Kayleigh Mang

Every society has values that are protected by a system of norms. Norms here being a shared expectation of behavior that can vary in severity from a folkway (a violation of which results only in slight embarrassment) to a moré (the offender of such deep-seated morals can expect to be, at most, ostracized) to a law (which may result in legal sanctions if violated). Actions that violate the established norm are deviance, while the actors of the aforementioned are deviants. Every society, then, has deviants and Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron is no exception. Clowes portrays all sorts of deviance using all sorts of deviants: conspiracy theorists, a sex cult, a physically deformed girl, and her nymphomaniac mother, to name a few. Some characters are confident and doubtless in, or despite, their deviance and hence are more adept at thwarting societal control (the process by which society attempts to regulate individual and group behavior) while others cower in their deviance, and are easily overcome by forces of the majority. In Clowes’ fictional society, particular types of deviance are "successful" at overriding common middle class values (by defying the norms that define and protect them), and others are not.

The character Godfrey, for example, is "successful" in his deviance. He is both attitudinally deviant (the things he believes are deviant) and behaviorally deviant (the things he does are deviant). Godfrey’s behavioral deviance is far more explicitly evident than his attitudinal deviance in Clowes’ illustrations. For example, he is never drawn with clothing on. On pages 30-31 he is naked, around both men and women, even (in page 31 panel 1) violating Clay’s personal space by hugging him. Panel 8 on page 30 shows Godfrey running head on towards the reader/Clay’s perspective; the background (save the television, which becomes an important tool in showing the audience Godfrey’s success at overthrowing the government) drops off and become white, drawing his nakedness into sharp focus and ergo implying its importance (as part of his behavioral deviance). This nakedness is an explicit violation of our prudence over indiscretion value (Tittle & Paternoster).

Godfrey’s attitude is deviant in that he believes women will kill all men on the planet, save for him, as was predicted by Elvis Presley. His attitudinal deviance is achieved (something he chooses) and defined by a peer association (he needs other people, namely Air, Dirt, Warmth, and Beautiful Sun, to fulfill his deviance). Attitudinal deviance is hard to portray pictorially but rather comes out in the text of the comic. Specifically his belief in free love: "We share our love freely here, Clay . . . it’s yours for the taking" (page 31, panel 2), a norm violation that strikes directly at our moderation over hedonism value (Tittle & Paternoster).

Godfrey is a rule-maker and self-proclaimed leader of the group. By "rule-maker" I mean that if he wants to make something part of the norm (remove it from deviant status) like casual sex, for instance – he gives the word and it becomes the norm in his subculture. What allows him to be so successfully manipulative? Godfrey has vastly more social power than any of the people he surrounds himself with, his peers: he has at least some money (see page 37, panel 5 where he asks for his change back from buying matinee tickets or panel 3 where he tells Clay he has no use for more money), he’s male, Caucasian, he has status legitimacy (he’s heterosexual, not divorced, etc.), and he has a decent number of people organized around supporting him. These women supporting him are crucial to his success. As part of his peer group he needs them to complete his deviance (they plan to help him murder a woman on page 34 and eventually they succeed in taking over the white house for him on page 130). They support him by means of deviance admiration – what Godfrey does is morally wrong, but they approve of it nonetheless. This support system allows him to implement new rules and defy social control (he was able to overthrow the US government!) in ways that less successful deviants could not.

The police are the other half of this rule-maker business: they are the rule-enforcers and together these two groups become moral entrepreneurs who can change the idea of what’s acceptable and what’s not. Godfrey does this in an assimilative nature (people seem to join him of their own volition, but perhaps they were volunteered like Clay and cannot escape). The police must enforce the norms, at least here, through coercion. The cult is able to defy our peacefulness over disruption value (Titter and Paternoster), and I believe the police, law-enforcers, would be crucial to this success. The connection between the two groups is, however, questionable. On at least one occasion police action can be construed as assisting the cult: for example, they give Clay clothing to wear after he is stripped on page 119, panel 5. Putting clothes on Clay makes him less powerful in the value system of the cult, where only the most powerful person gets to be nude. If they had allowed him to be naked, it would have had serious implications for his power in the realm of the cult. However, on page 129 the police are celebrating the fact that there is a police state: they are excited to serve and protect the public and beat down the uprising – by the cult. They refer to Godfrey’s band as "some hippies," so their allegiance is not likely with Godfrey and his peers. Their excessive use of code language lends to the contention that they have their own distinct subculture, with norms apparently aimed at serving society’s responsibility over irresponsibility value (Tittle and Paternoster). Beating and raping citizens is clearly not very ethically responsible; the amoral men Clowes portrays as our protectors are really only serving and protecting their own values.

On the flip side of powerful characters like Godfrey and the police, there are deviant characters that are not necessarily secure or in control of their deviance. Plenty of characters in Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron are ugly, but few are actually physically deformed. Tina is physically deformed (a conditional – part of her being – deviance) and has been since birth (ascribed deviance). She has a potato shaped body and head, no hair, wide set eyes, and spots on her skin. The splash panel on page 41 shows her mug shot of sorts, allowing the reader to view fully and plainly her deviance.

Also, she is a loner in her deviance – she doesn’t require anyone else to look the way she does. Unlike Godfrey with his supporters, she does not choose to be this way and is utterly alone. Perhaps she is a victim of her deviance, rather than "owning" it like Godfrey does; perhaps this explains why she can have relatively little confidence while he has plenty. Her doubt manifests itself several times in the text. She is seen (on pages 39 and 121) being harassed by diner patrons; her co-worker shoos them away – Tina doesn’t stick up for herself – presumably because they are violating the courtesy over uncouthness value (Tittle and Paternoster). On page 50 Tina drinks excessively in reaction to some social anxiety; the first panel on page 51 spans the width of three standard size panels. This allows the reader to take a moment to survey the scene, from the candle to the clothes on the floor, the strand of pearls to the empty martini glass, to the discarded leg brace. Time is stretched out by this use of panel size, and when combined with the odd mixture of romantic symbols and a sweating, slurring, naked Tina, the audience gets an idea of the awkwardness and subsequent tense silence Clay must have felt when stumbling upon the scene (see his gaping facial expression in panel 2). Tina is not "successful" in her deviance: no matter how hard she tries, her norm violations do not override our conventionality over bizarreness value. Godfrey can be powerful and influential while naked, but instead of seeing her as sexy, Clay still sees a naked Tina as just bizarre.

Physical deformity (or conditional deviance) does not, however, automatically dictate that a character will be unhappy in their failure to overcome society’s values. On page 66 Clay runs into a big-nosed man who walks on all fours, with feet pointed in and hands pointed out much like a dog. His mouth and eyes are down turned (usually indicating sadness) and Clay doesn’t ever look him in the eyes (panel 5), attesting to the fact that his appearance is a norm violation, and one that makes people uncomfortable. But the man on all fours is friendly, helpful, and lonely, but he doesn’t wallow in his friendlessness. Instead he pursues a friendship with Clay, who runs away because he is so uncomfortable: "Okay . . . I – I’m sorry but I’ve really got to go . . . I’m late! Thanks!" (page 66, panel 5). The man on all fours is unable to break through Clay’s conventionality over bizarreness value system, but he does not seem to be dismayed. In fact, he says "It was really nice to talk to you, goodbye" like he was not just rejected by a total stranger.

Out of the ten common middle class norms Tittle and Paternoster write about, Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron speaks volumes about our preference of conventionality over bizarreness, given the cornucopia of strange deviant characters portrayed. We see that social power (quantified by money, gender, race, age, political office held, "status legitimacy," and numbers/degree of organization) largely determines who will be able to override social control; i.e., who can live in their deviance without being coerced or assimilated into the norm.

Clay’s nameless wife (whom he chases throughout the comic) is a prime example of how social power can determine deviant success rate. She is a divorced woman recruited into a deviant career as a snuff film star, with what she believes to be peer support. But these people who claim to be her friends, who call her "darling" and "a goddess" are ultimately responsible for her death. In fact, it is her conditional deviance as a woman that lowers her social power to the point that these pseudo-friends (the snuff filmmakers) are able to wholly control her. Clay’s wife is only a prop – she is an attractive object to place in the frame, and when they’ve gotten all the shots they need, her "peers" kill her (see panels 1-3 on page 113 where her costar walks into the frame, shoots her from behind, and walks back out of the frame). She is entirely disposable to the filmmakers because there are plenty of other low-power ("disadvantaged") women to lure into a deviant career and then scrap when they are "used up."

What makes Clay’s wife stand out from the other characters in Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron is that she looks relatively normal. Beautiful dark hair, full lips, curvy figure: her sexuality, her sex is the only business tool she brings to the table, the only good or service she can offer: the filmmakers demand it and she supplies it. Her womanhood, though her ticket out of a hum-drum life with Clay and into a lifestyle she perceives as more glamorous, ends up being her death sentence. Being a snuff film star (a behavioral deviance) is not a successful deviance in Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron (we also see the male film star killed in panel 4, page 114 by the men with bags on their heads) because it violates several of our core values - prudence over indiscretion, and moderation over hedonism (the perception being that porn stars are oversexed and enjoy an excessive lifestyle). Clay’s wife’s deviance is doubly unsuccessful, then, because she is a woman – a conditional deviance (which she cannot help) that allows her peers to use her then throw her away.

In fact, there is a pattern of success throughout Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron: Attitudinal deviance, like Godfrey’s, is harder to control – people with strange beliefs may be written off as extremists, but they fare better than those with other types of deviance. Behavioral deviance, like Clay’s wife’s career as a snuff film star, makes a person more susceptible to a deviant label, but conditional deviance, like being a woman, is the hardest to shake. People with conditional deviance have a harder time getting society to accept them, which could result in death (Clay’s wife), unhappiness (Tina), but not necessarily (man on all fours). What makes the man on all fours have hope for normalcy grounded in reality, while Tina has this only in fantasy? It could be due to their difference in social power, but that’s difficult to say as the man on all fours doesn’t come with a back-story. In the end the deviants (powerful and doubtful alike) win: Godfrey storms the white house and Tina gets to be dominant with the once-non-deviant-now-conditionally-deviant man she’s been lusting after. Clay’s wife, in her death, doesn’t really "win" anything except the sympathy and mourning of Clay. Deviance, in "the real world," is a normal sociological occurrence that is supposed to promote social order and cohesion (by defining boundaries), but Clowes has flipped that on its head. Deviance in Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron does promote social change, but not necessarily for the betterment of society, as we see basic infrastructures (like food and water) crumble as a result of Godfrey’s deviance.