The battle against heterosexism can come from surprising places. Some comic books have joined LBGT and their supporters to confront heterosexism. The comic book audience is large Thousands of youths and adults relish the latest issue of their favourites.
According to http://365gay.com/ by Mary Ellen Peterson, DC comics has taken on gay bashing. "The Green Lantern" will feature a hate crime committed against 17 year old Terry Berg (above left ) and his boy friend. Terry " came out" in 2001 in issue No.137. Kyle Rayner, the recent green lantern (above right), is Kyle's boss, friend and confident who openly embraces and accepts him, while keeping the secret that he is the Green Lantern. While many comic books have since featured LBGT themes, this is the first comic to depict the brutal reality of hate crimes.
"The issue has Terry and his boyfriend walking down the street when three men start yelling out a derogatory anti-gay word and chasing them. They catch up with Terry, who's brutally beaten. Eventually The Green lantern nabs the attackers, and Terry recovers" said Peterson.
It's great for young people to see that the Green Lantern doesn't care that Terry is gay. He's a person. Terry represents acceptance. And now, in this hate crime, we're discussing the worst side of the gay issue," said cartoonist Judd Winick.
Other LBGT characters have appeared in the 1993 coming-out of Marvel comic's Northstar (pictured below center) of the Canadian X-Men group of Alpha Flight, the X-Men characters Mystique (pictured below left) and Destiny and Shadow and Yukio (pictured below right) who each have an implied lesbian relationship. The Green Lantern features lesbian characters Lee and Li, and The Authority features LBGT superheroes.
