This article was found at josswhedon.net and credited to Cindy. It is the transcript taken when Joss Whedon was honoured by Equality Now.

On the Road to Equality
Honoring Men On the Front Lines
May 15, 2006

MERYL STREEP: Mothers are often the vanguard of cultural institutions and transformation. And tonight, as well as paying tribute to Joss Whedon and the wonderful female characters that he’s created, we’d like to pay special tribute to his mother, the late Lee Sterns.

[Camera cuts to a black and white still. The caption reads: Lee Stearns 1936-1992]

MERYL STREEP continues: Uh, it’s nice when children credit their mothers for their success, and I’ve heard a lot about Lee, whose radical ideas about women’s strength, and independence, and passion, and empathy inspired Joss to create not only Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but many other strong women characters in Firefly, in Serenity and his other work.

Lee Stearns also inspired the creation of this organization, Equality Now, which was co-founded by Jessica Neuwirth, one of her—one of Lee’s favorite High School students. She would have been very proud of you Jessica, and Joss, for all you’ve done and continue to do, and uh, her spirit is here with us, tonight.

Joss also has an extremely energetic and ubiquitous fan base, that’s organized fundraisers across the country for Equality Now, his superhero’s favorite charity. So, it’s my great—great pleasure to introduce our special honoree, Joss Whedon, the wonderful man who’s about to bring us Wonder Woman. We commend him for his outstanding contribution to equality in film and television. Read the rest of this entry »

Lee is a a huge popular culture freak, loves comic books, science fiction, soundtracks and writes for Quit Your Day Job.

Anyone who recognises Wonder Woman recognises The Lasso of Truth or as it is also known The Magic Lasso.

According to legend it is unbreakable, able to hold the likes of Superman and Captain Marvel and can extend or shorten itself to meet the needs of Wonder Woman. One of it’s other qualities though is it’s ability to force people to tell the truth. When you know a little about the man who co-created Wonder Woman it is this quality that adds a deeper dimension to the lasso’s powers.

Wonder Woman was created by Dr William Moulton Marston who was a psychologist and feminist theorist along with with his wife Elizabeth Holloway Marston. Dr Marston was also the inventor of the early polygraph lie detector (the blood pressure component).

It is interesting then to note the plausibility of the lasso at least from a theoretical comic book sort of way. The lasso is tied around the individual whom Wonder Woman wishes to get the truth out of. The lasso monitors the subjects physiological changes that indicate a lie being told. Now of course the lasso takes the whole process one step further by inducing the subject to tell the truth. Perhaps the lasso has the ability to secrete a truth serum whilst monitoring the subject?

Comic books are often dismissed as rubbish, mainly by those who don’t read them. In a very early interview (prior to his creation of Wonder Woman) Marston described what he saw as the great educational potential of comic books. It’s nice then to reflect on the idea that something so fantastical as a magic lasso that can force the truth out of anyone had it’s roots in actual science.

Lee is a a huge popular culture freak, loves comic books, science fiction, soundtracks and writes for Quit Your Day Job.

Often when people think of the first super heroine Wonder Woman is who comes to mind. I know when I started researching this that I thought of her first. But I quickly discovered that not only was she not first but there were a group of super powered women who came before her, if only briefly.

Trina Robbins stated in her 1996 book The Great Women Superheroes published by Kitchen Sink Press that the character The Woman in Red who first appeared in Thrilling Comics #2 (March, 1940) is the first female superhero. But other argue that Fantomah, Mystery Woman of the Jungle who first appeared in Jungle Comics #2 (February, 1940) a month earlier can claim the title.

I’m afraid I have to side with the Fantomah camp. She simply came out first.

I’ve only managed to read the first three appearances by the Mystery Woman of the Jungle but I will be reading more as I get the opportunity. Fantomah is no Wonder Woman! She has undefined super powers where she is able to will things to happen, she can fly and her face is replaced with a skull to instil terror into her prey.

The very first appearance by Fantomah has her battling two greedy ivory hunters as they discover the secret location of the sacred elephant graveyard. She obviously has an affinity with the jungle as it is she who guides the elephants to their final resting place and of course defends the location.

Fantomah appears to the ivory hunters and tells them to leave. Of course being greedy ivory hunters the two hapless idiots enter the graveyard anyway. Fantomah once again appears to them and tells them they are now trapped. Eventually the two hunters turn on each other and one murders the other. The remaining hunter in trying to remove some gems from the dead elephants finds himself in quicksand. He slips under with Fantomah watching on.

Fantomah is certainly a strange character. In the issues I read she later battles giant spiders, drugged gorilla armies (in a delightfully gory sequence as the man who drugged the gorillas is thrown to them to be torn apart) and finally more jewel thieves (whom she uses her mysterious powers to transform into what looks like fish men).

Her powers seem limitless and there’s no carting people off to jail for her. You cross the jungle, Fantomah will let the jungle pay you back! This does differ her from her more recent counterparts who believe that life is precious. Even if there is some debate over her qualifications to be considered a superhero there is no denying that she was an early environmentalist/activist.
If you do get a chance to read any of the Jungle Comics that have now passed into public domain and can be found to download online I highly recommend it. If only to read a little piece of super heroine history!

Lee is a a huge popular culture freak, loves comic books, science fiction, soundtracks and writes for Quit Your Day Job.

There is a moment in my life that I will always remember even though I was only a witness to the event, it wasn’t happening directly to me. I was walking to work one mid morning and along the way a bird jumped out in front of me and started squawking. It was kind of like a seagull and I gave it a wide birth as I headed on down the street. It was only when past the bird that I noticed the cause for its concern. In the middle of the road a chick had been hit by a car. To this day I tell myself that the baby was already dead and there was nothing I could do for it. In all honesty I don’t know. I do know that I wouldn’t have been able to render any more aid than putting the baby bird out of it’s pain.

That is at least if I could have gotten past it’s mother. What made the event really cement itself into my memory was what I saw next though. I watched a bird about the size of a seagull with wings outstretched standing down a car.

It was one of the most extraordinary things I’ve seen, the mother literally blocking her chick’s body by standing in between an oncoming car. The bird screeched at the approaching car, demanding it stay away from her fallen child.

Here was a creature defending it’s young against a tremendous foe with no chance of winning. I hope that she survived and that wasn’t her only baby. The realist in me sadly believes that she also gave her life that day protecting her child but like I said, I hope not.

In Aliens Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) is faced with a similar situation and to a degree reacts in the same way. After surviving the first Alien film Ripley is picked up in her escape pod and awoken from hypersleep after 57 years. Her own daughter who was only young when she left has passed away having lived out her own life assuming her mother was killed in a deep space accident.

Events are put in motion that see Ripley returning to the planet where she first encountered the Alien with the space marine corps. It is here that she encounters ‘Newt’ a young girl around the age of Ripley’s daughter and the only survivor of the doomed settlement.

In the climax of the film Newt and Ripley find themselves in the Alien Queen chamber. It is here facing off against the giant Alien Queen that we see the culmination of Ripley’s protective or motherly feelings for Newt as she stands in between the Alien Queen and Newt.

The line I believe is ‘get away from her you bitch’.

Matt Murray puts it best when he wrote:

Protecting a lonely, traumatized child hardly needs any explanation; it’s hard-wired into our species to care about such things.

And so there you have it, something that links humans with the animal kingdom. A primal urge to protect our young no matter what odds that we face. Female elephants will form a circle around their young to protect them from danger. It’s only natural that Ellen Ripley would face down an Alien Queen to protect her surrogate young.

Lee is a a huge popular culture freak, loves comic books, science fiction, soundtracks and writes for Quit Your Day Job.