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1. This ridiculous tweet is getting so much attention, not just because of hilarious cluelessness, but because it's representative. 
2. I've run into a lot of anti-SJW comics fans who aren't so silly as to claim they're being forced to buy squirrel girl against their will
3. ...but they are angry - often not just angry but livid - that Marvel is making comics with a feminist and/or antiracist bent.
4. They often use cherry-picked sales figures to suggest that books like Squirrel Girl are killing Marvel slash the comics industry.
5. For example, by citing only the fairly low sales of SQ in floppy form, while ignoring that paperback and digital sales also exist.
6. Or by citing floppy comics sales dropping in the last 5-10 years, ignoring that floppy comics sales have been dropping for decades.
7. Presumably, b/c if we admit that floppy comics sales have been going down for more than 5 or 10 years, then we can't blame Ms Marvel.
8. They also ignore manga sales - too girly - and the amazing growth of middle-grade and YA graphic novels - also too girly.
9. They often cite sales figures as proof of legitimacy. But if that's so, why aren't they demanding more comics like Raina Telgemeier's?
10. Part of the reason is that Raina's books aren't what they think of as Real Comics. (i.e., too girly.) But the other reason, sadly, is
11. that probably many of them haven't read any Raina Telgemeier books. If they've even heard of her.
12. Anyhow... This is all very reminiscent of the Sad Puppies. They claimed to be acting out of love of the books they like, but if you
13. listen to their rhetoric at all, it's clear that what animates them isn't love of books they read, but hatred of books they don't read.
14. The idea that there is room enough for everyone to read the books they love seems completely alien to these folks.
15. If there aren't enough of the kind of comics they love, the reason isn't that Ms Marvel and Squirrel Girl exist.
16. It's because markets change. The fact is, comics in general - and floppy comics in particular - have been shrinking for decades.
17. Superhero floppies, in particular, have become a very niche market. Which is ironic, since superhero movies now dominate the mainstream.
18. I can't claim to know why. But I'm pretty sure there's no one reason; it's a bunch of factors working against superhero floppies.
19. Generally bad company policies and unreadable company-wide "events" at Marvel are one much-cited problem, but that's recent stuff.
20. I suspect the fact that floppy comics have a terrible hours-of-entertainment-per-dollar ratio, compared to almost any other form of
21. entertainment. I mean, I can read an issue of "Avengers" in three minutes. Maybe five, if it's @BRIANMBENDIS writing. For the cost of
22. two floppies - which will take me at most fifteen minutes to read, if I go slow - I can go see a two hour movie instead.
23. For the cost of five floppy comics, I can get a video game that I'll play for 20 hours at least. It's not a good bargain, except for
24. people like me - readers who are obsessed with comic books and might reread one book many times. There's not that many of us.
25. But that kind of problem can't be laid at the feet of "SJWs," so I don't think folks like Mike will give it much attention.
26. Personally, I think it's okay that comics are a niche thing (a few best-sellers like Raina and Watchmen aside). Art doesn't have to
27. be mainstream to have worth. I don't love "Mockingbird" any less because it had low sales, and I don't love "Fun Home" any more because
28. it has astronomical sales. I'm not threatened by the existence of comics I find unappealing, b/c that doesn't take anything away from
29. the comics I love reading. But the anti-SJW comics fans, like the sad puppies, don't see it that way.
30. Look at this tweet again. See the ridiculous, completely unexamined and unjustified sense of entitlement?
31. They don't want a world where they can read the comics they love. They want a world where we can't read the comics WE love.
32. The good news is, they are a tiny minority, even among comics readers. The Sad Puppies, who these comics folks so resemble, were able
33. to briefly claw their way into relevance by exploiting a flaw in the Hugo Awards rules. But the flaw was repaired, and the Sad Puppies
34. have faded back into the total irrelevance they richly deserve. Which doesn't mean that they don't still have plenty of the SF they love
35. to read; it just means that the SF (*science fiction) they love isn't at the center of SF culture anymore.
36. The comics equivalent of the Sad Puppies are even less relevant, since the Eisners are immune to being hijacked the way the Hugos were.
37. So all they really have is harassment and impotent anger. Neither of which will stop the comics they hate from being created and read.
38. But they'd be much happier if they'd learn to accept that not all comics fans have to share their tastes in comics.
39. In the meanwhile, the rest of us can continue to create and read the comics we love. That's certainly my plan. End of rant.
