One of the saddest things to me about the issue I discussed here, is that, as a member of the Teen Titans, Starfire is a character who was marketed to kids. And not just boys – little girls, who possibly wanted to dress like this and feel like they, too, were a strong, kind, good hero just like Starfire. And if any of those girls were to pick up this month’s Red Hood and the Outlaws, they’d find, well…
They wouldn’t find the sort of thing most people would want their children exposed to. I’ll just leave it at that.
So what does that mean exactly? That little girls are out of luck when it comes to picking up comics they might enjoy? Should we all point a finger at comics as a whole and call them sexist and demeaning? Personally, I think no. There’s a lot of good comics – and superhero comics at that – out there that offer a view of women that is not demeaning or degrading. There are comics out there that you can give to a girl interested in reading comic books without having to worry about what it’s going to do to her sense of self.
And hey, bonus – they can be pretty darn enjoyable to boys, men, and grown women, too!
There’s a ton of comics I could mention here, but I’ve decided to keep it limited to five that meet two criteria: 1) comics I’ve read so I can speak from experience and 2) comics that are fairly recent so they’re easy to find.
I’ll state right now that all of these are Marvel, but not because I’m trying to tell people not to buy DC. I just happen to read a lot more Marvel and feel like I can speak better about what comics from Marvel are good for a wider audience. I don’t want to recommend something I’ve never read.
