1968. He named the character Binky Brown in "Binky Brown Makes up His Own Puberty Rites", published in the 17th issue of the underground comic book Yellow Dog in 1969. "The Agony of Binky Brown" followed in the first issue of Laugh in the Dark, published by Last Gasp in 1971. At the time, comic books had a reputation in the US as low-brow children's entertainment, and the public often associated them with juvenile delinquency. Comics had little cultural capital and few American cartoonists had challenged the perception that the medium was inherently incapable of mature artistic expression. Synopsis Green (the cartoonist) takes the persona of Binky Brown, who opens the story writing a confession of the neurosis that has tortured him since puberty. In Binky's childhood, he knocks over a statue of the Virgin Mary and feels intense guilt over this affront to his mother and to God. Binky is raised a Catholic and undergoes the religious indoctrination of nuns at a strict Catholic parochial school that commonly employs corporal punishment. He forms an image of a vengeful God, which fills him with feelings of fear and guilt. Binky's intrusive thoughts bring him to believe that his body is trying to lead him to sin and eternal punishment. He develops an internal system of rules to cope with these thoughts and punishes himself for violations. He wards off thoughts and fantasies he could not control, and that gives him guilt by silently repeating the word "noyatin" to himself, a contraction of the repentant "not a sin". As he approaches adolescence and becomes aware of his sexuality, he begins to see common objects as phalluses—phalluses that project unholy rays. These objects include Binky's fingers, toes, and his own penis, and he obsessively tries to deflect their "pecker rays" from reaching holy items such as churches or statues of Mary. Binky finds his anguish all-consuming as he imagines the destruction he cannot avoid and spends hours praying to God for forgiveness. As an adult, Binky confronts his faith and by smashing a set of statues of the Virgin Mary, he declares himself free of the Church and its influence on him. Composition and publication Green spent about a year working on the 44-page Binky Brown Meets the Holy Virgin Mary. He took a few months making cards of what he called "factual incidents or neurotic habits" to incorporate. During the seven