Today I’m sad.
I’m sad because I read this: Frank Miller’s invective-filled hate piece about the Occupy Wall Street movement.
It’s a pretty shocking piece of badly reasoned, idiosyncratic garbage. Not because he disagrees with the OWS folks, but because he unloaded a shitload of baseless hyperbole on a movement he clearly doesn’t even understand.
It should come as no surprise that Frank Miller’s politics are right of center. That should have been abundantly clear to anyone who has done even a superficial survey of his work. His graphic novels Ronin, Daredevil: Born Again, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, and Sin City all revolve around the theme of man vs his society. They all glorify the sovereignty of the individual and the lone man’s fight against a corrupt and apathetic system. Needless to say, he has never been a great admirer of or believer in the power of the collective to effect change for the better. So, I’m not surprised he doesn’t support the Occupy Wall Street movement.
But I did not actually expect him to be so ideologically invested in his fictional work as to be unable to recognize that a) he is currently living in a society dominated by a very selfish and corrupt oligarchy which exercises an undue amount of influence over the people elected to govern, make laws, and manage economic institutions, and b) the system is such that no single heroic and self-sacrificing individual is going to make a dent in that reality.
I have my own problems with the Occupy Wall Street movement. I think they have done a very bad job of speaking with a single, cohesive voice that can concisely express the aims of the movement. Like many left-leaning organizations, it is weakened by its very plurality. It doesn’t have the clear focus of purpose nor the charismatic figureheads that, say, the American Civil Rights movement had.
But to label it “nothing but a pack of louts, thieves, and rapists, an unruly mob, fed by Woodstock-era nostalgia and putrid false righteousness” and “pond scum” (Miller, Anarchy, 11.7.2011), is both an unforgivable lapse of common sense and an attempt to demonize a group of people whose opinions he apparently disagrees with.
I say ‘apparently’ because he, apparently, has by the third paragraph, turned the supporters of OWS into unpatriotic, self-pitying supporters of “al-Qaeda and Islamicism.” How he managed to reinterpret the OWS activists from people protesting the current structure of free market economics into anti-American traitors, I can’t quite fathom. But it appears he does. This is an intellectual contortion worthy of Michelle Bachmann.
Moreover, what I can’t get my head around is why he can’t seem to recognize that the current state of political and economic affairs is so much a mirror of the dystopias his literary heroes fought against. He might be expected to have little respect for any collective effort against injustice, but the actual cause itself is fairly up Miller’s alley.
Unless, of course, he’s looking at a massive tax bill he doesn’t want to pay. I don’t want to believe he’s simply a self-serving, self-interested little prick. But it’s either that or he’s cognitively impaired.
So, it turns out that a comic book artist and writer I admire may very well be, in fact, a rather stupid man who can’t see past his own rage at (something ?) enough to be reasoned in his arguments or express himself with the kind of eloquence I would have expected of someone who produced the work he has produced in the past.
That’s a damn shame. I’m just terribly disappointed that his fictional work turns out to have slightly more intellectual depth than he himself possesses.
I will always love Frank Miller’s graphic novels. Yes, they were always ideologically simplistic, but they were – after all – comics, and they followed faithfully in a grand tradition of an ideologically simplistic genre. Very few comic book artists or writers have broken away from that, but a notable few have. I guess, ultimately, I need to spend with my heart and invest my hard-earned (yes, I’m a non-lout, non-thieving, non-raping employed person, Frank) cash on those that have managed to get free of their own fiction.
Miller’s comments didn’t surprise me – he’s the Orson Scott Card of graphic novelists. What is continually depressing, to me, is that voices like theirs (and Bachmann’s, Palin’s, Beck’s, etc), are given any sort of heed. They don’t deserve the publicity they are more or less freely given, and it is publicity that they court. These are wealthy people with unhealthy egos and unrealistic views of society. I think it’s more important that they continue to be marginalized.
Excellent post, spot-on commentary.
“These are wealthy people with unhealthy egos and unrealistic views of society”
Wow. I think that is the single best description of this group I’ve ever read. You have a mind like a steel trap and a pen like a sword, DJ
Yes, it hurts when a favourite artist turns out to be a schmuck in real life. I felt that pain after reading a few choice interviews with James Ellroy. An intelligent and provocative writer, a show-boating bore in real life.
I enjoy the irony of Miller – the man whose comics, as you pointed out, glorify the power of the individual to righteously strike back at corrupt systems – argues that the OWS protestors should enlist in the military, the ultimate hierarchical collectivist organisation. His love of all things military and patriotic gives the impression that Miller enjoys the righteous violence of his literary heroes but, somewhere along the way, forgot why their violence was so justified in the first place. Now, if it’s American and violent, it must be inherently good. Sad.
RG,
I picture men in tailored suits looking down at the streets from high office windows.
*****
“Whats this all about?”
“Get Mr. Miller on the phone.”
“I see…”
“Yes, there is great potential here.”
“10,000 additional shares in Halliburton is a good move.”
Thank you,
-TFP
I love Frank Miller’s work. Daredevil is one of my favorite comics … You’ve written a great piece, RG. I personally support the OWS movement and hope to see it spread even more. Miller’s politics are disappointing, but no surprise when his success puts him squarely in a position to bear the brunt of helping correct the problem.
I’ve never understood the scarcity mentality. I came very close to failing economics when I got my MBA because my professor and I disagreed over the notion of scarcity. I say there’s enough for everybody because the successful have a responsibility to open the doors of opportunity therefore eliminating scarcity and that things only remain scarce because the successful actually become gatekeepers rather than door openers. He said I was idealistic and naive.
Maybe I am, but that doesn’t make me wrong 😉
Any way … best wishes! GC
Hi RG,
Didn’t know you had this site. Love your article here on Miller. I’ve been through similar experiences with literary figures. It is very curious how relatively few radical left wingers make it into literary canons and such. I think there is a bias in the literary world here towards the political centre and Right just as there is in other things. I am reminded also of John Dos Passos who was sympathetic to communism in the 30s but was a Goldwater Republican by the 60s or 70s. roxykatt.blogspot.com
Hi Roxy! Glad you found me.
You know, I’ve decided to give up the left-right binary. I’m going for the sane-insane one instead. I would prefer people to lean towards the left, but I’d be personally pleased just to know they weren’t out of their friggin’ minds.
I tend lean to the sane minority, but sometimes there are the benefits of the insane majority.
Truthfully, I don’t think the majority is insane. I think the vast majority of people are sensible, measured, moderate individuals who have a pretty live and let live attitude most of the time.
I just can’t figure out why the media almost never represents this huge majority as even worthy of their attention.
I guess the voice of reason has no market value.
I think the value is there for the media, but it’s probably a tough journalistic job. We like our left and right, insane and sane, easily defined. I’m a right wing conservative who supports business, less government, and all the rest. But I’ve swung so far right that I’ve come back to the other side, and speak out against intolerance, defend my gay friends right to marry, and other such things which label me a liberal. I have also often been called insane for my seemingly opposed views. I think most of us are complex, it just requires more words than the modern journalists are willing to pay. As for Miller himself, like Hemmingway, his work stands on its own merits, even though both of those men are people I’m glad I’ll never get the chance to meet.
That’s what the OSW movement is lacking, market value.
Hahahaha touche
Wonderful post. DJ Young isn’t the only one with a pen like a sword and the ability to wield it skillfully. Love to see a warrior writer in action!