They also present a real image problem, even more so than other comics. I vaguely remember some teaching unit in school, I think it was 6th grade or so, that mentioned them (as prototypical for comics) and was totally uninformed, basically regurgitating all the usual cliches about comics as not sophisticated and simplistic, and with superheroes there was also stuff about authoritarian views of society and American imperialism or whatever, which I don't recall in detail. Anyway, I was by then already a major comic fan, and later even more so, and was trying to convince others that comics were an art/literature form equal to any others (for some reason I had a major "crusading" streak in high school, not that I ever convinced many people to turn vegetarian or to adopt feminist linguistic policies in school publications etc. -- sort of like Hermione with the house elves) and to position myself also as radically left wing, and superheroes really didn't fit. It was much easier to convince people that they should abandon their prejudices about comics when I showed South American comics dealing with military dictatorships and such as examples. It didn't help that the one fan of US superhero comics in my class was a violent psycho. Well to be honest he had better and worse phases, and at least you could talk about comics with him, but he also threw chairs at other people, once nearly strangled me with my scarf, and used to walk up to me from behind and hit me on my back with his fists, also he had the annoying habit to quote Nietzsche passages in discussions in class, no matter whether they fit with the topic.