KOOKY KOMICS KODE KILLED

FUNNY PAGES FREAKOUT:
Hey, I've got your code right over here, Wertham.

By Ed Gauthier
Staff Crypt Keeper

The ailing Comics Code Authority died this week, at age 57. It is survived by generations of formerly frustrated fans, now delighted at this week's news.

The code was dropped by Marvel Comics in 2001, replaced by their own rating system. Bongo Comics dropped it early last year, DC Comics dropped it last week, and Archie Comics likewise pulled the plug yesterday.

With Archie Comics making this move, that removes all the major players from the current field. (Dell, EC and several other publishers from the 1950s have long since closed up shop.)

The code was adopted in 1954 after congressional hearings inspired by Dr. Fredric Wertham's pro-censorship pop psychology book, Seduction of the Innocent. That over-hyped tome ranted that comic books were the main reason for juvenile delinquency.

Wertham's arguments made little actual sense but it was considered to be a sensationalistic read that created controversy smack dab in the middle of the repressive commie-hunting McCarthy era, therefore much of the public was fooled.

Of course, even the most "shocking" of those old comics look like tame and corny cartoons today, in light of the easy access by teens and adults alike to violent video games and internet porn.

That's basically the end of this article, unless you want to bore yourself silly by reading the main rules of the CCA below:

* Crimes shall never be presented in such a way as to create sympathy for the criminal, to promote distrust of the forces of law and justice, or to inspire others with a desire to imitate criminals.
If crime is depicted it shall be as a sordid and unpleasant activity.
* Criminals shall not be presented so as to be rendered glamorous or to occupy a position which creates a desire for emulation.
* In every instance good shall triumph over evil and the criminal punished for his misdeeds.
* Scenes of excessive violence shall be prohibited. Scenes of brutal torture, excessive and unnecessary knife and gunplay, physical agony, gory and gruesome crime shall be eliminated.
* No comic magazine shall use the word horror or terror in its title.
* All scenes of horror, excessive bloodshed, gory or gruesome crimes, depravity, lust, sadism, masochism shall not be permitted.
* All lurid, unsavory, gruesome illustrations shall be eliminated.
* Inclusion of stories dealing with evil shall be used or shall be published only where the intent is to illustrate a moral issue and in no case shall evil be presented alluringly, nor so as to injure the sensibilities of the reader.
* Scenes dealing with, or instruments associated with walking dead, torture, vampires and vampirism, ghouls, cannibalism, and werewolfism are prohibited.
* Profanity, obscenity, smut, vulgarity, or words or symbols which have acquired undesirable meanings are forbidden.
* Nudity in any form is prohibited, as is indecent or undue exposure.
* Suggestive and salacious illustration or suggestive posture is unacceptable.
* Females shall be drawn realistically without exaggeration of any physical qualities.
* Illicit sex relations are neither to be hinted at nor portrayed. Violent love scenes as well as sexual abnormalities are unacceptable.
* Seduction and rape shall never be shown or suggested.
* Sex perversion or any inference to same is strictly forbidden.
* Nudity with meretricious purpose and salacious postures shall not be permitted in the advertising of any product; clothed figures shall never be presented in such a way as to be offensive or contrary to good taste or morals.

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