From a 2008 interview with Alan Moore (the comic book writer who created Rorscharch), for Street Law Productions

“You could put a superhero in the real world for a dramatic effect, because they are kind of stupid. They got these tight costumes, stupid names; they’re kind of unbelievable, so if you actually put them in the real world and have people reacting to them the way that people would, you’d laugh at them, you’d be scared of them. It would be a different way of looking at them, so that’s what went mostly into Watchmen.

“[Gibbons and I] thought about superhero types like Batman, so I thought, ‘What would he be like in the real world.’ And he’d be very much like Rorschach—if you’re a revenge-driven vigilante, you’re not quite right in the head. Yeah, alright, your parents got killed when you were a kid, whatever, that’s upsetting. But for most of us, if our parents were killed when we were little, would not become a bat-themed costumed vigilante—that’s a bit mental.

So, I thought, ‘Alright, if there was a Batman in the real world, he probably would be a bit mental.’ He wouldn’t have time for a girlfriend, friends, a social life, because he’d just be driven by getting revenge against criminals… dressed up as a bat for some reason. He probably wouldn’t be very careful about his personal hygiene. He’d probably smell. He’d probably eat baked beans out of a tin. He probably wouldn’t talk to many people. His voice probably would have become weird with misuse, his phraseology would be strange.

“I wanted to kind of make this like, ‘Yeah, this is what Batman would be in the real world.’ But I had forgotten that actually to a lot of comic fans that smelling, not having a girlfriend—these are actually kind of heroic. So actually, sort of, Rorschach became the most popular character in Watchmen. I meant him to be a bad example, but I have people come up to me in the street saying, ‘I am Rorschach! That is my story!’ And I’ll be thinking, ‘Yeah, great, can you just keep away from me and never come anywhere near me again for as long as I live?’”

Yes, we’re meant to feel sorry for Rorscharch, because his life really is kinda shitty. But we’re also meant to be disgusted and frightened of what he has become. Rorscharch is a parody of a far right conspiracy theorist who hates women, hates homosexuals, reads alternate-universe versions of Breitbart, and is the embodiment of America’s destructive War on Drugs. He’s also a hypcorite who compromises in the face of a political agenda - he lets the Comedian off the hook for rape, just because the Comedian is a “patriot”, while murdering rapists for the very same crime. Keep in mind that Rorscharch was written by Alan Moore, who is pretty damn far left (he’s an anarchist, just look at V for Vendetta)

This article sums it up pretty good.

http://ift.tt/1SglCpw

I’m posting this in response to this http://ift.tt/2CpuDLs

No offense intended to the poster, I totally get where they’re coming from - I also thought Rorscharch was a badass when I first read Watchmen, and I only realised how wrong it was when I started thinking about it more. I love that people are enjoying Watchmen, it’s one of my favourite comics, but I don’t want people to get the wrong message from it like I did.