I've been thinking about the accessibility of our comics lately, and I'm wondering whether the use of profanity in some of our stories is limiting our audience. Here's my thought process:

1. Some of our stories are totally fine for kids.
2. The ones with cusswords might not be OK for other reasons like violence, so I don't know whether replacing "shit" with "s#@*" or some alien characters would be a good idea because it might make child-inappropriate stories more accessible.
3. We write our stories with an adult audience in mind, and if we made more of the stories accessible to younger readers, they would be more likely to find the ones that aren't appropriate for them.
4. But, while I believe profanity is minor compared to violence when considering what a child should be allowed to watch and read, society here in the U.S. generally views things in the opposite way, where Wallmart will sell your rap CD about selling drugs and killing people as long as you replace or cut out all of the individually offensive words and phrases. So censoring the profanity could increase our potential readership.

What do you think? Is profanity even off-putting enough to think about?

Well, in terms of a web comic, I don't think the vast majority of parents have any idea of or control over what their kids see, so I don't see profanity as having much impact. For a print book, I suppose it might get you placed in the grown-up section of a store (if they have one)... but your comic has some pretty graphic violence (including slurping of brains), so I don't think profanity is going to make the difference there. You probably shouldn't be trying to market what's obviously an adult title to children.

I do believe it is true though that profane language has much more impact in written language than it does in spoken langugage, and should be used judiciously. I did think that your use of profanity in the first chapter I read seemed excessive and unnecessary.

My feeling is that if you're worried about censoring profanity, then you shouldn't be using it at all. If you're going to use profanity, then use it uncensored. If not, then don't use it at all. It doesn't make any sense to me to use profanity and then censor it. I know this is a time-honored comics tradition, but I think it was born when the Comics Code was imposed in the 50's, and profanity was outlawed, but the writers still wanted to seem edgy. I don't think it really has any place in modern comics (unless, perhaps, you're deliberately trying to invoke a retro-comics feel).

Similarly, notice that while TV programs use profanity and then "bleep" it out, movies generally don't. That's surely because TV programs are restricted from using profanity, while movies can choose to use it or not use it; if they don't want the adult rating, they just don't use profanity at all.

I have a somewhat different problem, because the public here is so infuriatingly ignorant about comics that they automatically assume they're for kids, while I'm actually fighting to get through their heads my comic's not for kids. Not that it's inappropriate for children, but I don't want it to be marketed as such because they're not my target audience at all. My comic is still family-friendly because I'm subtle and graphic violence or open profanity has never enhanced my experience of anything I've read, rather detracted from it. So I don't put them in mine. I do use profanity when called for, but not explicitly, by using the old device of replacing cuss words with pictographs ( made rather fun by the fact they reflect Lebanese cuss words so you'll see a bucket or the like) or blotting out parts of the words. Which lead to one amusing oops, actually – in this page, the word is efficiently hidden on-screen, but in the printed book, the overprint made it quite visible! I didn't think I needed to do this more carefully so I didn't blend the two layers, and the text was only printed in black against the surrounding CMYK. OOPS! But I can live with that. I also don't bother at all with masking words I consider harmless like "damn" or "hell". That makes my approach super-subjective, but it might as well be, since there is no control at all over what I do it's up to my sensibilities, and parents are not "trained" to look for a rating and decide whether to give them to their kids based on that. If they have any sense, the word "war" stops them from giving it to their kids without thinking. Again, there's no graphic violence in the story, but the themes can be disturbing enough, or so I'm told.

Carpe, (do you mind if I call you that?)
I can tell what you guys are writing is mostly done with an older audience in mind, so I think you don't have to worry about swearing. If it's used in an intelligent way, it's a good tool to have at your disposal as long as you don't use it excessively. It's knowing when to use it that makes it powerful.
At the same time though, it you really want to "censor" you could always come up with your own swear words. Since your story takes place in a different world/universe it should work.

Haha! Am I really so desensitized that I forget this stuff is there?

Jailing Fortune is certainly not a book for kids. We've had a few at cons ask if it's ok for kids, and I always need to remember that our OTHER book, Carpe Chaos: Ignition is ok for kids (just by chance really.

When I wrote Jailing Fortune, I made unnecessary swearing aspects of the two main characters, since they're both escaped murderers and general thugs. Seemed like part of their personality. I don't think there are swear words in any of our other stories so far.

Also Hard Lessons.

To me, I think it really boils down to the fact that it needs to bring something to the story and isn't just done for no reason. As Enca just said, their one story that had profanity was written with character traits in mind and that makes a lot of sense to me since there's a reason for it. If you had a story that looked child friendly and the characters walked around swearing for shock value only you might have a problem.

I know as I've been writing various parts of my stuff over the past year I've definitely though about this topic, but at the end of the day, I don't necessarily think my stuff is aimed at kids (not that I'm dropping an F-bomb on every page). I'm just trying to have my characters be true to themselves. If that includes the occasional bit of profanity, then I'm ok with that. Does that limit my story to adults? Maybe a bit, but if that was my concern I should have taken that into account when I was starting out and figuring out the target audience.

I agree that censoring swears is a copout. If you're going to swear, then swear. If you want it appropriate, use appropriate words.
Whether or not you use mature content boils down to whether or not it's essential to the story.
For example, do Romeo and Juliet need to die? Ya. Or else the entire story has a different meaning. Is a double suicide appropriate for children? No, but it's essential to the story .

I've wrestle with this myself. I'm not aiming my book for kids but I know that when I was a young I sought out those adult books that were being denied to me...Faust, TMNT, Razor, Ludwig Lament...these were the books that responsible stores told the minors NO but I sought them out. For now as I am writing it I have the cuss words censored but I may or may not change that when I go to release/print.

@CarpeChaos
Heh, in Australia it would be seen as weird if you didn't swear. Profanity in graphic novels has personal never been off-putting for me. Whether or not it limits readers I believe depends on two different points.

What the writer wants to write.
What the reader wants to read.

As a writer you create your story to reveal warts and all or not at all. The story’s purpose should be paramount and really shouldn't be cut or censored if it devalues that feeling of experiencing the story.
As a reader you search out a story that appeals to what you want to read. Thus, they will actively search a story out. If they find something they don't like chances are they will just leave it, whether or not is has profanity in the story or not. As a friend of mine once said, 'A good story is never unwanted.' Each person’s story is unique to tell. Sometimes they can be told with words. Sometimes not. I never want to shy away from appreciating the beauty of people and their stories, nor the opportunity to share them.

Another thought, does a story have a limited scope of readers? Certainly. Not everyone is going to be interested in what you’re writing/drawing. Another! How many graphic novels have you read with profanity? ...I certainly haven’t seen very many...

@Arioch
*agees with what Arioch has said*

@Cedarseed
I would guess one way of thinking about cuss words with pictographs is not to even think of them as such. Such an example as getting angry can be explained as just a bunch of incomprehensible noise depicted by random pictures.

I'm not really sure I see what's the point in that? If they don't refer to anything, why add them at all?

I have to agree with Cedar. People make real sounds, that can be represented with real phonetic language and not symbols. The only reason to use abstract symbols is because you don't want to represent recognizable profanity, and that seems to me to be a cop-out. Either curse or don't curse. Don't pretend to curse.

Let me suggest a somewhat tangentially-related example (which is more related considering how alien language is used in Carpe Chaos). Our Intrepid Crew is a space operate webcomic that I admire, but I have at least this one gripe with it: many different alien languages are featured, and we are expected to assimilate such alien names as Sa'ai, Eloree, Mriss, Tokkee, and Bvill... but there is one crew member whose name and speech are represented in alien glyphs that are not decipherable by the reader. I don't understand the purpose of these glyphs. Perhaps they are meant to imply that the language is so alien that it is indecipherable to Human ears, but all of the humanoid-looking characters in the story seem to have no problem pronouncing these names.

But there is also a more practical problem with this choice: the reader has no way to identify this alien character. We have no idea what this glyph means or sounds like, no name to call this character, no nickname or identifier of any kind with which to refer to him. I realize that he's probably not a major character, but a lot of gibberish dialogue is devoted to him.... and since we have no way of referring to him, he might as well not exist at all. It's just a bad idea.

Don't use abstract symbols when there are much clearer and better alternatives in regular language.

@Megazell
So your saying that using profanity could have a positive effect by making the books forbidden, like all of those banner ads that say "adults only, only click if you're over 18!" That's a good point. Eric's at Comikaze as I write this and he said a couple of teenagers came up to our booth, started to read Jailing Fortune #1, found the profanity hilarious, and immediately bought one #1 each. I find that hilarious!

@William Burke
Yeah, that's a good point about limiting readers. I just showed Jailing Fortune to a friend the other day and after opening it and flipping through the first few pages his response was immediately, "whoah, are you guys trying to pigeonhole yourselves?"

Funny story: a French journalist (I deduced this from his press badge) was at Comic Con and was wandering the floor as the show was opening one morning. He stopped by our table and began looking through Jailing Fortune. When he got to the page where Pieca shouts "Fuck you!" at the other Porg making fun of him, he closed the book, handed it back to me, said "I don't like rudeness" in his French accent, and walked away. I thought it was funny given France's, or at least Paris's, reputation.

The nice thing is that all of our stories are different and once Jailing Fortune is done we can go and try something else.

@Arioch
I completely agree about either including or omitting profanity, rather than censoring it or using weird symbols. But I will say that when symbols and squiggles are used to represent something that isn't supposed to be pronounced, like the classic Charlie Brown "angry" thought bubble:



I think it can work pretty well. Calvin and Hobbes did something similar on occasion. It's expressing a mood more than any specific words, which is cool with me!

I don't get the name-as-undecipherable-symbols thing either.

Thing is, though, that I think an emotion like the one being expressed by the "scribble" is better expressed through the character's facial expression. Schultz and Watterson were both masters at facial expressions, so even though they used the scribble, I think in most cases it was redundant.

O Calvin & Hobbes, how I miss thee....


Symbols can be used for comic effect, like a dagger for an angry person, or the radiating lines for surprise, or any of the bizarre manga conventions (like the giant sweat drop for embarrassment). But I think whether you use such things depends heavily on the visual style of the comic, as they generally work better with more abstract or "silly" subjects. But we're also getting a bit out of the realm of profanity use.

@CarpeChaos - Yeah, it's a weird dynamic. I've seen that same situation work in comic cons where teens buy the parody or over the top violence books because of the use of swear words and such. I remember seeing a lot of kids with copies of The Crossed btw the ages of 11 to 16 and as a parent now I am like |<0.0>| but then I remember how I was so...