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Lee Painter
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 January 2009
Posts: 304
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 2:42pm | IP Logged | 1
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Remember when comics were fun?
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Jonathan Stover
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 June 2004
Posts: 749
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 2:50pm | IP Logged | 2
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On Earth-Marvel, isn't pretty much everything a spin-off of Hydra? Besides AIM, the Secret Empire was a spin-off (or possibly a spin-off of AIM), and they had the additional weirdness of occasionally using vaguely Islamic chants. And the Sons of the Serpent were...white supremacists with a snake fetish??? Brubaker should have really confused people by making the Tea-Partiers gay Muslim white supremacists who used to be the kitchen staff at the Hellfire Club. Cheers, Jon
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Matthew McCallum
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 03 July 2004
Location: Canada
Posts: 2711
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 3:12pm | IP Logged | 3
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Lee,
Aren't you forgetting about the Invisible Hand? You know, that always seemed like an important part of the equation...
And the sole intent of starting a business is making a profit? Really?
So recognizing and seeking to fill a gap in societal needs, providing a better service or a quality product more cheaply than the ones currently existing, ETHICS, these are all secondary or insignificant concerns in any business plan?
Edited by Matthew McCallum on 15 February 2010 at 3:44pm
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Matthew McCallum
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 03 July 2004
Location: Canada
Posts: 2711
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 3:44pm | IP Logged | 4
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Patrick,
The treatment of black (or ethnic) villains poses an interesting challenge. In turn of the century literature through the pulps they were either crafty evil masterminds ("the creeping yellow peril" of the English clubland thrillers) or virtual subhuman animals. In neither case were they civilized like our heroes.
Comics followed suit and there were few positive representations of minorities until you reached the mid-1960s, and even then they were few and far between. The 1954 Comics Code was silent on the presentation of minorities, which shows just how much the issue of fair treatment registered on the radar.
In the Civil Rights Era, it would be insensitive to have overtly black villains that white heroes would gang up on and overcome. Conversely, a black hero like Luke Cage could face black villains; that took the curse off it.
It would be an interesting thesis project to study the evolution of the black villain in comics, from introduction to when they could finally go toe-to-toe with white heroes on equal terms without the reader going "Hey! He's black!"
Someone please help me out here: wasn't The Prowler the first significant black villain in the Marvel Universe? Of course, being fully masked he was OVERTLY black, but wasn't he the first ongoing black villain?
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Rich Rice
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 08 April 2008
Posts: 195
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 3:53pm | IP Logged | 5
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"Who you gonna get to do the dirty work, when all the slaves are free?"
First the t-shirt argument. Now the 'raise yourself up by the bootstraps' argument.
Yes, in Good Ol' God Save America, you too can become a millionaire. The only question then is, what the frack do we do when we are 250 million millionaires strong? Who the frack is going to unplug your toilet?
You're trying to set policy by leading with the circumstances of the individual and basing the group model on the one. Systems are complicated, massive structures with very real, essential must-be-met needs. Whether Al wants the job or not, somebody has to unplug the toilets in Liberty Town. Someone has to pick up the garbage. Someone has to flip the burgers and take your order. You can't have 250 million middle managers, business owners and CEOs. No matter how wonderful the 'rag to riches' stories happen in America. Good for Al that he went to night school, took an extra job, started his own business and became a wealthy man. It's wonderfully anecdotal but it does not preclude the need for buttons on men's pants. The nation still needs buttons on men's pants and someone has to put them there.
The world of button makers, burger flippers, trash collectors, grave diggers, can opener widget makers, toster inspectors, cab drivers etc. add up to a sizable portion of our society. And damn it, their 'jobs' are essential to the whole. They need to make a living wage. You can't simply say, "Let them eat cake." or "Pick yourself up by your bootstraps." Some, maybe. But for all that move on, you still need someone to put your deceased relatives in the ground. The social order just works better for that happening.
Not only is it essential that this huge mass of people be able to afford housing, put food on the table, save for retirement -essentially meet their own needs, the industrial engine of Capitolism needs them just as well. We want them to buy Fords. Get their kids an Ipad. See Avatar. Buy John Byrne Comics. Huge swaths of industry are pegged on volume sales, not just sales to the well to do. So if Michigan's Auto industry is to thrive, that whole sub category of average sludge workers need to be somewhat well off. A poor underclass is just the invitation to social disorder and chaos.
No man is bound to buy or sell a product, but I'm sure somewhere out there in the wonderful world of Business Statistics, there a statistical model for how much pain a social system can endure before the minions go all French Revolution on you. And they won't take business abstracts as a solution.
Class is open: Graduate Studies 604. Let them eat cake.
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Lee Painter
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 January 2009
Posts: 304
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 4:34pm | IP Logged | 6
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Lee,
Aren't you forgetting about the Invisible Hand? You know, that always seemed like an important part of the equation...
And the sole intent of starting a business is making a profit? Really?
So recognizing and seeking to fill a gap in societal needs, providing a better service or a quality product more cheaply than the ones currently existing, ETHICS, these are all secondary or insignificant concerns in any business plan? The invisible hand doesn't exist in reality. People have been manipulating the market since day one. See the Fed for a great example. And yes the sole purpose of starting a business is to make a profit. "Incentives" aka profits are what drives the capitalist system. No business, regardless of what service theya re performing, that isn't making a profit will stay open. Ethics plays no role in business decisions, see Enron.
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Patrick McNally
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 10 February 2010
Posts: 33
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 4:55pm | IP Logged | 7
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"Someone please help me out here: wasn't The Prowler the first significant black villain in the Marvel Universe?" Probably, though my memory is a bit rusty. Pennysworth has always stood out in my mind as an instance of the black evil mastermind in a comic book where the majority of heroes were white (or green in the case of the Hulk). That series with the Sons of the Serpent began in Defenders 22 and then Luke Cage popped in issue 24 to be there on hand for the final climax in 25. Cage's presence meant that we did have a black hero on hand when the black villain Pennysworth was exposed. But the story was striking at the time, to have it be exposed that the Sons of the Serpent were actually being used by Pennysworth.
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Mike O'Brien
Byrne Robotics Member
Official JB Historian
Joined: 18 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 10934
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 4:57pm | IP Logged | 8
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Touche, Matthew! And speaking of the invisible hand and tea-baggers (getting worked up into a santorum...) - here's one that brings both elements into one: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/2/13/836855/-Teabaggers-p rotest-radio-format-change,-and-go-there
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Monte Gruhlke
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Joined: 03 May 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 3303
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 9:51pm | IP Logged | 9
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After a good hard think about the uproar over Captain America #602, my reaction is "so?"
So what? Let people be offended if they want to be. Let them then not buy that issue. What was that thing in the Bill of Rights that says something... something... free speech... something... something?
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Brad Krawchuk
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 19 June 2006
Location: Canada
Posts: 5819
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| Posted: 15 February 2010 at 10:23pm | IP Logged | 10
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99% of all offended people probably haven't picked up a comic in 20 years anyway.
Who cares?
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Rich Rice
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 08 April 2008
Posts: 195
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| Posted: 16 February 2010 at 2:29am | IP Logged | 11
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When you hum this little ditty, think old, Southern Baptist hymnals.......
I'm workin' on the AT&T
The AT&T Plantation
I'm workin' on the AT&T
The AT&T Plantation
You know the strong are doing what they can
The weak are workin' hard for the Man.
You know Blue Cross they love me too
The took my shirt and they took my shoes
I'm working on the AT&T
The AT&T Plantation
If I could learn to read and write
Good Lawd, you know I probably turn out alright.
But that runs 27k a year
Nobody got that kinda cash up here
I'm workin' on the AT&T
The AT&T Plantation
Now my massah he treat me right
I get time and a half at night
While the Union tries to charge me dues!
Well those dues just gimme the blues
I'ma workin' on the AT&T
The AT&T Plantation
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Rich Rice
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 08 April 2008
Posts: 195
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| Posted: 16 February 2010 at 2:32am | IP Logged | 12
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I'm a 'free' man.
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Topic Closed)
