Comics and Idolatry

I didn't go to Comic-Con this year, for various reasons, but I did go walk around downtown San Diego on Sunday with some friends and people watch (and of course eat at Cafe' Diem). I unfortunately missed the crazy Westboro Baptist Church people out protesting, and even more unfortunately I missed the Comic-Con attendees protest of the WBC protest. At the Comics Alliance link you can see images Con attendees counter signs - which are great, particularly the Odin is God one.

While I've heard of the WBC, and am continually appalled by their anti-American, anti-military, anti-Semitic, and homo-phobic views, I somehow find myself surprised that they also take out their rage and hatred on American Idol, Twitter, and Comics. At some point I realize that false idolatry, as they see it, is kind of a big deal in organized religion - but I fail to see the damage to any God in respecting and looking up to an iconic figure, whether it be Obi-Wan Kenobi, Captain America, or Lady Gaga.

Maybe I have trouble with the idea that celebrating comics endangers one's soul because I am more likely to believe Batman is real than that a God created me. I believe that any God who denies humans role models on Earth is not a very self confident one and he/she is pretty lame. Comic books, science fiction, and fantasy are meant to teach you life lessons; they are meant to allow you to explore notions, choices, feelings, and ideas in the safe world of a comic book, a novel, or a movie; they are meant to allow you to grow into your life as a more mature, well thought person.

Look at some of our biggest comic book/nerd/fantasy heroes: Batman, Superman, Captain America, Luke Skywalker, Captain Kirk, Aragorn, Frodo, Spider-man, Dorothy Gale, Alice, and the X-Men. Each of these characters deals with some sort of unfathomable tragedy, responsibility, or hurdle and must make the right choices to save a loved one, a planet, the human race, etc. These struggles and choices are meant to teach us to be better people. Comic-Con, and other comic/nerd conventions, are meant as celebrations of the mythos of nerdom, as celebrations of the human condition and spirit.

I'm a proud nerd, and I love Comic-Con, and it hurts me that people look down on it as being something ridiculous and look down on nerds as being less than human (although many are less than normal). I realize that I write this while watching Star Trek and wearing an Empire Strikes Back t-shirt - but I hope you get the pretty biased gist.

May the Force be With You.

Outside Comic-Con 2010

Comic-Con 2009 - Cafe Diem

Comic-Con 2009 - Main Hall

Comic-Con 2009 - Stark Industries Booth