All it took was a little outside media attention for the old comics boys’ club to act.
After Buzzfeed News published the accounts of three women whom Eddie Berganza sexually assaulted, as well as confirmation from five former DC Comics employees who said they reported him to HR back in 2010, DC Comics has suspended Eddie Berganza. Seven years after their HR department reportedly heard the complaints, and a little under seven years after Berganza was promoted to executive editor.
Mm, okay.
“DC Entertainment has immediately suspended Mr. Berganza and has removed him from performing his duties as Group Editor at DC Comics,” said a statement from the company. “There will be a prompt and yet careful review into next steps as it relates to the allegations against him, and the concerns our talent, employees and fans have shared. DC continues to be extremely committed to creating a safe and secure working environment for our employees and everyone involved in the creation of our comic books.”
Honestly, whatever talk there’s been about him being “reformed,” it’s important that DC Comics is finally taking action. We’ll see whether this suspension turns into an actual firing, or a demotion where his behavior can no longer destroy women’s careers, but it’s important that someone who was promoted to executive editor despite multiple counts against him in his HR report faces real, public consequences.
Even if I suspect those real consequences are a corporate mandate from a Warner Brothers conglomerate that is in no mood for its tiny comics subsidiary to mess with its PR.
Still, it is undeniably too little, too late. And the men who enabled Berganza – who when asked to choose between an alleged serial harasser and creating a safe workplace, repeatedly and shamefully took the side of the harasser – are still working at DC Comics. Berganza’s position may change, but theirs won’t. And they show no sign that they’ll be less accommodating and enabling to the next sexual harasser they hire.
(Via io9; image via DC Comics)
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