"To put it another way, it's a racist and sexist culture that makes racist and sexist comics, not the other way around. "

But, since children - our tabula rasa - were the primary consumers, couldn't comics have been seen as both deriving from and promulgating a racist and sexist culture?

Good point.

I was never that interested in comics as a kid, in fact, I thought most of them were just silly. I always preferred a good book, movie or TV show.

There's only one race - human. Our cultures evolved over time to become what they are today. And we are all funnier than hell.

The mistake is, and always has been, that children are the main consumers of comics. Not so. Even in today's market, younger kids are drawn more toward the "talking animal" variety of stories, and the crime and horror comics that Wertham railed against were mainly consumed by teenagers and up: the same people who make up the bulk of the audience for crime, horror, and action movies today.

I remember the comics controversy well. my war-hero father banned them from his children's lives on the grounds they were... hmmm. I'm not certain he ever articulated his reason, except that there was someone out there advocating their being banned. his ban lasted until he discovered a hoard of comics in his own closet, where my mother had put them. she was a die-hard Batman fan, and was the one buying comics of all kinds - disney and other cartoon characters, superheroes, "true" romance, Mad Magazine, illustrated classics, and Edgar Rice Burroughs - for all of us to read and share. daddy couldn't deny her anything, so the comics were tolerated, and never mentioned again. : )