itself, not about cultural appropriation or any particular substantive matter; it, too, begins and ends with feelings. They started by saying they hoped to “make a portrayal that wasn’t hurtful,” and then assert that “this was incorrect and not possible, and we don’t wish to create a comic that will hurt people.”
The desire to avoid hurting people is, all other things equal, admirable. But for me the tell is when they say that the avoidance of hurt feelings turned out to be “impossible.” That seems about right: they are impossible to predict, control, and especially argue against.
Hi Noah,
Responding to your reply from way up there. My little comment had nothing to do with a letting-it-all-out theory of art and expression. It had to do with the acidity of celebrating an artist for his or her silence — and specifically making silence the key evidence of one’s artistic sensitivity.
Perhaps this patronizing backhand to the artists — your silence in the face of your dumbness was so wisely chosen that I can’t wait to hear what you say next — seems especially odd, though, because the reviewer (as I note above) had nothing negative to say about the comic itself. She specially didn’t say it was shitty. Hell, she barely said anything negative at all. (Maybe I should compliment her on her reticence.)
That said, celebrating artists based on what they chose not to create, implying that their silence is the strongest mark of their potential artistic integrity, rings as much romantic authenticity as any put-it-out-there hymn.
“celebrating artists based on what they chose not to create, implying that their silence is the strongest mark of their potential artistic integrity, ”
You could see Celan as romantic, definitely. But I think you can complimenting someone on an editing choice seems like it can be fairly mundane.
Hi Peter, Heidi sort of lumps Yoshioka in with MSBC’s critics, and she spends much of her post treating the FAQ as though it’s representative of everyone who found it objectionable. The problem is that Yoshioka isn’t (to my knowledge) among the comic’s critics at all. (Nor is she a reviewer, as you also refer to her.) She wrote that post after the comic was cancelled, and I don’t *think* (though I could be wrong) she had spoken out on it before that.
Yes, Yoshioka writes that the comic bothered her in a way she can’t quite articulate. But this shouldn’t be taken as the core of the critics’ argument about cultural appropriation. It is one woman’s reaction, and it’s not put forward in the spirit of critique (since the comic was cancelled). As for whether “it makes me feel weird” is a valid argument in general, I suppose it depends on if you’re just a person criticizing the comic (which is the way I use the word “critic” in my post, to be clear) or a Critic with a capital C. The people criticizing MSBC were not writing critical essays for the Internet or for, let’s say, your class. They were not necessarily trying to convince an audience. They were talking to the creators on public platforms, sharing personal reactions. And based on the way some of them have been treated for doing that–by big comics personalities like Heidi and through those pesky death threats–I imagine some of them will be reticent to do it again.
As for the creators’ statement about the cancellation, I’ve already argued above that I think it can be interpreted in more than one way. But whatever way you look at it, I don’t think language like “we don’t want to hurt anyone with it” is the same thing as saying the comic hurt people’s feelings. It can just mean the comic was damaging. All that said I really dislike the way that statement was worded. Intentionally or not, it feeds right into the longstanding myth that Heidi perpetuates: that political correctness is killing comics.
Nate, it is not my contention that any one person is or even can be infallible, or that any person may have an experience that encompasses all other experiences of some phenomena. That would be deity-level, logic-breaking superpower. But Jem appears to beyond common sense and the anthropological consensus you articulate.
Jem writes, “You can do a lot of research about other cultures. You can devote a lot of time and energy to learning languages, customs, visiting the country, pouring over work from their greatest creators, and generally really loving what it is that the culture is about. However, there are some things you just can’t learn from books or from visits or even from living there. As an outsider there will always be things you will never understand.
“Our worldviews are shaped by the collection of experiences that have made up our life to this point, and living the life of a privileged white person and approaching the world from this worldview, you are inevitably going to misunderstand, misrepresent or just plain miss some crucial elements of what it means to be from a particular culture.”
She also seems to imply, between this passage and others addressing her ancestry or that of other people whose parents or great grandparents were born in Japan, that she does not suffer from such misunderstandings and that she can tell white people who may have more direct experience or knowledge of Japan what it is and is not okay to write about Japanese natives, and the whites must acquiesce or be ‘huge jerks’–a point which seems inconsistent with her argument above, barring some form of racial essentialsism.
“Zan, my post wasn’t meant to be a referendum on MSBC, its creators, or the validity of its critics’ claims. It’s meant to critique Heidi, who is, in that particular post, a bully and a white supremacist.”
Well Kim, maybe those things have something to do with whether or not Heidi’s reaction was white supremacist. I didn’t care for Yoshioka’s essay either, because while discomfort is a totally valid starting point for a writer the idea is to explore the reasons for your discomfort, and because she frames it as an FAQ, instruction for the uninitiated, that assumes an authority not supported by her vague, muddled arguments applauding the comic’s cancellation.
And she touches on a problem that doesn’t fall so neatly under the rubric of cultural appropriation and Asian experience that westerners can’t share and so should defer to. The comic is a gay romance set behind the scenes at a “magic boy” anime which looks headed in that direction itself. That’s not a dwarf elephant in the room, it’s a robust, well-fed one. When that commenter lost it on seeing the Japanese title on the final posted page it seems like he (sounds like a he) must have been stewing over something before he got there. And Jem’s gnomic reference to problematic portrayals of gay men is actually somewhat relevant to the comic, unlike her other comments. When she proceeds to enthusiastically support artists’ working with anime influence but suggests the setting crosses a line, that’s not cultural influence but the portrayal of the culture she’s objecting to.
I can see how people could be touchy about seeing that aspect of Japanese pop culture made the subject of a comic, not an entry in the genre but the subject, and how it could draw heat from different sides, from people who find it exploitive to people who don’t like its existence being advertised. I don’t think the creators even had any hard-hitting cultural criticism in mind, I think they just enjoy the genre and weren’t ready to deal with “cultural appropriation” and “western arrogance” being the publicity for their comic. I’m dubious about those labels myself.
*long sigh*
Let’s take a moment to recap. I stated from the outset that MSBC doesn’t strike me as cultural appropriation and that, so far as I understand it, I think the creators decision to quit was ridiculous. To be totally honest with you, I don’t care very much about the comic itself. What I care about is Heidi’s response, which was an abuse of her platform.
Jem Yoshioka, as I have tried to explain, wasn’t actually one of the critics of MSBC. Just because she framed her blog post as an FAQ doesn’t mean it should be taken as some sort of certified document about what MSBC’s critics think. (In the text of the post itself, I think she’s pretty clear about that.) Those critics–only one of whom posted the anon ask that sparked this conversation–are people who were sharing their personal responses. They were not litigating their case for cultural appropriation in the court of ZAN. They were not writing critical posts directed outward toward an audience. They were a relatively small group of people who were either talking amongst themselves and/or directly @ing (harsh, but not abusive) comments to the creators on semipublic platforms like Twitter and Tumblr.
The creators canceled the comic. Somewhere along the way an incorrect narrative was established: MSBC’s creators were bullied off the Internet. It’s hardly surprising–that narrative is just a continuance of the same old shitty myth about political correctness being a threat to everything that’s interesting and funny about our world. Jem Yoshioka tried to step in and say, goodness me, that narrative is wrong! She tried to explain where she thought the critics were coming from. Whether or not she was successful in doing so is not germane. Writing an FAQ that supports the creators in their decision to quit is demonstrably NOT being a bully.
Along comes Heidi MacDonald in her capacity as “reporter.” She skims someone’s Storify, reads Jem’s blog post, and gets MAD and WORRIED about what these mean jerks on Tumblr and Twitter are doing to comics. She perceives their comments as an attack. (Ask yourself: an attack on what?) She writes a hot take that amplifies (and thus solidifies for posterity) the narrative that they killed MSBC. She takes a group of people who essentially said “I think this is bad” or “this bothers me” and paints them as dishonest, inauthentic, intractable aggressors who have robbed the world of some amazing comic. She treats them with contempt. She deems their personal reactions invalid. She waxes on about how DANGEROUS they are to comics. She conflates them with Jem, whose blog post she misrepresents so aggressively that I thought I was in the wrong tab. She does ~all of this shit~ in the name of promoting diversity. She then trots into these comments with a *totally different take* and accuses me of misquoting her when I didn’t use quotation marks. Like…what?
This isn’t the first time I’ve written about white supremacy at The Beat. I really doubt it will be the last.
Kim, it seems to me that the ideas being discussed are more interesting than the ‘history’ of petty tweets and blogs. In that regard, I think Jem’s is both the more interesting piece, more even, and yet more flawed. Heidi’s criticism of Jem’s FAQ addresses and quotes Jem’s writing directly, and seems to set it properly as an original essay rationalizing (rather than informing) a decision Heidi clearly viewed as irrational or mistaken.
Arguing against or grappling with Jem’s piece does not strike me as racist or suggesting white people are the greatest. In fact, you do not seem to agree with at least some of what she wrote and implied.
It seems to me you are more interested in shaming Heidi for her vitriol than in dealing with the ideas at hand. I am not sure why, but I suspect that admitting Heidi may have been right (or at least not entirely wrong) about some things might hurt your narrative. If she is actually justified (in part or in whole, in substance rather than tone), then racial animus seems less of a motivating or underlying factor, and Heidi less of a white supremacist in her treatment of Jem and Jem’s piece.
I think the term “white supremacist” should be used with caution. All white supremacists are racists, but not all racists are white supremacists. They often aren’t even aware of their racism.
Tavis, Kim is in fact clear in the post that Heidi’s tone, and the way she frames the argument, are what she’s talking about. It’s not clear to me why you think that’s an illegitimate topic.
Tone matters, especially when the tone is dismissive and angry and said from a large platform under the guise of neutral journalism. Kim agrees that Heidi is right about some things, it seems like. She’s saying the way Heidi handled this is hurtful. You can agree or disagree with that, but getting more and more huffy because Kim’s post is about what it’s about rather than what you think it should be about seems pointless.
You also seem to just be repeating the same arguments while getting more and more accusatory. Maybe time to give it a rest?
Tavis,
This quote seems totally uncontroversial:
“Our worldviews are shaped by the collection of experiences that have made up our life to this point, and living the life of a privileged white person and approaching the world from this worldview, you are inevitably going to misunderstand, misrepresent or just plain miss some crucial elements of what it means to be from a particular culture.”
I agree that the writer’s footing is shaky to the degree that she suggests that ancestry is equivalent to culture, but that doesn’t seem primary to her argument.
So the entire case against me is tone policing. I see.
Tone policing is a tactic used to derail discussions about feminism and racism. It is a tool of oppression. If you want to see an example of it, look at the way Heidi characterizes critics of MSBC in her post.
Of course, *accusations* of tone policing can be used to derail conversations, too. I wrote thousands of words critiquing the content of Heidi’s post, which falsely describes a group of people responding to a comic as censors and bullies. I critiqued her presentation of that post as journalism. I critiqued the false narrative she puts forward of what “killed” MSBC. I critiqued the way she painted herself as a champion of equality even as she dismissed and displaced other voices. And yes, I critiqued her tone–not to derail her argument, but because it is inextricable from all of the above.
Am I oppressing you, Heidi? Me, a fellow white feminist, writing on a platform that’s smaller than yours, spending a lot of my time engaging substantively with the argument that you put forward in your post? In turn, are you engaging substantively with my critique?
Nope, nope, and nope.
Noah, tone and framing do matter. I think Heidi’s tone was unhelpful throughout much of her article, including the bits where she rails against Jem’s statements. However, I disagree with Kim’s assesment of how Heidi framed Jem’s writing in particular (for reasons given in my previous post).
With respect to Heidi’s approach to Jem’s FAQ, if the criticisms are justified or salient, there is a good case to be made that they are worth making, and not necessarily driven by racial animus or intentionally or effictively made to promote white supremacy. Which was my point above, though I suppose I made it poorly.
I suppose you
–As an aside, I cannot begin to untangle the Twitter and Tumblr drama here, and it doesn’t personallt interest me much, though I do not deny it may matter to others. If Heidi misrepresented it, that is either immoral (if intentional) or professionally unethical (if negligent). I take no issue with how Kim has addressed that or questions of journalism. More, Kim may, of course, focus on what she wishes to, without worries of legitimacy, and without any care for my opinions of what is most interesting here. Assuming her “long sigh” post was at least in part in response to Zan, I intended to address why I thought they disagreed about Heidi’s handling of Jem’s FAQ, and to show that a recap didn’t address this difference in opinion. But again, I suppose I did this poorly.
It was not my intent to take an accusatory tone. That sort of thing isn’t nice, and has no place in a thread accusing someone of racism and white supremacy. My apologies.
Nate, fair enough. I’m not opposed to everything Jem wrote. I just think it brings up some interesting questions, and seems to work on some packed biases of its own. I am not versed in anthropology, though. Maybe this is old hat for you.
Well, I guess who’s engaging with the issues and who’s slinging repetitive accusations is in the burning eye of the beholder. This is not the first time I’ve been really disappointed in this site.
I’d like to comment about this relative to a subsequent similar incident.
DC Comics recently previewed a variant cover to a Batgirl comic that provoked controversy. The cover portrayed the character being terrorized while a captive of the Joker. The artist, Rafael Albuquerque, intended it as an allusion to Alan Moore and Brian Bolland’s notorious Batman: The Killing Joke, in which the Joker shot, paralyzed, and in the view of many readers, raped the character. Apart from being an obvious reference to an extremely controversial story, Albuqurque’s cover was also criticized as at odds with the more lighthearted tone of the current Batgirl series. Yesterday, in response to the uproar, Albuquerque withdrew the cover, and DC cancelled the variant issue. Albuquerque said, “My intention was never to hurt or upset anyone through my art… for that reason, I have recommended to DC that the variant cover be pulled.” In DC’s statement, the publisher made reference to “threats and harassment.” Albuquerque later noted that he did not receive threats. Batgirl co-writer Cameron Stewart clarified that the people who objected to the cover did.
Those interested can read the full story here:
http://www.comicbookresources.com/article/dc-comics-cancels-batgirl-joker-variant-at-artists-request
After the announcement that the cover was withdrawn, I sent a tweet about it to Heidi MacDonald, Kim O’Connor, Noah Berlatsky, and one other person. The tweet mocked Heidi’s “But I never want to see these criticisms used to PROACTIVELY SILENCE ART” from the MSBC piece. I don’t have the exact wording of the tweet because I quickly took it down after seeing DC’s statement about threats. The tweet’s tone didn’t seem appropriate if Albuquerque was being threatened. But now, in light of his and Stewart’s clarifications, I wish I’d left it up.
Tweets, though, can be forwarded to email, and Heidi responded, tweeting, “No the art was made and displayed and deemed inappropriate for very clear reasons.”
My reaction is that a double standard is at work here. In both this instance and MSBC’s, an author (or authors) responded to a controversy by withdrawing the work at issue, stating that they didn’t want to hurt or upset people by seeing it through. With the Batgirl cover, Heidi is sympathetic to those objecting, so she’s respectful of the decision. But with MSBC, she’s not sympathetic, so she attacks those objecting, and does so in a way that effectively attacks the authors’ decision as well.
The claim that “very clear reasons” were at work in the Batgirl decision, and not in the MSBC one, strikes me as solipsism. In both instances, the criticisms were clear enough to the authors that they chose to cancel their respective works. But since Heidi isn’t sympathetic to the criticisms in the MSBC case, they’re therefore not “clear,” and they deserve an attack that smears the critics and insults the authors’ decision.
It seems this is all about her, not the authors.
Uh, no, Robert, people can disagree with the criticisms of MSBC and agree with the criticisms of the Batgirl variant cover.
I’d add that the Batgirl cover was imposed over the objections of the comic’s creative team. It was part of a line-wide theme month and had nothing to do with the contents of the book. So apart from about a million other problems with your analogy it doesn’t make sense as a free speech issue.
So…of course people can agree with one criticism and disagree with the other. The question is, does it become a threat to free speech just because you disagree with the criticism?
Robert’s saying that it makes little sense to see it as a free speech issue in one case and not in the other.
Work for hire is different from not work for hire…but I don’t think that changes the central dynamic. Or at least, you’d need to make the case at greater length. You’re allowed to criticize work for hire comics because they’re just dreck anyway and it doesn’t matter, but when there’s an issue of real creative integrity, you can’t call for artists to change anything ever? I guess someone could argue that, but it doesn’t seem like a very strong position to me.
Well, Robert isn’t framing it as a free speech issue, he’s painting criticism after the point of the artists’ withdrawal as an illegitimate attack.
Robert wrote, “With the Batgirl cover, Heidi is sympathetic to those objecting, so she’s respectful of the decision. But with MSBC, she’s not sympathetic, so she attacks those objecting, and does so in a way that effectively attacks the authors’ decision as well. The claim that “very clear reasons” were at work in the Batgirl decision, and not in the MSBC one, strikes me as solipsism. In both instances, the criticisms were clear enough to the authors that they chose to cancel their respective works. But since Heidi isn’t sympathetic to the criticisms in the MSBC case, they’re therefore not “clear,” and they deserve an attack that smears the critics and insults the authors’ decision.”
I brought up free speech because his analogy breaks down in a big way when one of the works in question is being forcibly imposed as a package to the work of some other artists who don’t want it. Not to mention that the cover was already published on a wide electronic platform, and there’s nothing the world didn’t see. The cover artist got to make his statement, such as it is, and his withdrawal got some traction from the company that the creators couldn’t on their own.
Now with MSBC, here’s a comic that was criticized on the basis of who the creators are, with little relevance to the comic, and in a way that’s been presented as beyond debate if you don’t have the right background yourself. That’s objectionable for a number of reasons, and while it’s not a legal free speech issue it’s highly contestable on a free speech basis. The creators’ right to withdraw their work in the face of criticism or for any other reason doesn’t mean the debate has to stop after they do so. Hell, their claim that it’s not possible for them to proceed without hurting people is up for debate. It’s also not taking away their rights to look at the whole incident and have questions about the way it went down.
Of course, according to Rob Martin’s position in his Jim Shooter essays, all aesthetic and moral debate is settled by the question of who was the copyright holder or designated representative.
Voss, please keep to the topic of the thread. We’re not debating Jim Shooter here. Go on in that vein and I’ll delete your comments.
Robert,
It seems wrong to take Heidi or anyone to task for distinguishing between “clear” reasons and unclear reasons, between good reasons and poor reasons. That is simply what one does when evaluating actions, claims, and arguments. It is not solipsism to say that one set of reasons is bad/unclear and another is not; it’s just built into arguing.
In this case — if we’re talking about the attacks on the two comics and not the artists’ subsequent reactions and decisions — I think it’s not unreasonable or unfair to distinguish between (1) attacks that dislike a extant work because it does X, Y, Z and (2) attacks a not-yet-created work that *might* do X, Y, Z.
Beyond that, it is equally appropriate to distinguish between two sets of critical reactions, as expressed, calling one set clear and specific, the other set vague and unconvincing — regardless of what you think of those reactions per se.
Of course, just tossing those labels out — YEA! or BOO! — and not providing one’s own reasons is another matter, at least as far as argument goes. But the clear/unclear, good-reasons/bad-reasons distinctions themselves are entirely plausible.
Hi Peter.
My issue with Heidi’s piece on MSBC is that she attacked the MSBC critics in a manner that seemed intended to discredit or delegitimize the authors’ decision to discontinue the work. That’s what I objected to. I’m sorry if it wasn’t clear.
Heidi can disagree with those critics all she wants–I’m not on board with them myself–but leave the authors’ decision out of it. If they want to discontinue the work because a black cat crossed their path one morning, that’s their business. It should be respected no matter what.
According to his statements, Albuquerque withdrew his cover for much the same reasons the MSBC authors gave. He said he didn’t want to hurt or upset people. Heidi has treated that decision with a respect she isn’t willing to grant the one by the MSBC authors. I feel there’s a discord there, and I highlighted it.
Thanks for the opportunity to clarify.
When a work is published, it’s out there for people to talk about. That means it’s abrupt cancellation and non-ending is just as open to commentary and analysis as any other creative decision.