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Thursday, June 18, 2020 

Artist Cameron Stewart accused of sexual misconduct

Who's the latest comics contributor to be accused of sexual harassment? The Canadian illustrator and writer Cameron Stewart, who, according to The West Australian, has been accused by a model living in Quebec of grooming her when she was 16 years old:
Batgirl comic writer Cameron Stewart has been accused of grooming model Aviva Mai while she was a teenager.

In a series of tweets yesterday, Mai describes her grooming experience before eventually naming Stewart as her abuser.

“Hey. That post about being groomed as a teenager? I’m talking about Cameron Stewart. The comic book artist. We met when I was 16 and he was in his 30s. Maybe 32? It was 2009,” she wrote. [...]

Cartoonist and writer Kate Keth backed up the model and artist, tweeting her support and coming forward with her own experience of Stewart grooming her.
Now, it does appear that there's enough witnesses and victims speaking up to suggest Mr. Stewart is guilty of something smutty, and I see he's locked up his Twitter account to boot. But, here's what I don't get coming from the primary accuser:
Since Mai came forward, a number of women involved in the comics community have expressed their knowledge of Stewart’s behaviour, and Mai has encouraged those drawn to the conversation to donate to non-profits that help women, including those for women of colour and trans people.
Excuse me? What does the whole transgender ideology have to do with this, and why should they be a focus instead of the biological ladies who are the actual victims of sexual abuse here? Hauling the transgender ideology into the mess only dampens the impact. On which note, it's most fascinating that when Mr. Stewart was assigned as a leading writer for the Batgirl series of the 2010s, he and co-writer Brendan Fletcher, as told in this item, came up with a whole transgender wedding ceremony:
In 2012, Marvel Comics made history when it featured a gay wedding on the cover of Astonishing X-Men #51. Now, DC Comics is following the trend with the first ever transgender wedding to premiere on Wednesday in Batgirl #45. In the comic, Batgirl Barbara Gordon’s best friend, Alysia Yeoh, a transgender woman, is getting married. [...]

The wedding was something writers Brenden Fletcher and Cameron Stewart, who took over creative control of the publication in 2014, wanted to do for a long time.
And one of the reasons why they got around to it? Because, as explained by MTV a few years ago, they wanted to appease, and virtue-signal:
When Barbara's new design was revealed, many fans were excited to see Batgirl head towards a brighter, less gloomy future. But some also worried that the series would be distancing itself from all the positive progress it had made with Barbara's transgender roommate, Alysia Yeoh.

That concern became even more pronounced with the arrival of the villainous Dagger Type, who cross-dresses as Batgirl in Issue #37. Dagger Type isn't identified as trans, but many readers were upset by Barbara's shock at his reveal, arguing that it bought into a "villainous man disguised in drag" trope that can often have real-world consequences for trans women.

But in response, the "Batgirl" team did something refreshing: rather than dismiss their critics as overreacting, they listened respectfully, publicly apologized, and promised to do better in the future.

"We are trying to do something that is really forward and progressive, and I think we hit a blind spot to us," Stewart told MTV News over the phone. "But one of the things we were really grateful for is the ongoing dialogue that we have with our readership, who are able to bring to our attention things that we may have been less aware of."

To make sure that they didn't upset any new readers, the team has even rewritten the offending line for the new hardcover collection, so that Dagger Type's gender presentation isn't what Batgirl's surprised about anymore:

"We didn’t want to alienate any part of our audience, and we felt doing this was a way where we were able to maintain our integrity for the story, we didn’t change the story in any way that we felt was a compromise, and we were able to be more sensitive to those who were upset by it," Fletcher said of the change.
Yes, because "cultural sensitivity" is that big a deal, eh? Wonder how this guy feels now that his co-writer's been exposed as a phony who virtue-signals and panders to LGBT ideology in hopes it'll conceal his grimy actions elsewhere? And how does Mr. Fletcher feel now that reprints of the issues may go out of print, since nobody with common sense would want Mr. Stewart to collect residuals, let alone read a work of ultra-leftism that obscures the fact any man can disguise himself as the opposite sex in order to commit serious offenses? For example, a Somali Islamofascist in Britain back in 2006 disguised himself in a niqab in order to flee authorities after murdering a female constable. In 2014, a Muslim in Ontario, Canada disguised himself in a burka to commit an "honor" murder against his wife. Nor are transgenders saints, as this case of a man-turned-woman in Sacramento who committed triple homicide should make clear. As should this case of a female convict in Illinois who said she was raped by a male transgender inmate incarcerated in the women's prison where she was kept. All because of the political correctness nobody in comicdom wants to admit is a serious issue these days.

If my estimates are correct, Stewart's career may be coming to a close, and he's already lost a deal to draw a variant cover for Image's Ice Cream Man. DC's management also appears to be cutting ties with him, and the SJW-pandering Batgirl run he crafted with Fletcher will probably go out of print. Call it a case of SJW appeasement coming back and biting the sleazebags in the butt, if you will.

Since we're on subject, Multiversity Comics says Warren Ellis has, if anything, been accused of sexual coercion. These accusations don't sound as severe, though based on what's being told, it's possible his career may be grinding to a halt. What I can say for now is that I don't find most of Ellis' work appealing, vaguely recalling that Global Frequency had some material that could be considered insulting to Israel, so maybe this is what he's had coming to him for a long time, and the affair he wrote up between Kitty Pryde and Pete Wisdom in Excalibur's latter half may not age well.

What we see here is a case of leftists in comicdom whose past actions are coming back to haunt them, and proof that their appeasement of identity politics can only get them so far. Now, they're learning their ideologies can't shield them indefinitely.

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About me

  • I'm Avi Green
  • From Jerusalem, Israel
  • I was born in Pennsylvania in 1974, and moved to Israel in 1983. I also enjoyed reading a lot of comics when I was young, the first being Fantastic Four. I maintain a strong belief in the public's right to knowledge and accuracy in facts. I like to think of myself as a conservative-style version of Clark Kent. I don't expect to be perfect at the job, but I do my best.
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