Women Write About Comics: Round One

Batgirl Special (1988) DC Comics - Writer: Barbara Randall (Kesel), Penciller: Barry Kitson, Inker: Bruce D. Patterson, Colorist: Carl Gafford, Letterer: John Costanza, Editor: Denny O’Neil, Cover Artist: Mike Mignola

Women In Refrigerators, 13 Years Later
January 22nd – 28th, 2012

In 1999, writer Gail Simone and some like-minded friends created a controversial site, Women In Refrigerators. The site hosted a fairly comprehensive list of female comic book characters who had been killed or maimed, usually to generate emotional trouble for a male lead. The list and site take their name from an incident in Green Lantern #54, when Kyle Raynor’s girlfriend is killed, dismembered and literally left in his refrigerator.

But the list wasn’t about that specific incident, and it wasn’t intended to call out particular writers, artists or editors. Gail said, “This isn’t about assessing blame about an individual story or the treatment of an individual character and it’s certainly not about personal attacks on the creators who kindly shared their thoughts on this phenomenon. It’s about the trend, its meaning and relevance, if any.”

Women In Refrigerators caused a bit of a stir, and is still referenced in conversations about violence against women in comics today. Hello, ‘fridging’. I would like to say goodbye to you, but unfortunately I can’t. Suffice it to say that WiR is still all too relevant.

In this first (hopefully first of many!) round of the Women Write About Comics blog carnival, we’ll be writing about Women In Refrigerators, 13 Years Later. To get your brain juices flowing, here are some possible takes on the theme:

Why is the list still relevant? What’s changed and what hasn’t since 1999? What are some of the major (or minor) fridgings in recent years? Are some groups of women more commonly targeted for fridging than others? How does it feel for the girls and women reading comics, when their favourite character is fridged? What are some stories and characters that have managed to rise above the phenomenon?

We’ve set the posting dates well past the holidays, to give you a chance to recover from all that shopping, eating, partying and family-ing (or if you don’t celebrate, to recover from everyone else’s holiday end times spectaculars). We look forward to seeing your fantastic post/video/podcast/comic in the new year!
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Women Write About Comics is about moar (voices, ladies, awesome), so we welcome any and all approaches to the theme. We do ask that you participate in good faith though. Please be respectful of the theme and your fellow participants.

Please see the FAQ for more information about participation.
You can contact your ~carnival master at themegsbenedict[at]gmail[dot]com.

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Megan Purdy

Megan Purdy

Publisher of all this. Megan was born in Toronto. She's still there. Philosopher, space vampire, heart of a killer.

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