Comic books! Are you a fan? Truth to be told, I am not really a fan of them, but let me tell you I read more Archie Comics than humanly possible. When I was younger, I would read those all the time. At first, we only had one copy and it was my older sister’s, but then my parents saw how much we liked it, so we started buying more. My siblings and I were often on the hunt for Archie Comics in bookshops, but also in garage sales, because that’s where you find the good stuff. I still have many copies of Archie Comics in different sizes, both in English and in French, and my oldest ones date back to 1979. I was always impressed by the amount of ideas the authors had to have. Now that I think of it, I realize that there is probably a very large number of people who wrote and draw them.
The other day, I was feeling nostalgic and I picked up a copy, and as soon as I started reading, it struck me how awfully sexist Archie Comics are. I got a bit disappointed because I used to love them so much! But they just represent the time in which they were created, and that is what art does; it tells the story of a moment in time. Archie Comics are basically a proof that we evolved, and thank God for that because fighting with my best friend over a boy as stupid as Archie Andrews doesn’t sound appealing to me. Nonetheless, they will remain my favorite comics, and when I will gently force my children to read and love them as much as I did, I will simply also teach them a lesson about feminism.
-Pénélope Simard
Peas and Jelly 