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Church And Chang

Sorry, that's Cheech And Chong.

That's better. Chung and Chang. Kevin Church on the left there, comics creator and industry blogger and Bernard Chang, comics artist, recently announced as the Supergirl artist.

Four years ago, Church reviewed How To Make Money Like A Porn Star, drawn by Chang. I remember that book. I remember quite liking the art, specifically. As it seems did Church who, concluding a very negative review of the book (including a definition of satire I would contest in the wake of Private Eye, Spitting Image, Brass Eye, Victor Lewis Smith, Steve Bell, Gerald Scarfe and Snuff Box but anyway) wrote a week ago;

Bernard Chang's art is the single bright spot in this mess – it's a bit like Phil Noto, but with more stock faces and body types and he manages to do cartoony and "comic book" art with equal aplomb. I'd love to see him work on a book that's not as aggressively dumb in the future.

But it seems that wasn't. Church wrote;

Yesterday, I approached Chang's table in Artist Alley at the New York Comic-Con and said that I liked what I'd seen from him lately. Chang told me that he wanted to kick my ass and that "if I were you, I'd leave right now."

Then responding to the announcement of Chang's new gig on Supergirl wrote;

Bernard Chang, I hope you treat your peers better than the people who have praised your work in the past.

After a back and forth on his blog discussing the nature of threats, Chang popped in himself to dispoute Church's account.

first off, i never threatened to "kick your ass". my recollection of the event was you walking down the aisle, our eyes glanced, you stopped and walked over to my table and said, "i'm kevin church and i am a fan of your work."

my response,"i know who you are and no you're not."

"no, i really am," you replied.

to which i replied, "if i were you, i'd step the fuck away."

and as you walked away, you spouted,"sorry for having an opinion."

end scene.

yes, i do have a dislike for you because of your rather negative review of my book a few years ago. the main problem i had was after your review posted, you continued to slam it in your comments and other postings. i emailed you personally and thanked you for your honest review, but would appreciate it if you discontinued your bashing of the project in your comments and other postings. i might note harpercollins sent you a free review copy based on my direction (have you ever wondered why they have never sent you another review copy before or since). when you replied that you would refrain from additional comments, i thought it was over. but the very next day, you could not help but throw in another smart ass dig at my book when commenting on another subject.

in addition, i will note that you already knew i probably didn't think of you favorably because you saw me avoid you at sdcc10, when you were sitting at the same table with mutual friend ming doyle. so if anything, you approaching me at nycc was probably you trying to elicit some kind of reaction. and well, if you're stepping up to me, then i'm going to speak my mind.

this is america and we are all free to express ourselves. but why are you surprised when someone you talked shit about has a negative opinion of you in return? am i not allowed to express myself as well? "step the fuck away" is hardly "kick your ass". and if you are to be respected as a blogger or journalist or reporter of the truth, then don't make shit up, and don't agree to one thing and then stab me in the back the next chance you get.

After a little dispute about deleted posts and spam filters, Church replies;

You say you said one thing, I heard another. It was a noisy room, but I don't think I'm lying or making up something that wasn't said, even if you have a different recollection of events. I do remember saying that I was sorry for having an opinion and I was probably pretty sarcastic when I said it because I was taken aback by your behavior towards me. Honestly, I don't know how I'd benefit from saying that you said something you didn't, and if I didn't feel that you'd threatened me, I'd likely not have posted this at all. I'm disliked by enough people that I understand differences of opinion, but your hostility was shocking, particularly as I approached you in good faith.

I don't recall this incident and I honestly had no idea what you look like until yesterday when I saw you under the giant banner that read BERNARD CHANG. Seriously. I feel that you're ascribing negative intentions to a situation where there was none on my part.

As far as the review of How To Make Money Like A Porn Star goes and comments I may have made after a conversation we had: I'm sincerely sorry if you feel betrayed or stabbed in the back. It's been four years and change and I honestly don't remember any discussions with you about the book. I searched in my Gmail archives, but I'm pretty vicious about deleting emails unless they are work-related.

Finally, I'm sorry if you feel that I personally attacked you or have harassed you in any way. It was not my intention.

Chang wasn't having it. He wrote;

just as i thought, now you want to play the victim card — like you had no idea i took a dislike to you from any of the email exchanges back when the first and only times we ever communicated directly a few years ago (until this past weekend). i would be glad to post them if you'd like.

truthfully, i don't like you. and based on our history any sensible person in our positions would understand such. i mean, i don't give you even a second of thought in my everyday life, but when you came up to me this past weekend, it was the first time we had ever "officially" met in person, and me telling you to go away was just an honest reaction.

i also find it opportunistic that despite this "awful" incident occurring on saturday morning of the show, it took until after you learned i was getting a regular gig on a book on late sunday, that you decided to tweet about it, four to five times (even sarcastically hoping i would injure a limb in return). i guess before then, it just wasn't as newsworthy — or worthy of bodily harm?

this has nothing to do with your initial review of my book. yes, it was scathing (i'm sure your site traffic spiked as a result), and i took the punches like a man. but then after the review was posted, you continued to bash the book in other non-related posts, taking delight in mean spirited jabs, drumming up conspiracy theories, and even going on wikipedia to add part of your review to the text, all at my expense. when i asked you privately to refrain from continuing taking pot shots, you agreed, but the very next day, the verbal assaults continued. it was just too good — or too fun — to pile it on. to me, it showed you lacked character and integrity and is a demonstration of lower value.

you can hide under the victim card all you like, but i think you are too smart and manipulative to not know your actions will always have a reaction. and in this case, bravo! you got a few tweets and a blog post out of it. sadly, this will be my last comment about this. but please, don't come up to me again, kevin. i just don't like you as a person.

Church countered saying;

I did not write a bad review for traffic. I wrote a bad review because Neil Strauss's script was misogynstic, stereotype-laden, and your art deserved a better platform.

Not at your expense, at the book's expense. And I mentioned it four times total, including the review and this post. The two other times were when I was talking about a giveaway that Heavy Ink was running and again when doing a pre-reviews post when the book came out. Here are the google results that show when the book's title has shown up on my site. If you Google your name, it only shows up twice. I do not spend time bashing your work, nor did I post about the book as much as you seem to think I did.

As far as the Wikipedia matter: fair enough, I see that I did edit in a link to the book, and then removed it the next day, which you can see in the article's history.

As to the allegation of opportunism, Church replied

Fair enough, I was prompted by the announcement.

As to the assault on his character and value

Imagine how I felt when you threatened me.

If he did indeed threaten you, Kevin! And to the final "i just don't like you as a person."

Then we're agreed.

And that's where we are to leave it. Chang claiming he made no such threats, Church insisting he did, and me cutting and pasting between the two.

I've also been very occasionally threatened with violence, though generally in print and usually by fatter older men than myself who, if nothing else, I could at least outrun screaming for my mummy. As a result, I've always found it more entertaining to mock such threats. And usually meeting in person has resulted in hands shaken, business cards exchanged and mojitos bought.

Certainly why, if anyone were to threaten me physically in person, I'd try to get it written down first. And I am surprised to see such disagreeability between two people who, as far as I can see, have always solved most disagreements by smoking inordinate amounts of…

No, that's Cheech and Chong again. Sorry, I'm getting confused.

For full disclosure, here's how Kevin Church himself responds to being approached in good faith at a comic book convention by someone who doesn't know who he is, about 1:40 in…

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