An Exercise In Ethics

I stumbled on to ComicMix republishing the list of folks that donated (through The Hero Initiative) to help Robert Washington III's family in paying his funeral costs.

I remember it being a subject that many commercially successful websites that cover comic books covered. Many have themselves or contributors in that list, but there are some that are conspicuous in their absence.

I share the link above so that, if you're so inclined, you can reference the list versus a site you may have frequented that generated content and hits by covering it, but appear to not have donated a single penny.

Not Like This

So, Dwayne McDuffie got fired from the writing gig on the JLA. Seeing as how I questioned why he was still on the book, you'd think I'm happy with this move.

I'm not.

You see, I don't like seeing anyone get fired. McDuffie's expressing sorrow that he won't be able to wrap up certain plots make me wonder whether he had one of those "maybe it wasn't quite THAT BAD" moments of clarity you sometimes get once you're rid of something.

The job I referred to being miserable at in the previous blog? Got fired from there. Spent the initial few weeks grumbling about it being a wrongful termination. Then, with distance, I realized it was the best thing that could have happened for me.

Here's hoping that moment comes to Dwayne very soon.

But in the meantime, I can see where DC Comics would feel justified in terminating McDuffie...just as I can see where McDuffie could argue that he didn't say anything worthy of termination. Personally, I'd side Dwayne on this. Living in a "right to hire/right to fire" state, though, I know there are certain things you shouldn't do because your employment is completely at the will of the client. NY is not such a state, but freelancing gigs are pretty much the same territory.

One of the most infuriating things about this news would be the comments from fans ignorant of the whole story. There are some fans railing against him for elements of his run that were handed down from editorial and saying it justifies his termination. From using characters that weren't "JLA" enough (which is always a ridiculous argument) to the inclusion of Milestone characters (which, again, is a stupid argument), the decisions weren't up to McDuffie. He didn't write the Big Three out because he'd prefer not to have them. While I'm sure he enjoyed getting a crack at the Milestone characters being rolled into the DC Universe, their placement in JLA wasn't entirely his call.

So, we have McDuffie fired off the book for questionable reasons, rather than leaving on his own or finally being given more room to tell his stories, with a bunch ill-informed, entitled fanboys dogpiling on him (not that everyone giving him a light kick on the way out the door is such a person). Of all the ways this could have shaken out, it wound up the way I'd be the least pleased with. Ugh.

Squashing A Milestone Rumor

No truth to the rumor going around that Milestone (in their work within the DC Universe) is making a comic related to the following image*:

*there's, also, no truth to that being a rumor that's been going around

MILESTONE: One Reason I'm So Happy

Let me make something clear: my primary reason for being happy that Milestone has returned is the pure selfish desire to enjoy those characters again.

But I have another reason.

You see, recently, a friend of mine was spending time with her god-daughter and, naturally, the child's mother (they're friends and all). The child is black and attends a predominately white school. One afternoon, she told her mom that she wanted to be white.

This caused a stir immediately with the parents. Now, when I was asked what I would do if I had a child say that to me, I said I wouldn't be so quick to jump to a negative conclusion. I've had kids tell me they wanted to be a dinosaur before, so I wouldn't panic right away and fear that the child felt inferior for not being white. But that is a legitimate concern in American society, I believe.

One of the reasons this can happen is due to the images kids see in the media. Popular entertainment is dominated by white faces in this country. I'm not saying there is some insidious motivation behind that occurrence, but it can have damaging effects.

Little girls want a doll? Dominated by Barbie.
Little girls want to be beautiful? Gotta look like Barbie or all the white ladies on all those magazine covers.
Want to be a star? Almost all the big celebrities are white.
Want to be a hero? Well, Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, Wolverine and almost every popular hero that kids are introduced to at an early age? White.

I know there has to be more diversity these days than there was when I was a young 'un. But every time you see a white star playing what was supposed to be a black character (love that Angelina Jolie, she took a fictional black character (The Fox) AND a non-fictional black role (as the widow of Daniel Pearl)), you know that it isn't THAT much better.

And it doesn't necessarily change as someone grows up and realizes logically that no race is superior to the others. A good friend of mine never fully realized that he could be considered handsome until experiencing how his white step-mother felt about his black father. Seeing how his step-mother felt about his father was a real life-changing moment for him. Of course, now he has an ego the size of Texas, but you have to take the good with the bad when people have a break-through.

So, you know, if the return of the Milestone characters helps a few kids to dream a little bigger because they realize that you don't have to be white to do big things in life...I'm pretty fucking happy about that.

Best News Of The Con! (To Me, At Least)

God bless you, JK, for Twittering this so happiness could hit me sooner rather than later:

NewsaramaBlog DC bringing Milestone back 3 minutes ago from txt

NewsaramaBlog Static joining Teen Titans less than a minute ago from txt

Wow. Can't wait to hear more details!

I'm not the only one excited, either:

hermanos Dc and milestone again! 7 minutes ago from txt

bullytheLSB Hooray for this news from SDCC: the return of Milestone! Static joins the Teen Titans! BOUT TIME. Let's see how old Rocket's baby is now! 4 minutes ago from web

I'm sure more people will start popping off about their excitement as the news settles in. Whole bunch of people that catch up on con coverage Monday at work, ya know?

Update: The Milestone characters will be folded into the DC Universe. McDuffie will be doing a Milestone Universe story to wrap up all the old stuff. Trades will start to become available for all of the old Milestone books. Static may not be joining the TEEN Titans...at least not right away.