Saturday, October 11, 2008  
comicbookbin : Should Canada Have a Comic Book Industry Policy?

:: Posted by max @ 10/11/2008 08:26:00 AM
Winding down a late night I noticed Herve has entered another post on the topic of the Comics Industry here in Canada. One I agree with in general sentiment!

I'm a little surprised, as some things he's said about grant funding in his last post seemed to run kind of counter to this one politically.

I'm also a bit put off by the idea he ends on, which suggests possilby a degree of editorial influence from the state via funding that I'd have to object to fundamentally...

If we agree that Canada should have a distinctive policy for its comic book industry, then the next question is what strategy to must use to enact its policy. Should the Canadian Government and provinces be actively supporting the comic book industry through grants, loans, tax credits, or help for representation abroad? Should for example, a special push be made to create comic books for special groups like children and aboriginal Canadians? In the book world, most type of literature is supported, but material such as cookbooks and travel material are not supported to the same extent as fiction. In the film world, the government does not support pornography, reality television, and game shows. In animation, because most of the contents is geared towards children, there are stricter guidelines and requests for clear overt Canadian contents in the works. In video games, there doesn't seem to be any oversight over the contents of the products, probably because the job creation aspect is the ultimate objective of the government as opposed to the promotion of Canadian culture.

There are many genres of comic books touching very different target markets, not sound support strategy can be generated without first understanding what it is one seeks to promote. In hindsight, perhaps Canadian comic book readers should take their local industry more seriously and start asking themselves what kind of comic books they would like their fellow Canadians to create.
Hmmm, now that last bit is a bit problematic. I know where he's coming from - it's an audience oriented argument - but i think he's failing maybe to see the implications of making that kind of thinking federal policy.

But, It's hard to argue with the feeling it be nice to be taken a bit more seriously on some levels by the government. On this i can relate to what he's saying.

I think to some degree things are moving in the direction wished for already, in a very short time really comics by any name have been getting a lot more attention and credit for what they have to offer.

I'd point out that in all the National, Provincial and City level Grants [none of which were available to comics about just 5 years ago] all to at least some degree - I'm not clear just on how much - have various priority categories already. For example it won't win you a grant on it's own - the work has to be up to it competitive standards still - but for some time now in any class of Canadian Council Grant for anything; if you present work that is intended to address Native, Visible Minority, Children's and Women's issues or concerns, then that wins you points in the Judging. If you present a credible voice on the subject you fit the profile of one of the Councils' Mandates to make an efort to give special attention to those groups.

So to some degree we already live in the world he describes, though as far as I know it's not a Comics Policy per say but merely the mandate.

No argument, depending on the content of it, I'd love to see Ottawa acknowledge comics with an official independent policy.

I have to say I doubt it'll happen until we make a lot more money than we do - The culture argument he makes is good, I'd say that's a great angel and I can think of at least one creator who already is doing that for his own work - we do need to do things like that more. But as an industry I suspect we'll need to show a bit more green to carry it to the heights of a policy.

Personally my own expectations and hopes for more are tempered by reminding myself that there's a long list of other pressing issues I'd like my government to spend it's energy on before they get around to trying to pay some formal lip service to my favorite form of story telling and show they talked to the right geeks by making all the right references - So for now I'm ok to settle for counting ourselves lucky we survived the last round of cuts and shuffles at the Council, and gently remind them how much we rock by rocking. And making shure they get the memo of cource.

It would be nice to be taken as seriously as those other mediums. But having my ass kissed is not how I was taught to be a man, if you'll pardon the macho sentiment. And to some degree it's in our advantage to be underestimated at times, one of the things that's made us a powerful subversive form. I can see the lights of a strong argument along that line too.

Also frankly I'd be a bit afraid to see what kind of messages THIS government would ask us to promote abroad in exchange for it's favor. Think i'll wait till after the races, to see who it is i'd be writing my letters too.

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