Unnecessary Censorship

Unnecessary Censorship

Crime SuspenStories are unlike any other comic we have read thus far this semester: not only are the individual narratives a fraction of the length of the other comics we have read, but more importantly they pertain specifically to scenes of crime, violence, bizarre illness, and other wicked depictions. Furthermore, there are consistent themes seen across all (or at least the majority) of the comics. For example, female characters are over embellished, and the evil characters get what they deserve.

Interestingly, however, the comic book writers made a conscious decision to censor a specific area of violence. While the artists seem to have no problem depicting floating bodies with shotgun wounds, decomposing faces, and drowning convicts, they decided to conceal the reader from direct view of animal corpses. In A Moment of Madness, Doctor Ralph Bentley in uncontrollable fits of rages mangles and murders his pet cat as well as a farm boy's dog. Not only are the depictions of Bentley killing the animals absent, but their corpses are also hidden behind Bentley in the panels and only a few of their limp limbs are visible.

Why did the writers choose to censor these images? Considering that the Comics Code Authority wasn't around to enforce this behavior, and ironically enough Crime SuspenStories were the inspiration for the code's creation, it is ambiguous as to why the writers made this choice. I personally believe that the writers were aware that no audience, even the most sick minded, wouldn't be disturbed by the image of a brutally murdered housepet. For whatever reason, as seen throughout all of the media industries, humans have an infatuation with and desire to see violent human crimes, blood, corpses, and the like; however, when it comes to our beloved house pets, we want nothing more than to never see them as bloodied as we want to see one another.