Blood and Guts and Ice Cream Dreams

eschergirls:

I love how men aren’t just fully clothed in Christopher Hart’s world, but that they always seem to have their faces covered too. xD  As usual, the woman seems to have left large chunks of her outfit at home (though she does have half her face covered, which I guess is good because we wouldn’t want her to mess up her carefully applied lipstick would we?  Remember, she’s been applying that lipstick since before she got out of the washroom!)

But I’m posting this specifically to note:

On men they show strength.  On women, they show sex appeal.

Which shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone given that it’s pretty obvious to most that men in comics are drawn to embody strength and power while women are drawn to be appealing to the presumed-to-be hetero male reader.  But it’s nice that he actually says it, since a common excuse for Escher Girl art is “but men are meant to be sex objects too!”

As I always say, I’m fine with people who say “but comics are MEANT for hetero men and their sexual fantasies!” and then we’ll have THAT debate, but let’s not pretend okay?

“On men, they show strength.  On women, they show sex appeal.” It’s nice of Christopher Hart to make a point of summarizing what’s wrong with the portrayal of women in comics.

It’s not that women should never have sex appeal, or that men should never be strong. It’s that in Hart’s world, all men show strength, and all women show sex appeal, and its those respective qualities that take priority for artists like Hart.