The Four Color Media Monitor

In an update to this earlier news from France, ArtNews announced a cartoonist whose was accused of normalizing pedophilia in his comics has been removed from Angouleme's guest list:

The Angoulême International Comics Festival, the second largest of such events in Europe, has removed French illustrator Bastien Vivés as its guest of amid fresh criticism that his work promotes incest, paedophilia, and child pornography. The festival is scheduled to run January 26- 29.

The guest of honor typically produces and designs an exhibition of wholly original artwork that would debut at the festival and be on view until March 12, however the announcement prompted international headlines, several detailed explainers, and an online petition garnering more than 110,000 signatures.

There are valid ways to call for not welcoming perverts at conventions, and some of the descriptions of the man's work do sound repulsive. Besides the content of the comics, however, there's also the following to consider:

Critics, including child protection agencies and feminists, say the 38-year-old’s graphic novels, though fictional, promote incest and child pornography through their repeated depictions of sex involving minors. The artist and his publishers defended the comic works by citing creative freedom in portraying “forbidden fantasies”.

In response to an online petition, some stores in France have chosen not to stock his book Le Petit Paul. Emma, a French cartoonist who went viral for her online comic on the invisible “mental load” of women, has publicly criticized the board of the comics festival and Vivés’ work on her social media channels. On Twitter she denounced violent statements Vivés has previously made about her, including a Facebook post in which he wishes for her death and for her child to experience anal rape whenever her posts are liked on the social media platform.

He said that?!? And yet he retained his status for as long as he did? Just another example of how Europe's going down the drain in law enforcement and morality. One can only wonder what he must think of the scene in Identity Crisis where Dr. Light, in the out-of-character portrayal there, anally raped Sue Dibny, in a story with zero female viewpoint. Vives recently apologized for his horrific statements, but it doesn't mean the industry should continue business with him. What he said is just as offensive as what the former actor Armie Hammer was accused of, and makes it very embarrassing to continue associations with such an individual in this day and age.

It's an interesting question whether the USA-Canada industry and conventions, with the way things are going there now, would welcome such an awful man to work there and attend their festivals. Presumably, at this point, they wouldn't, but if there's no vigilance in keeping an eye out for what the leftist-run conventions approve of, then who knows, they could begin to welcome those kind of perverts over there.

For now, Angouleme's festival board's taken a step in the right direction by shunning Vives, but it's still a small step towards fixing a broken continent that's never managed to get any proper morality and safety in place.

Labels: conventions, Europe and Asia, misogyny and racism, moonbat artists, violence