Sex in the 90s

[aeka]

As everyone here knows, DC has gotten a shit tonne of criticism for their portrayal of sex in their New 52 line. Not without reason of course since the sex that has been portrayed so far has been nothing short of fanservice.

But then, back in 1990, DC got away with this...



Makes me wonder what the reactions to THIS was back then if people of today complained about the Batman/Catwoman sex scene in Catwoman #1. At best no one was in any position to complain about the scene being non-consensual. :}


Warning for sex and nudity. NSFW.

Comments

[aeka]

Are we really calling the scene from Catwoman 'rape', now? It just.. Well, it seems a little extreme, somehow.

I was being sarcastic. I personally thought the idea of Bat and Cat having *anonymous* violent sex with each other was out of character for them both at best, though people did complain about the rape overtones of the scene. Truthfully, I've seen far, far worse than what was actually depicted in Catwoman, enough to make the Catwoman scene look vanilla by comparison.

[salinea]

Can you... not use the word rape sarcastically? I mean... given the weight of it, and the way our culture also tend to dismiss it easily... if you don't believe it's the right way to call that scene, it's just probably less inflammatory not to use the word at all? Please.

[aeka]

Fair point. I'll remove it right now.

[salinea]

thanks.

[filthysize]

You've already deleted the comment so I apologize for bringing it up again, but I'm genuinely curious: people were complaining about it having rape overtones? What were they specifically? Because I didn't see that at all when I read it.

[aeka]

If you re-read the page in which the sex sequence starts, in the narration she admits that he 'resists at first before giving in,' thus spelling out that it doesn't start out consensual. There's also the fact that he does resist at first when she forces herself on him, which as far as I know, is still considered sexual assault, or at least in the US. So I can understand why some people construed it as such.

It was a strange scene to be honest that indulged the 'female-on-male rape is okay' trope in an odd way.

[kksimone]

Maybe I was just too happy to see a domme presented as something other than a joke, but I read that he always resists because that's just part of the game/scene. Which, admittedly, is exactly what I wanted to see.

[sinisterlink]

See, I personally just took the "he resists at first" thing as Bats having those kind of "we can't keep doing this/meeting like this" kind of thoughts and then just going, "oh, screw it" after a couple seconds. And honestly the "resisting" thing maybe could have been worded better, but the art in the book made it pretty obvious that he was into it considering he was unzipping her costume and kissing her neck and stuff.

Although your comments of it being kind of a "game" with the two of them has put many amusing scenarios in my head, so thanks for that. :p

[salinea]

A comment addressing the issue in the original post: http://scans-daily.dreamwidth.org/3307736.html?thread=113006552#cmt113006552