Things like [this thread](http://www.comicon.com/cgi-bin/pulse.cgi?http%3A//www.comicon.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi%3Fubb%3Dget_topic%26f%3D36%26t%3D002664) and [this response thread](http://www.comicon.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=39&t=000082) fill me with such boiling vitriol that I usually don't comment for fear of seeming like I'm foaming at the mouth over here. The thread in question asked it's mostly superhero reading audience "Why don't you read independent comics?" and the answers range from laughably ignorant to well, less laughably ignorant. People actually ask questions like 'Does a comic have to be in black & white to be an independent?" and of course there's the ever-present device I like to call the "I have a black friend" Defense of people saying they read both "mainstream" superhero and indie books so as to seem like asking the question is an insult to their character. Of course these people never give examples of anything they read so it's hard to say if it's typical superhero-fan defensiveness or the truth.

Not to knock the guy who obviously put a lot into his response to the question in the second thread but, please. Give me a break. His first 2 paragraphs make me want to punch him in the throat. His answer boils down to “They don’t give me what I want in a comic” which he goes to say is basically fluffy happy stories where he doesn’t have to think too much and where he can regain his hope for the world and blah, blah, blah. If you don’t have the stomach to read the responses to the original thread, this guy’s response is all of them rolled into one. After bundling all comics that don’t come from Marvel and DC into the same independent bag, he loads it with stones and drops it into the river. Commense foaming at the mouth.

To all superhero readers who use the word “indy” to refer to everything without the comforting little M or DC in the corner, stop it. You make yourself look like a complete witless moron when you say everything in the back 300 pages of the Previews catalog is the same. Bone does not have the same attitude and sensibilities as Courtney Crumrin. Queen & Country is not a exercise in navel-gazing. Blankets does not have poor art because Craig Thompson didn’t fill in every vein and eye-gouging nipple. Repeat after me: “All comics not published by Marvel or DC are not the same. They do not share anything except a Mt. Fuji sized hurdle in the way of their sales because my superhero comics are taking up all the space in the shops.”

There is nothing you can say to justify not reading something because it’s not from Marvel or DC. Nothing. I don’t care what your definition of independent is. I don’t care that you didn’t like Strangers in Paradise. Neither do I. Saying it’s okay that all you like is superhero comics is not standing up for your rights as a reader, it’s brain-dead ignorance. That’s all. Is it okay to read superhero comics, yep. Is it okay not to read “indy” comics, nope. Because those are not two groups of things. Superhero comics is one thing, spy comics are another. Romance comics are another. Independent comics are All of the Above. Disregarding a group of people for some largely arbitrary reason is called racism, disregarding a group of books for arbitrary reasons like publishing company or distribution is called stupidity.

Grrr. I said it was going to be boiling vitriol. You were warned.