Powerful Comic Books

Sometimes a comic book is not just a comic book. The comic book entertains, the comic book is  thrilling, but the comic book goes beyond being fun.
    A  comic book is more than fun when it takes on or comments on social issues.  A good example of an entertaining but powerful comic book is the 1956  story Judgment Day.  The comic was  a fantastic  science fiction tale. It was also  a victim of censorship.

     In  the 1950's  comics  contained   gore, sadism, and half-naked women. The contents of these comics resulted in censorship with the creation of a  Comics Code that was  similar to  the Hayes Code for movies. (See the book Seduction of the Innocent) But it was not sex or sadism that caused  Al Feldstein's Judgment Day to be a target of the Code. It was the ending. 

Out of all the superheroes, Superman has a history of fighting racism in both his radio show and comics. The anti-racism  poster below is  from 1949 in which Superman tells a group of diverse young people "And remember, boys and girls, your school, like our country, is made of Americans of many different races, and national origins, so if you hear anybody talk against a schoolmate because of his religion, race or national origin--don't wait, tell him THAT KIND OF TALK IS UN-AMERICAN." Also on the Superman  radio show, Clark Kent dealt with a KKK-type organization attempting to recruit new members in the Metropolis high school. 
    In contrast to this anti-hate stance, comics routinely displayed offensive carticultures of African and Asian Americans and others and  Superman along with  most other  cartoon and comic book characters, uttered racist slurs against the Japanese during WWII.

   Another comic book standing out by covering social issues is  There are no Master Races by True Comics. The comic  used both the Bible and science to counter Nazi propaganda that one race is superior to all others.

     These comics and others went beyond being strickly for entertainment purposes. They took a stand and printed anti-prejudice, anti-hate stories.

The 1954 issue of EC's Frontline Combat dealt with racism and prejudice  in the military.

THE SHERIDAN HOPE THRILLERS ON AMAZON:

EXCITING TALES OF MODERN SHERLOCK

CLICK FOR SERIES PAGE:
 http://www.amazon.com/gp/bookseries/B00PJ7QVE8