Prog 1490: Rex & Violence

[scutfink]

No, but, yeah, but...

The Satanist does have a point...

I've been meaning to post something about declining moral standards in the Prog since the blow-job gag in Dredd a few months back, I just couldn't think of a way to word it without sounding like a fuddy duddy killjoy...

[Funt Solo]

Bastard = pre-watershed swear word.

I think we're entering the realms of idiocy here.  Like the time that IPC managment censored the giant pickle jar of Judge Cal on the basis that they thought children might go and buy a 6 foot tall test tube, gallons of vinegar and some scaffolding.

If you want to over-protect your own children, that's fair enough - go ahead and do so.

And it's not really me talking here, it's my 8-year old self, who greatly enjoyed early 2000AD, which was on a par in terms of violence, with modern 2000AD.

As for the swearing - come on, you hear worse than that in most families, and every playground.

[GordonR]

Not forgetting the famous missing/censored scene from the Apicalypse War, where Dredd escaped from the Sovs by hiding inside an old abandoned fridge on some wasteground.*









*  Note.  May not actually be true.

[Leigh S]

Swearing... hmmm - i really dislike the "everyone's doing it" argument.  It's the same one you'll hear to explain any number of admittedly worse offenses.  

The only question I can think of regarding swearing runs something like: Does swearing enhance the strips it's featured in, while at the same time, not alienating any potential audience.

For my money, the answer is no.  The comic was never more attuned to an adult sensibility when it had no swearing in it. Would the Hunter's Club be a better story if Lennard J Stibble had exclaimed "bollocks!" as he was shot? Unlikely.

That said, swearing doesn't necessarily bother me -in the right story, it's fine.  A gritty realistic story is going to be undermined by lots of hecks.  It's just sad that 2000AD has to be the only place to publish a whole spectrum of tales that in a healthier comics industry would be able to be targeted at younger and older audiences in a more sensible manner.

Tis a shame there'll be no real equivalent of 2000AD out there for my son once he's old enough.

[Satanist]

"As for the swearing - come on, you hear worse than that in most families, and every playground."

Well that makes it ok then. Cheers. I don't want to come across as any kind of prude as I swear like a crack addled whore being screwed by a drunken sailor! That doesn't mean I'll be amused when my son says his first "fuck".

The fact is that cover doesn't actually reflect the content of the story its referencing. If 2000AD wants to be an adult title fair enough, put that on the cover. If it wants to be child friendly then tone it down.

Personally I'd like to see one for adults and a new version for kids with a free water pistol shaped like a lawgiver! For my son ofcourse!


  ***ahem***

[Funt Solo]

Well, that's just it - I don't see swearing as an offence (although it may be used in an offensive manner).

People seem quite happy to have nonsensical doublespeak such as "ethnic cleansing", "collateral damage" and "rendition" spat at their children, but the minute someone says "bastard", up goes the hue and cry.

Doesn't make sense, to me.

My sister's 8-year old said "bastard" (after watching The Young Ones) and was told what it actually meant and that he wasn't allowed to say it (even though he'd used it in perfect context).  As far as I'm concerned, that's just a positive learning experience, as opposed to a reason to censor The Young Ones.

[Carlsborg Expert]

Swearing does not suit kids.

It suits adults and made up characters. Period. snarf.

[GermanAndy]

Cover: Okay, Rex and Violence is a new one :-) and a good one.

Droid Life: Retirement as a paper-clip, ouch. I love this strip.

Dredd: I liked this story, but on some points it stretched my suspension of disbelief too far. Or I see the Judges as too effective when they are not. I mean, thousands of vanished murderers and so on, for years, and no one ever did notice this? Good work :-) The part with "the butler did it" I could have done without, at least he had a nice twist in the backstory.

V.Cs: still don?t like it.

Lobster: like the art, thought the story so-so

Low Life: Didn?t thought it the mess others thought it, but it wasn?t a very good story. Maybe I have read too much of this stuff, but Ronson as killer was a clich?, the killer-convention was wasted, and the art was oft unclear, especially the ending. (He is seeing the ghosts of his victims? Why?) But I like complicated and bitter Nixon. She is an interesting character. Of course you can only do bitter and complicated just soo much, till it gets boring.

[scutfink]

Posted by Carlsborg:

Swearing does not suit kids.

It suits adults and made up characters. Period. snarf.

That's a moral I don't remember seeing on Thundercats...

[Carlsborg Expert]

Kids should be encouraged to attribute more imagination to their language. They should be given more elments of descriptives and adjectives.  It really is dissapointing when a 9 year old comes up with

" I went to the fooking park wi' me fooking mates."

Funny on a drunk.  Frustrating either way but worse when young minds contribute with such banality of imagination.

I know this much. You cannot get away with being imaginative or descriptive to such a degree when you're drunk in adulthood.

Its as if you are wierd if you go off on a tangation and not say fook in place of every descriptive as a member of adult society.

So do it when you are a kid. Because if you haven't been paid by a publishing company to use your imagination in the "real" world then you are obviously insane and thus segregated to psychopathic or mentally divergent.