Like many women who read comics, I have a "girl in a comic shop" horror story. When I first started working in the comics industry, I told it a lot more often than I do now. I'd since pretty much retired it, thinking it wasn't relevant anymore, not in this age of manga and young adult graphic novels. But it seems I was wrong, so here's the story, briefly:
I was about nineteen at the time. I wanted to pick up a comic really quick, so I went into the store while my male companion, who usually went in with me, waited in the car. As I approached the counter, the cashier, a grizzled man probably near fifty, exclaimed, "Wow! Look at you! So-and-so would love you!" (I was in a pretty gothy phase at that point, so I'm sure that's what he was referring to.) He then called to another employee who was in the back room of the shop to come over and confirm that so-and-so would, indeed, love me. I don't think I ever went into that store alone again.
My experience is not unique. Recently, graphic novelist Hope Larson compiled the results of a survey she did of comics-reading girls and women, and she reports, "Many respondents reported feeling uncomfortable in comic stores. They were stared at, talked down to, and generally treated without respect." And at The Comics Reporter, one of Tom Spurgeon's "Three Arguments We Could Be Having" about comics is "Why are so many direct market comics shops still female unfriendly?" In that essay, Spurgeon writes, "Nothing irks me as a sign that comic shops have calcified to their detriment as much as the fact that so many still seem to be specifically resistant to female customers."
Why is this still happening? Why are girls and women still having the same kind of bad experiences in comics shops that I did more than a decade ago? (I now buy comics at conventions and at Comic Relief in Berkeley, a fine store that does not suffer from any creep-factor.)
As I commented to Hope Larson in regards to her surveys results about what both publishers and stores can do to be more welcoming to female comics readers—it is still happening because many in the comics industry seem not to think that these readers are worth effort. Comics have thrived, in their own way, on being insular and appealing to a closed circle of fans. Comics isn't just a medium for many people—it is a community. And, unfortunately, a community whose largest faction is very much a clique.
It seems to me that many members of this clique regard it as having a clear "no girls allowed" rule. They don't want to stop using their comic shop as boys-only clubhouses. They don't want their superhero comics to stop brutalizing and objectifying female characters. They don't want to take the time and effort to produce and effectively market female-friendly comics when they have a built-in audience to cater to.
The solution to this? Ladies, we're just going to have to do this for ourselves. The last finding of Larson's survey was "There need to be more women creating comics and working in the industry as editors and publishers." I would add that there need to be more women working in, managing, and owning comics shops, too.
I doubt that my comics shop horror story would have happened in a store where women work or a store that a woman owns, and where it's expected that all customers be treated respectfully.
[Jennifer de Guzman is editor-in-chief at the independent comics publisher SLG Publishing. She also writes fiction—mostly in prose, occasionally in comics—and holds an MFA in literature and creative writing from San Jose State University]
