I saw this promo was shown on my local Fox affiliate on Sunday, for a story which aired tonight. The gist of it is that the new52 upped the sex & violence, and that some readers didn't like the changes, old news right? I could rant about how the changes to Starfire weren't upsetting b/c of the contrast with the cartoon Starfire, but because of the emotional detachment of new52 Star vs classic Star… but I did that in a past blog.

What really upset me is when the reporter saw the T and T+ ratings and took it to MIDDLE SCHOOLERS and their PARENTS. T and T+ aren't meant for 12 year olds. Also the idea that comics used to be considered "family friendly" is kinda totally wrong! The idea that comics (or music or movies or videogames) are corrupting our youth recurs every 10 years or so. It's total bunk, but it's cyclical bunk. That's why the Comics Code Authority was invented in 1954. It came up again after the famous 1971 Spiderman issue where Harry Osborn was on drugs (although portrayed in a negative light).

"Many adults think that the crimes described in comic books are so far removed from the child's life that for children they are merely something imaginative or fantastic. But we have found this to be a great error. Comic books and life are connected. A bank robbery is easily translated into the rifling of a candy store. Delinquencies formerly restricted to adults are increasingly committed by young people and children ... All child drug addicts, and all children drawn into the narcotics traffic as messengers, with whom we have had contact, were inveterate comic-book readers This kind of thing is not good mental nourishment for children!"
- Fredric Wertham, Seduction of the Innocent, 1954

I urge all of you to thumbs-down the Youtube video and/or leave a comment on the linked story from myfoxdc.com and let my your opinion be heard!