InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "once upon a midnight dreary"

sandoz_iscariot (sandoz_iscariot) wrote in scans_daily,
@ 2009-08-09 21:17:00

Current mood:	sleepy
Entry tags:	char: fantomah, creator: fletcher hanks, era: golden age, theme: racism

Fantomah from Jungle Comics #7.
More insanity from Fletcher Hanks, this one featuring my favorite of his creations, Fantomah.

...wat.

(note to mods: the comic is in the public domain, so I'm posting the complete story.)

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jlroberson
2009-08-10 02:16 am UTC (link)

See the forest despite the trees. For this time, the very idea of punishing white men for doing shit to African natives in itself was a few light years forward, so cut Hanks some slack. You wouldn't see this again till the story of T'Challa and Klaw. Usually "natives" were pretty much always a threat to be eradicated, even in Grape Nuts ads:
http://www.seanbaby.com/comicads/comicads39.shtml

The very fact that Fantomah defended them rather than the white invaders makes the strip pretty remarkable for 1940.

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	box_in_the_box 2009-08-10 02:20 am UTC (link)
	That's actually a good point. Granted, it still makes the natives out to be children to be cared for (or exploited), but as you say, even that was rather progressive for the era. Point for Hanks, I guess. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	jlroberson 2009-08-10 02:43 am UTC (link)
	At least in comics, it was. (Reply to this) (Parent)

houbanaut
2009-08-10 04:16 am UTC (link)

I'd even argue that it's oversensitive to call those drawings "racist caricatures". To a certain extent, it just seems to be Hanks' poor grasp of faces (compare the "Send men and provisions!" guy).

Furthermore, I think it's fair to consider that in a society more segregated than ours, even a sincere attempt by a white artist to portray black people realistically would tend to emphasize the unfamiliar features, such as thicker lips.

To assume that white people are the norm and therefore depict other ethnicities as defined by their differences from the default is (or at least should be) outmoded today, but this kind of ethnocentrism isn't really by itself racist.

And as for the paternalism (maternalism?) of the story, consider that it was written at the height of the colonial era, with all of Africa (give or take) in the hands of European colonies, and native people hopelessly outgunned. So this village's inability to resist heavily armed gangsters doesn't necessarily show them as "children to be cared for" (they seem to have been doing fine up to this point, and they certainly manage to seize the opportunity for escape).

I feel like I've been spending way too much time defending a crazy person. It certainly wouldn't surprise me if Hanks was a virulent racist. I just don't see particular evidence of it in this story.

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	btravage.livejournal.com 2009-08-10 06:54 am UTC (link)
	"this kind of ethnocentrism isn't really by itself racist." Yes it is. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	houbanaut 2009-08-10 03:18 pm UTC (link)
	You should consult a dictionary or an encyclopedia on what racism really means. To call a naive, not particularly negative portrayal "racist" just because we happen to know better trivializes the malignancy of actual racism. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	houbanaut 2009-08-10 03:30 pm UTC (link)
	That's not meant as a personal attack, by the way. Just saying that I disagree with you. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	runespoor7 2009-08-10 03:58 pm UTC (link)
	Racism doesn't need to be negative to be racism. When someone says "oh, Jews are clever," that's racist. When someone says "Black people are naturally good at music/dancing," that's also racist. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

nagaoka
2009-08-10 05:12 pm UTC (link)

More stereotyping than racist, but I won't argue that in general people would view it as a racist remark. It's sort of grown in its meaning to be synonymous with stereotyping (when dealing with race).

I think houbanaut has the right idea though. I really don't see how the guy's depiction of the natives is a racist caricature any more than drawing narrow eyes on a Chinese person would be. Is it just large lips/wide nose that's setting people off?

I just think it's a strange idea that drawing people with anything but white facial features can be considered racist. I suppose it's just a side effect of blackface and the extremely exaggerated caricatures like Whitewash that we have perhaps become overly sensitive to depictions of other races.

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sandoz_iscariot
2009-08-11 12:32 am UTC (link)

I really don't see how the guy's depiction of the natives is a racist caricature any more than drawing narrow eyes on a Chinese person would be.

For the record, this artist created an Asian villain called "Slant-Eyes" with exagerrated "yellow peril" facial features. Fletcher Hanks may have been a product of his time but I don't really feel like cutting him slack regarding racist depictions.

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houbanaut
2009-08-10 06:23 pm UTC (link)

Pretty much what nagaoka said: I think it's stretching the definition of racism. Unless there's an implication that one race is superior to another (which there might well be in these examples, depending on context), it's not properly racism, just stereotyping of a group. Which can still be offensive or patronizing, obviously.

I don't see what any of that has to do with whether naive portrayals of people of other ethnicities in a way that emphasizes differences from typical Caucasian features is inherently racist, particularly when made by artists and for audiences who weren't used to seeing such faces in real life. Comic book art is to a large extent about exaggeration, and the baseline is always going to be the everyday.

Rather than continue this discussion in the abstract, I think it would be more interesting to do a series looking at how comics have depicted Africa and Africans over the years. Maybe that would make it more clear which stereotypes are innocuous (keeping in mind that comics rely heavily on stereotypes in general), which are embarrassing or politically incorrect, and which are out-and-out racist.

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runespoor7
2009-08-10 08:04 pm UTC (link)

If the stereotypes are based on race, how are they not racist? They always have connotations, even if the people using them aren't aware of it; if the other group is called "clever", they can't be trusted because they're sly and duplicitous, if they're natural athletes, they're better fit for physical work (and they're more likely to go after your wimmin), etc.

In this case, to me the most striking thing is that none of these people talk. They're silent, obedient until they run away, but the depiction of their behavior there reminds me more of cattle than of human beings. There's also the fact that Fantomah calls the "crooks" thieves and murderers (because they shot the planes), but not slavers. She seems to be more upset about the robbery of diamonds. Of course, that's mitigated by the fact that the ending image is of the village returned to peace.

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dr_hermes
2009-08-10 09:34 pm UTC (link)

There's somr overly critical reaction to depictions like this. Sometimes it seems almost as if black people would have to be drawn essentially as white people with brown skin to not be accused of racism. There were some outlandishly exaggerated stereotypes in 1940s comics -- Whitewash from the Young Allies comes to mind-- but this doesn't seem to be anything other than a straightforward attempt to draw black people.

The artist does have this bizarre, stylized technique which almost looks as if he were pasting Coloforms on the page. So he's working within those limits. Harold Foster he's not.

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	runespoor7 2009-08-10 11:30 am UTC (link)
	1940 is a bit later than the height of the colonial era, though. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

houbanaut
2009-08-10 03:27 pm UTC (link)

Actually, as far as Africa is concerned, this was precisely the time of total European control of the continent, with Italy occupying Ethiopia 1936-1941.

Although a few scattered dominions had achieved independence before WWII (if we exclude the colonies in the Americas, which belonged to an earlier era of colonialism), the disassembly of the European empires didn't start until the post-war period.

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	runespoor7 2009-08-10 03:52 pm UTC (link)
	From the perspective of how much territory had been conquered, and from the perspective of the Europeans' attachment to their colonies, yeah. However independence movements and contestation had already begun. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

dr_hermes
2009-08-10 09:38 pm UTC (link)

There were scattered attempts at nationalism and independence, but that gained real momentum with the end of WW II. I've always thought how ironic it was that the (literally) racist attempts by Germany and Japan to build new empires had the opposite effect. In the postwar world, European empires began to crumble and independent nations emerged, one by one and then more rapidly.

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