One of the books that I am reading is Harold Schecter’s The Mad Sculptor: the maniac, the model and the murder that shook the nation. The Mad Sculptor is Robert Irwin, prior to committing the murder (I haven’t gotten that far yet) Irwin is committed to Bellevue hospital, after an attempt at a little self-emasculation (he stopped because of the pain). While he was there one of the psychiatrists who saw him was Fredric Wertham.
Fredric Wertham (March 20, 1895 – November 18, 1981) was a German-born American psychiatrist and crusading author who protested the purportedly harmful effects of violent imagery in mass media and comic books on the development of children.[1] His best-known book was Seduction of the Innocent (1954), which purported that comic books are dangerous to children. Wertham’s criticisms of comic books helped spark a U.S. Congressional inquiry into the comic book industry and the creation of the Comics Code. He called television “a school for violence”, and said “If I should meet an unruly youngster in a dark alley, I prefer it to be one who has not seen Bonnie and Clyde.”[2] Comics, especially the crime/horror titles pioneered by EC, were not lacking in gruesome images; Wertham reproduced these extensively, pointing out what he saw as recurring morbid themes such as “injury to the eye”.[1] Many of his other conjectures, particularly about hidden sexual themes (e.g. images of female nudity concealed in drawings or Batman and Robin as gay partners), met with derision within the comics industry. Wertham’s claim that Wonder Woman had a bondage subtext was somewhat better documented, as her creator William Moulton Marston had admitted as much;[citation needed] however, Wertham also claimed Wonder Woman’s strength and independence made her a lesbian.[2] Wertham also claimed that Superman was both un-American and a fascist Wertham critiqued the commercial environment of comic book publishing and retailing, objecting to air rifles and knives advertised alongside violent stories. Wertham sympathized with retailers who did not want to sell horror comics, yet were compelled to by their distributors’ table d’hôte product line policies. Read more (Emphasis added)
While it appears that Weftham research was…..
…..”manipulated, overstated, compromised, and fabricated evidence” in support of the contentions expressed in “Seduction of the Innocent.”[3] Wertham intentionally mis-projected both the sample size and substance of his research, making it out to be more objective and less anecdotal than it truly was.[6] He generally did not adhere to standards worthy of scientific research, instead using questionable evidence as rhetorical ammunition for his argument that comics were a cultural failure.[7]
Wertham used New York City adolescents from troubled backgrounds with previous evidence of behavior disorders as his primary sample population. For instance, he used children at the Lafargue Clinic to argue that comics disturbed young people, but according to a staff member’s calculation seventy percent of children under the age of sixteen at the clinic had diagnoses of behavior problems.[8] He also used children with more severe psychiatric disorders which required hospitalization at Bellevue Hospital Center, Kings County Hospital Center, or Queens General Hospital. Conclusions drawn from flawed sample populations cannot be extrapolated to society at large, leading to sampling error. Read More
…the Comics Code Authority did not expire until 2011 when the final two publishers who were using the services withdrew from the service! Let’s just be thankful the Mr. Wertham is not still around or I’m sure we’d have a Video Games Code Authority making sure that Video games were safe for children’s consumption!
While I don’t remember any about Wertham or The Seduction of Innocence, now that I know about the Comics Code Authority, I certainly do remember seeing their seal on the comics that I read…..
Yep – there it is right in that upper right hand corner!!
Now I know that those comics were safe for my consumption!