Swiftly on the heels of DC Comics' announcement that they were dropping the Comics Code from their publications, Archie Comics announced they were following suit. Marvel dropped the Comics Code from its titles in 2001, when the CCA (Comics Code Authority) denied one of their issues. It was replaced with a ratings system devised by the company. DC is planning the same.
As Archie Comics President Mike Pellerito told Newsarama, "The code never affected us editorially..." Further, he noted that the decision was made a while back and Archie Comics has not submitted anything to the CCA for approval for over year now. "We are trying to look forward to where comics need to be in the future."
The CCA was formed in 1954 in response to the government's claim that violent imagery in comic books lead to juvenile crime. This idea was forwarded by a book entitled Seduction of the Innocent, in which several outrageous claims were made and false allegations of extortion were levied against publishers. A Tennessee-born Southern Baptist by the name of Estes Kefauver is largely to blame for the censoring of comic books, but revisionists have worked hard to obscure his involvement.
© C Harris Lynn, 2011
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