We had a discussion a while back when DC edited a Golden Age WW tpb to remove racially insensitive caricatures.  Well, now they've taken the next step.  Due to racial concerns, Shazam v. the Monster Society of Evil, an important storyline in the history of comics, will not be published by DC.  The deluxe hardcover has been cancelled, and will not be resolicited.  This smacks to me of trying to erase history and pretend it didn't happen.

There are many Captain Marvel stories DC could publish from the Golden Age that do not dwell on evil Asians or Billy's rubber-lipped valet, Steamboat. 

Why would they erect a lightning rod for criticism in this painfully-overwrought era of political correctness?

The idea that any character in a "realistic" super-hero strip could be as comically exaggerated as some of them were (The Spectre's sidekick, Percival Popp, the Super-Cop, is practically an origami folded being from Edwin Abbott's "Flatland.") became passe pretty quickly after the war, taking with them the racially offensive characteristics many had carried. By the time Ebony was removed from the Spirit strip in 1949, he was becoming something of an outdated concept already.  

Ebony was smart and brave, but because of the way he was drawn, he's a racist caricature.  So, he gets removed from the series or remade in later versions (even as a girl in DC's "New Wave" attempt).  It doesn't matter that black people of the time liked him.

My friend worked in a video rental place in the 80's or 90's.  He says black people rented Disney's "Song of the South" all the time.  But since some people (probably some white people) deemed it offensive, it's thrown in the vault, never to be released again.  So, Disney makes and releases the inoffensive "The Princess and the Frog" instead and nobody cares.

Is it your argument that racially offensive stereotypes are in fact good things, Eric? Or just the examples you cite? What should the reaction to a dud movie like "The Princess and the Frog" have been? Immediate commendation simply because of its racial aspects? 

Everybody on THE SIMPSONS is a little offensive one way or another, caricaturing different people types.  Should only white characters be on the show?  Then you get people complaining about that.

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The difference being that no one would characterize Homer as being representative of white people, while Apu is of an ethnicity that at the time received minimal representation and what little representation they did have was stereotypical. I mean, I can recall witnessing at least three East Asian kids mocked with the Apu name or catchphrases whose only similarity to the character was being brown. I can't recall any non-fat, non-bald, non-dumb white kids being teased with Homer.

But, yes, apparently, racist kids use the name "Apu" or the catch phrase "Come again" to insult Indian kids on the playground.  But don't mean kids or racists always find SOMETHING to use?  If we excise Apu from the culture, and dumb white kids start calling Indian kids "Mindy Kaling" or something, do we then have to remove Mindy Kaling from the culture?

How much of this is political correctness and people LOOKING for something to be offended about?