On Dave Sim, Cerebus, and Genius as a Personal Pardon

I've been thinking about Dave Sim. It's perhaps understandable. He's the subject of my most recent newsarama column. Ragnell's also blogged about him.

I haven't yet, but now I will.

I haven't read Cerebus. I've looked at it in the store. I've pulled a volume or two down from the shelf. I've considered the recommendations of friends who assure me that Jaka's Story is so incredibly moving, for example, that I'll be able to forget the opinions and philosophies that the man expouts.

I've opened it, skimmed enough to at least have an idea that the man's reputation for quality and genius does not appear undeserved. I very rarely respond to visual imagery alone, but I remember being struck by certain panels, just gazing at them.

And then I put it back on the shelf.

I can't help but think of Leni Riefenstahl. I'm sure I'm breaking some sort of Internet law in doing so. I await accusations that I'm equating general anti-feminism/misogyny (while I generally balk at using the term to describe someone I do not personally know, I think that we've seen more than enough of Sim's philosophy from his own mouth...or keyboard, at least, to be able to make that judgment with a reasonably clear conscience) to the atrocities committed by the Nazi party. The truth is though, that I'm using Leni Riefenstahl as a comparison because she's one I know quite a bit about. I'm sure we can all find our own personal examples of a particularly talented creator with beliefs or practices that we find personally abhorrent.

Leni Riefenstahl is an unquestioned genius in the field of film-making. The techniques and imagery that she used in Triumph of the Will can be seen aped everywhere from Citizen Kane to Star Wars. In a strictly technical sense, she may well be the greatest film-maker that ever lived.

She was also a nazi.

Of course, the amount of Riefenstahl's actual involvement in the Nazi party is debatable. She certainly claimed later that she was unaware of the true nature of the concentration camps, for example, or that Triumph of the Will was going to be used a Propaganda film. She might well be telling the truth.

But she's also a woman who read Mein Kampf and said that she became a National Socialist upon reading the first page. She's a woman who saw the 1935 Nuremberg Rally, the pronouncements that eventually became the Nuremberg Laws, and saw in it the possibilities for another propaganda film.

It's often argued that a creator's personal beliefs shouldn't be allowed to taint the merits of their artwork. I think in an ideal world that's probably true. I think in the real world, however, it is not.

When it comes down to it, art, be it a painting or a sculpture, novel, film or a comic book, is an act of emotion and passion. It's an act of sharing from the soul. The beliefs of the artist can't be denied because ultimately they're all in there. One can look at the Lord of the Rings, for example, and see all the elements of Tolkein's particular interpretation of Catholicism bared for the world to see, if we know what we're looking for.

I think that's ultimately why so many of us try to avoid reading interviews or political views of the particular creators that we enjoy. We think that this will "color our perception". The truth is, that we're not afraid to bias ourselves, we're afraid of the opposite. We're afraid that by knowing a little about the creator's views, our own blinders will be removed and we'll see the truth in the artist's work.

And then it doesn't matter how much of a technical genius the creator is, because the end result is like a world class chef cooking with bad fish. It doesn't matter how beautiful the dressing, or how exquisite the sauce, when you're vomiting your dinner up later.

Art isn't made in a vacuum. Morality. Principles. Right-and-Wrong, all of these things are a part of the world we live in, and they're a part of each of us. We're not going to agree with every talented writer or artist out there, and I'm certainly not arguing that we should destroy all the works of art by people who express unsavory beliefs or commit abhorrent actions. But it is wrong to pretend that these actions or beliefs don't exist. Genius is not an all-purpose excuse. Talent is not a universal pardon.

When it comes down to it, we have no obligation to judge any piece of art solely on its own technical merits. We have every right to consider every aspect of the creator when evaluating a piece of work. We have every right to completely dismiss an artist, to completely avoid his body of work, if he's someone who we can't stomach. I've decided that I will not read Cerberus. I may change my mind later, but it's my decision and I don't feel guilty over it at all.

From his words, Dave Sim is probably fairly called a misogynist. It's true that his comments are not the danger to women that the actions of many other misogynists are. It's also true that for all his ranting, I've never heard that the man ever personally harmed a woman.

But at the same time, I consider how Leni Riefenstahl never, to my knowledge, harmed a Jewish person. She's can't be accused of killing any Jewish people herself. She's certainly not culpable for the death camps or gas chambers. She may indeed have never known they existed.

But she certainly helped promote an idea that, by most accounts, she genuinely believed in, which involved the dehumanization of a large group of people, and was the core of a movement that acted according to this idea and led to one of the greatest atrocities the world's ever seen.

The only real difference that I can see is that, fortunately, there is no such equivalent movement for Mr. Sim.