Library of Congress Opens Records of Anti-Comic Book Shrink

eldavojohn writes "Some light is being shone on comic book history today as the Library of Congress opens up the 222 boxes of a German psychiatrist's evidence and papers against comic books. Dr. Fredric Wertham is well known by comic book fans as the author of Seduction of the Innocent, a bestselling book linking comic books and juvenile delinquency — leading to a full blown congressional investigation (some say witch hunt) of the comic book industry. Wertham was long involved with criminal trials before campaigning against comic books and promoting industry and government censorship for children. Ars adds a little more context for the younger crowd and notes that he later tried to move against television violence but couldn't find the publisher backing he had against comic books."

Comments

Ah yes, Wertham

[Captain Splendid]

As much as Dr. Dickhead and Congress should be excoriated appropriately, let's not forget that the Comics industry bent over backwards to censor itself. If they'd shown a little more backbone, imagine what Lee and Kirkby could have done with the "Marvel Way" in the sixties. Imagine not having that fucking glut of saccharine Archie products.

Mind you, we probably wouldn't have gotten Mad magazine if things had turned out differently, so it's hard to be judgmental.

Re:Ah yes, Wertham

[MozeeToby]

I don't know, it seems to me that often the best stories are written when the authors hands are tied a little bit. Typically, code or no code, the author will get the message out that they're trying to get out, but with the code in place it puts a check on the author, preventing him or her from taking the easy way to make their point. It encourages authors to look at both sides of situation more thoroughly than they would have otherwise which in my opinion adds more depth to the story.

Congress: The New Superhero!

[WrongSizeGlass]

Is Congress the new superhero, defending the rights of comic book readers everywhere? Um, no ...

Dr. Wertham is just an early predecessor to Jack Thompson. These idiots think that anything they don't understand or enjoy should be banned because "clearly it has no moral value". It's a myopic view of art and entertainment that would lead to everyone buying and enjoying the exact same things. Sure, the RIAA, MPAA and big radio would love that but it would kill creativity as we know it.

Comic books and video games aren't my cup of tea but that doesn't make me think they should be banned because those who enjoy them are delinquents and dangerous. If everyone who didn't share my POV was labeled dangerous ...

It's My Fault, I Apologize, I Was Wrong

[eldavojohn]

Dear Slashdot editors:

Regardless of whether you're right or wrong, the phrase "some say witch hunt" is a weasel-faced cop out. It's a device commonly seen on Fox news to to inject opinion into otherwise factual reporting. If "some people" say it, tell us who. Otherwise, let us know it's your opinion.

Regards.

I wrote that summary and CmdrTaco posted it without editing so I guess some if not all of the blame should be on me. And I'll concede that the statement is not accurate. There were staged comic book burnings and during the testimony, Kefauver and Wertham (a German doctor no less) opened their testimony with statements calling Hitler a "beginner" when compared to the comics industry as well as flat out claiming comic books affected children to the same way Nazi propaganda indoctrinated children. Several books on the history of comics detail this testimony including Bradford Wright's Comic Book Nation: The Transformation of Youth Culture in America.

So I must confess I was wrong to use that phrase, clearly "a witch hunt" would have more sound logic than what was used in an attempt to have the government replace the parents in guiding their children. Tell me though, if you don't think it was a witch hunt, why did backing dry up when they tried to move on to television to clean up all the violence that children saw in the moving pictures? The unrealistic violence of Larry, Moe and Curly is okay because ... ? Also, you do know that after the reformation of the comic book industry, juvenile delinquency did not plummet, right? We can still purchase said comic books today. So it seems you have the public burnings to spread fear and you have the oddly selective nature of who is guilty but the "worse than Hitler" testimonial logic is probably more faulty than "weighs as much as a duck" so I don't know what the right label would be.

Perhaps a better label would have been "insanity?"

Re:Comics and Video Games

[CannonballHead]

Government intervention is always bad.

There is the problem. I know a lot of people reject propositions with a boring and overly-simple argument of "government is too big," but that doesn't mean that all people who are in favor of a small [federal] government take that route, and it doesn't mean that they think that all government intervention is bad. You're unecessarily reducing a viewpoint to a ridiculous. Claiming that those who are against "government expansion" are in favor of anarchy (if government intervention is always bad, then anarchy would be good, because it would be no government intervention).

Of course, you are probably just exaggerating to make your point, which is probably what the people you're arguing against are doing, too... meaning we're all arguing against exaggerated opinions of the other side, which means we're not even really arguing about something real ;)

I'm a "small government" sort of guy. Didn't Romney do the health care thing in MA? Isn't that "government intervention?" Doesn't he still claim it was a good idea? Of course, that was at the state level, not the federal level... but still.

I suppose I'm nit-picking. But the exaggerations on both sides make any sort of meaningful political discussion impossible. Democrats, according to some Republicans, quite literally want to drive America into the ground and give our land over to Muslim countries. Republicans, according to some Democrats, want to literally milk the people's money out of them through corporations and wouldn't mind if [insert large corporation] actually ran the country. Usually, these are supported by huge jumps from a given action to a motive. Actions are easy to see. Motives are pretty difficult.

As an example, from my own ideological POV's typical party member, "Obamacare" is clearly an attempt to set up a completely socialist government in America. It's also, clearly, an attempt to ruin America and give it to Iran. It's also clearly an attempt for Democrats to gain more federal power. Of course, some of those clear motives are rather mutually exclusive, but we'll ignore that. The action that caused all this was a health care bill, but we clearly know the motive behind it.

The same goes for Democrats. They clearly know the motives behind Repuplicans blocking a given bill (it is undoubtedly an evil and nefarious motive, like wanting to get more money from corporate lobbyists, or wanting to ensure they get re-elected, etc). My whole point? We are so caught up in ascribing motives that we can't even argue about the real substance - the legislation itself.

And, to wrap up, exaggerations about POV's - including "small government" folks being against any government intervention at all, which then boils any discussion down to "well what about [something the government does that is necessary]???!?! you insensitive clod!" and including "all 'socialists' want to control ever single area of your life just like Russian communism!" - is a part of the can't-have-rational-discussion problems...

IMO, of course. ;)

I like Adam Smith's critique of small government

[spun]

"Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the defence of the rich against the poor, or of those who have some property against those who have none at all."
The Wealth of Nations,Book V, Chapter I, Part II, 775

If Government is stripped of all other functions save the defense of property, it is a tyranny of the rich. I believe that is why the rich nearly invariably favor small government. The more desperate the have-nots are, the more they will put up with and the less they will demand. Taking away social safety nets favors the rich employer who desires a pool of desperate, starving, cheap workers.

But the truly rich make up less than one percent of our population. Why do the non rich desire smaller government? Is it out of some philosophical principle? Well, if humans were commonly genius-saints, perhaps. But we aren't. Most of us start from our assumptions and reason backwards to find support. And most of the upper middle class assume they will be rich one day, despite the lack of any evidence that this is likely. The gap between an upper middle class person making $100,000 to $250,000 per year and an actual owning class person is tremendous. We do not have as much upward mobility in our society as we would like to believe, but everyone believes we do. Why? Simple: anyone who says they don't think they can make it is obviously a failure. Who wants to admit to being a failure? The myth says hard work will make you rich, what, are you lazy?

This is how the rich fool the middle class into defending the rich from the poor, even though the middle class has far more in common with the poor than the rich.