Commentary on underground comix

Gay Comix was a delight to read! For a couple years now I’ve been craving stories by older people in the LGBT+ community, but haven’t always been aware of how to find them or get an “in”. It was wonderful to read these narratives by fellow artists that are charged and energized by their personal experiences. I also read Tits + Clits and Diary of a Dominatrix, but Gay Comix is the one that struck the greatest chord in me, so it’s what I’ll be keeping in mind throughout this discussion.

I’ve frequently been wary of people who scorn ‘political correctness’ because there’s often an implied effort to shame people with legitimate traumas who want to reduce the risk of continued trauma for themselves and others. What’s political correctness to one person who is unaffected by the issue may be a reminder of someone else’s most painful memory. I’m deeply in favor of sensitivity to prevent suffering, and repulsed by creators who delight in being offensive “just for the sake of it” when they do so by taking cheap shots at vulnerable communities.

However, after reading these comics I can get some sense of what’s been lost— there does seem to be community-wide encouragement of censorship going on in the queer circles I frequent today. Perfectly reasonable limits can become unreasonable quickly when people follow the slippery slope concept of whether people are allowed to even enjoy controversial content on their own time. I’ve known trans artists who have been publicly shunned for drawing trans people in ways that others find triggering, artists in their early twenties who have been demonized for shipping characters in their late teens, abuse victims attacked because they’re not endorsing the most “correct” abuse narratives.

This stubborn binary approach to morality is something I had joined in on in the past, but as I’ve gotten a little further into adulthood I’ve been trying to analyze which parts of my black-and-white mentality are deserving of reconsideration. As I’ve been doing this work, I’ve realized that I would be exiled from most of my social groups for even considering certain concepts, and the thought that my imperfect but well-intentioned human growth could lead to my future being destroyed if I say the wrong thing once does alarm me.

Since I’ve veered off-topic, I’d like to discuss this conflict when it comes to censorship in art.

As a media major who grew up on the internet I struggle between the tension of either encouraging creative freedom of all kinds, thereby allowing incredibly harmful media to get made, or discouraging controversial media, which makes it difficult for creators to make raw and honest work. I grew up on the wilds of deviantART and I know that I and some other friends of mine were traumatized by some of the things we saw at a young and sensitive age on the internet. And yet I can also say that being raised in such an unlimited environment was absolutely responsible for me becoming comfortable with many things about myself and others, all through debate and exposure to things I never would have encountered otherwise in my sleepy suburban town. Though much of my development was stunted from many of the images and ideas I absorbed as a youth online, I personally would never trade that trauma for a sanitized environment where I never meaningfully interacted with people who are different than me. I’m not even sure that all traumas are 100% valueless.

In a time of almost mandatory media interaction and consumption, it’s more important than ever to be cognizant of the power that media has on developing minds for better or worse. It’s almost frightening to know that I have all of this power as a creator, and I’m constantly worrying about how I might perpetuate harmful things in my future work. So in many ways, it was refreshing to read these stories that intentionally flipped the bird at social norms or the idea that all content needs to be didactic and morally pure.

(I still really hate the ones that encourage adults drooling over children though please stop oh my god.)