Last week, the comic book world found it had gotten covertly political when it was revealed Indonesian Muslim freelance artist, Ardian Syaf, inserted coded anti-Christian and anti-Jewish messages into the first issue of the Marvel comic, X-Men Gold.

In a career-limiting move, Syaf decided to unilaterally sneak political messages into the artwork of X-Men Gold #1.

Watch as I share the coded messages with you and explain why it was all so controversial.

In the aftermath, Marvel Comics issued a statement noting it will no longer employ Syaf and that the offending images will be removed from future reprints of X-Men Gold.

For his part, in a Facebook posting, Syaf stated:

“My career is over now. It’s the consequence [of] what I did. Please, no more mockery, debate, no more hate. My apologies for all the noise. Goodbye. May God bless you all.”

I sort of feel sorry for Syaf, who is indeed an accomplished artist. He does deserve to be disciplined, though Marvel banning him forever might be extreme.

But let’s be clear - this is not a freedom of speech issue. Syaf is a freelance artist hired to visually render the writer’s script, he’s not the publisher or comic book owner.

If Syaf wants to start his own comic book and go full Sharia, go for it.

But what’s really ironic about the Syaf affair is that if an illustrator wanted to insert subtle messages of bigotry into a comic-book, the last title he should pick is the X-Men.

When comic co-creator Stan Lee came up with the idea of a group of young super-powered mutants back in 1963, The Uncanny X-Men were supposed to exist as a metaphor against bigotry, not a propaganda piece embracing bigotry.