Small Wonders: Why She Wore Lipstick To Bust Up A Crackhouse?

Lately I’ve been thinking about gender presumptions in super hero comics. I’m choosing my words very precisely because to be honest I think that it’s reached a point where the word sexism is being grossly overused. I think a lot of time the people, (admittedly especially the males) writing and reading comics are not malicious in their intent. Rather they are thoughtless in their presumptions. So unless I am intending to talk about something I feel is malicious in intent, or just so godawful that there’s no excuse not to see it, I will not be choosing to use the word sexism. The purpose of Small Wonders, is in some ways the opposite of Really Geek Thoughts. Rather than taken on some grand idea or concept I’m going to be focusing in as tightly as possible on something. After all you can’t build a house all at once. And sometimes I think we members of Geek Nation are very good about obsessing about all the details except the important ones.

So, let’s start off with a debate style resolved statement. (Note I’m not intending this as a debate but if someone reads this and has any thoughts pro or con to what I’m saying I’m always happy to hear them.) Resolved, comic book fans want heroes that are heroic but have a dimension of believability and realism about them so they can better identify with them and their lives.

This is the main reason for one of the oldest concepts in superhero comics, the secret identity. It’s Clark Kent, that makes it possible for readers to identify with Superman. But when a character in either heroic or civilian id, acts in ways that are to far outside the readers zone of shared experience, they have a much harder time connecting with said character. Sometimes it’s big stuff. But sometimes it’s the little things. Such as, why is it that every, and I mean every female super character wears full make up all the time? Really, I mean it. Check your comics. Go ahead I’ll wait.

Back? Well what did you find? Because if you found one that doesn’t let me know. I’d be interested to know about it. To be honest this is something that was nagging in the back of my mind for a bit now but it didn’t come into the forefront of my consciousness until reading Teen Titans 43. Specifically page 20, panel three. Batgirl (Cassandra Cain) takes off her mask, her fully concealing mask, to reveal a face with what looks to be a fresh coat of lipstick and eyeshadow.

Now let me digress to tell you a little story. As most of you know if you have read enough of these little musings of mine, I’m not a woman. However I live with one. And while I’m not perfectly observant at all times, I do pride myself on trying to pay attention to her preferences, dislikes etc. One of the things I can tell you without descending into TMI territory is that she is not much for make-up. Sometimes when we’re going out somewhere nice, sometimes just because she feels like it. But one thing I can just about guarantee you is that when the warm weather comes she will be wearing make up as seldom as possible because she tends to feel icky and nasty wearing it when she’s hot. So, now coming back around to my point, why exactly is Cassandra Cain, who is wearing a full body fight suit, and a full face mask, wear makeup while she’s in working clothes? For that matter why do a lot of these she crusaders for justice? Or evil? It just doesn’t make sense. And I think that may be one small problem among many that are building to a lot of these larger problems.

Considering the fact that most of these artists have no problem making the male characters mouths fully defined without falling back on the use of “lipstick”, they should equally have no problem doing it for female characters.

Therefore I have to conclude that the reason why every female, hero, villain or supporting wears lipstick is because, of unchallenged gender presumptions. So I’m making the challenge. Superhero comic book writers and artists. Stop for a minute and think, does it make sense for a female character to be in full make up in this scene? Does it make sense from a character stand point? If not? Then don’t do it. Draw her without it.

Okay okay, I know it’s a really, really tiny nit to pick. But here’s the thing, maybe if we all start working with the tiny nits, we can then work up to the bigger issues. After all if a writer or artist can’t handle something as simple as the notion that a lot of women would never in a million years wear makeup while smashing the universe conquering plans of Evil Overlord X, then how will we ever expect them to handle the notion that not every female on the planet wants to get married and become a well kept baby machine?

Peace
And
Long
Life

Toriach