Comics as Confrontation : A Case for Breaking Silence around Sexual Abuse in Comics

In this essay I will provide an overview of the socio-cultural and legal attitude towards sexual violence in India, as evidence of the need for bringing survivor’s narratives out into public view. I will look closely at Indian comic artist Shromona Das’s Naming and Shaming (2018) , American artist Phoebe Gloeckner’s A Child’s Life and Other Stories (1998), and my own comic Feral (2025), to elucidate the ways in which comics are a potent medium for survivors to confront, not only our own memories by stringing together a sequential narrative, but also the audience, with the visualization of a lived experience that needs urgent acknowledgement. After a lifetime in a culture of not being believed, this essay is an effort to rationalize my decision to break my silence about the violations that have been inflicted on me, in the comics format, in my own work.