Ok I read Moores rational. Cant say I agree with it. Sometimesa cigar is just a cigar. Though using those characters does provide a hook for the story and the reader. The story could be told with original characters, but would lack that hook and the free publicity it causes.

Alan Moore can do as much wrong as the next man.

The 'blonde hispanic whores' thing and the 'speech bubble is like nigger' things?

By the time I realized the Bad Byrne stories -- which included such fables as "Byrne's stuff doesn't sell anymore", first heard when I was doing FANTASTIC FOUR and selling twice as many copies per month as I had on X-MEN -- it was already too late. They had become a motif in fandom. Add in the InterNet, and those who come to forums where I post with the deliberate intent of "rattling (my) cage" -- and off we go. I do not suffer fools gladly. In fact, I do not suffer them at all. But, on the InterNet, there are more than enough sycophants who are eager to turn those fools into martyrs.

As noted further up thread, scratch an offendee, find an offender.

I have a question for Mike O'Brien.  If you did not want Dave to quote you out of context, why did you delete your posts?

What little remains gives the impression that you seem to be the very thing you hate.  Try to remember Mike, as a fan of JB's when you behave as you have in this thread, the shit that should so rightly be attributed to you also unfortunately sticks to JB, unfair as that is.

Grow up. 

John Byrne wrote: In fact, he is supporting something he admits he has not actually seen yet.

Moore has a body of work I find mostly trustworthy - why wouldn't I be interested in something new from him? Like the Scorcese fan excited for the next Scorcese flick, I have a certain amount of faith that Moore will produce something worthy.

John Byrne wrote: And invoking "you haven't seen it yet" as an argument against those who condemn it -- this despite the fact that those who have not seen it are operating, in forming their opinions, on Moore's own descriptions of the project.

Given that the book's been characterized as nothing more than an exercise in pedophilia or "cartoon porn", I get the feeling that a lot of people here HAVEN'T been reading Moore's descriptions. And the only person I asked for "proof" from was Mike O'Brien, who likened LOST GIRLS to Madonna's Sex book with an air of authority. Me, I haven't said the book is definitively anything - only made educated guesses based on first-hand accounts - but Mike wrote, "Lost Girls is like Madonna's Sex book" and assessed it as "...a lame, over-priced non-strokable smut book aimed at hard-core fans." Sounded like he knew something we didn't, so I asked him what.

Like I said a few pages earlier, it's your board, your right to drop proclamations, but I really don't feel I'm venturing into asshole territory by standing up for a project I think might have merit. For me, asshole territory is Joe Zhang posting libelous dreck about me reading "pedophile comics" and Mike O'Brien posting "eat shit in hell, you pedophile" (then deleting that and more, and posting an apology that's not really an apology). Why is that behavior allowed to stand, but I'm called out for defending, without insult, a controversial work?

Dave Farabee wrote: Why is that behavior allowed to stand, but I'm called out for defending, without insult, a controversial work?

Well, because this isn't a democracy in here, I guess....JB supports (or doesn't stop, anyway) that behaviour and disagrees with yours.  He isn't a neutral observer of an argument, he has his side and you have yours.  I think both Mike and Joe (both of whom I like) have stepped over the line pretty egregiously in this thread, but it's not my board.  And JB can put up with whatever he chooses.  Don't like it, don't show up. 

Edit: surplus asterisks

Joe, if you gave a shit about right and wrong, why'd you overtly LIE about me on page five of this thread? You claim I made a post where I was upset about Byrne dropping the a-hole thing on me - I didn't, and the thread's still there as proof. Anyone looking will see I brushed the dismissal off, joking that Gaiman (who liked the book) and I must've been two peas in a pod. A few pages later, I got curious and asked what specifically designated me an a-hole. At no point was I "upset." You've lied about me, or at the bare minimum, mischaracterized me.

The thread:

http://byrnerobotics.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=12847& ;PN=1&TPN=1

And in the same post where you make up this supposed "upset", you try to smear me with the implication I read "pedophile comics."

What gives, Joe? Where's your moral high ground when you resort to such sleazy tactics?

But, this has now taken on something of the status of a cult, and "independent thinkers" all over the InterNet would rather spread lies than appear "uncool" by actually standing up for the truth. It's no surprise at all, is it, that so many of these are the same people who support the "darkening" of superheroes. They don't want to read the adventures of characters whose deeds and words show them, the readers, what weasels they really are. They'd much rather bask in the comfort zone provided by heroes with "feet of clay". They'd much rather think "Batman would win because he cheats." "Byrne is an ogre because, to say otherwise would require me to actually think for myself."