# When did DC Comics acknowledge overtly that the Themyscira Island Amazon's were a lesbian culture? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 10, 2015, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-dc-comics-acknowledge-overtly-that-the-themyscira-island-amazons-were-a-lesbian-culture/737170 "2015-11-10T05:05:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 5:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-dc-comics-acknowledge-overtly-that-the-themyscira-island-amazons-were-a-lesbian-culture/737170/1 "2015-11-10T05:05:39Z")
When did DC Comics finally overtly acknowledge that the relationships between women on Wonder Woman’s home [Themyscira Island](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Themyscira_(DC_Comics)) were basically lesbian couplings? The [wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Themyscira_(DC_Comics))does not say but I know I have seen some DC comics in the past few years that show there are romantic relationships between Amazons. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-dc-comics-acknowledge-overtly-that-the-themyscira-island-amazons-were-a-lesbian-culture/737170/2 "2015-11-10T05:30:10Z")
_Wonder Woman_ #37, Volume 2, December 1989 may be a contender. In this early post-Crisis story, twelve ethnically diverse delegates from “man’s world” visit Themyscira. One of them, a Unitarian minister named Alan Witherspoon is shocked - _shocked!_ - to find out the isolated women-only culture has involved the women “finding comfort in each other” (or whatever the euphemism was). ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 8:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-dc-comics-acknowledge-overtly-that-the-themyscira-island-amazons-were-a-lesbian-culture/737170/3 "2015-11-10T08:04:49Z")
That’s probably the one. That writer, George Pérez, had at least one named Amazon couple on the island. (A few years after that, Wondy popped up in an arc of _Justice League Task Force_ written by Peter David [better known for his work on Marvel’s _Hulk_ and DC’s \*Star Trek \*comics] and…strongly implied…that Paradise Island was a pretty good time, sexually. I don’t really count that as hard canon; it was in a goofy story by a non-regular writer on another book. _But DC did publish it,_ and I expected someone to would mention it. It was in late 1993 or early 1994, four years year later than Ekers’s cite, though.) A few years later (about 1999, maybe?) writer/artist Phil Jimenez introduced at least one other Amazon couple. Greg Rucka’s run didn’t seem to have a lot of time for romance for Amazons (there was a little romance with some supporting characters, but they weren’t Amazons), but there was an Amazon who had a crush on Diana in that run. Gail Simone referenced the idea of Amazon courtship customs when Diana was pursuing Tom Tresser. By this time, it was more acceptable to have LGB characters. A lot of the other writers have…avoided the issue of homosexual Amazons one way or another. Now, subtextually, I think original writer W. M. Marston’s Amazons were meant to be, let’s say, not nuns. And I think there’s a quote (not published in a DC comic) where Silver Age Wonder Woman editor Bob Kanigher referred to the Amazons as “lesbians”–with the implication that they couldn’t actually say that in a children’s comic book at that time? And when, um, Paul Kupperberg, I think, was the editor (early 1990’s) he said in a letter column something to the effect that yeah, DC kind of avoided coming out and saying what the Amazons actually were. And then, somehow, it seems the more high-profile _named_ Amazons have canonically been portrayed on the lower half of the Kinsey scale. Diana seems to favor women as _friends,_ but men as _romantic prospects_ in a lot of versions. Actually, I think Pérez and Jimenez both introduced Amazon couples to kill one member off for drama, and in Pérez’s case, that may be first time aliens were actually able to attack Paradise Island and get a body count. I don’t know if it’s related to admitting that the Amazons aren’t all frustrated and celibate straight women, but the trend that seems to have stuck the most since Pérez is Themyscira getting smashed up. 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Don\_Draper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b2d939/32.png) [@Don\_Draper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_Draper)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-dc-comics-acknowledge-overtly-that-the-themyscira-island-amazons-were-a-lesbian-culture/737170/4 "2015-11-10T21:17:21Z")
Offhand, I’d say the first time she exclaimed “Sufferin’ Sappho!” ought to have been a major clue… ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2015, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-dc-comics-acknowledge-overtly-that-the-themyscira-island-amazons-were-a-lesbian-culture/737170/5 "2015-11-10T22:23:48Z")
> [@Don\_Draper](#): > > Offhand, I’d say the first time she exclaimed “Sufferin’ Sappho!” ought to have been a major clue… I actually though you were kidding. [But…](http://www.superdickery.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/bb63wondersploog.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2015, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-did-dc-comics-acknowledge-overtly-that-the-themyscira-island-amazons-were-a-lesbian-culture/737170/6 "2015-11-11T00:15:29Z")
> [@astro](#): > > I actually though you were kidding. [But…](http://www.superdickery.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/bb63wondersploog.jpg) That looks like a Kanigher and Andru panel, probably. (So, mid-1950’s to mid-1960’s.) But she’d been saying it from the beginning. I think Marston liked the sound of it. A lot of the goofy interjections (“Merciful Minerva” was my favorite) went out with the Pérez revamp in 1986.