Many moons ago I used to read this newspaper that was like a trade journal for the comic book industry. A regular cartoonist for the paper had done up a strip about how he hates when a comic book has a radical change in art styles. The cartoonist depicted the before and after shots of a fictional character he created just for the strip and ragged on the changes. In this strip, the cartoonist had a fictional female artist replace a fictional male artist.

As coincidence would have it, at about the same time, the art team on the comic book Valor changed. The male artist was out and the female artist was in. The female artist's style was radically different than the male artist's. She thought this cartoon strip was an attack on her.

Without contacting the cartoonist directly, she wrote a letter to the newspaper knowing full well that it would be printed. In it she savagely tore into the cartoonist, calling him a failure someone who would never make it as a comic book artist. His works were "unmemorable", she said.

It turns out that this was all a coincidence.

Back then I was on GEnie, and a semi-regular on a message board devoted to the author of several Star Trek novels and many comic books. This author was a friend of the female artist and several people were discussing the events I've just shared. Nobody even brought up that what she had done was wrong. The attitude seemed to be "oh well, she's a friend of the author, we want to be liked by the author".

I'm not certain why the attack on the cartoonist upset me so much. Probably because I was an aspiring cartoonist myself. Her venomous assault seemed to be an attack on all aspiring cartoonists, I suppose. So I posted to the author love-fest the exact words that the female artist used, changing the names. She had failed to produce any works that were memorable. And to me, that was true, I couldn't recall anything she had done.

Over the next few days, the following was made clear.

It was okay for a friend of the author to insult someone. It was not okay to insult a friend of the author using the exact same words she used.

It started with the author posting a reply, and the end read "You're ignorant."

Most people hear 'ignorant' and equate it to 'stupid'. Of course after the author spoke, the insults began. He later stated he meant "ignorant of her work" but his intent was clear. But I digress.

I made a social faux pas -- I had insulted the friend of the subject of an admiration society on society grounds. I decided I liked "Faux Pas" and kept it.

Since then, I've seen some of the female artist's work. Sure, some of it is pretty good. But still, I'll remember Jo Duffy as someone who savagely attacked someone in public over something she misunderstood.

-Faux "and that's the short version!" Pas