Last week, comic writer Tim Sheridan released a promotional video for the now-released Alan Scott: Green Lantern #1. Sheridan’s video was notable for taking a negative approach to marketing by implying anyone critical of the comic was either a troll, hater, or bigoted toward the LGBT community. Chaos ensued.
The Claim
However, Sheridan makes a very specific statement in his video that I’ve heard before from multiple creators and pundits in favor of LGBT representation in comics. That statement, in Sheridan’s own words, is…
You can hear it for yourself at the 0:50-second mark in Sheridan’s video below.
Well, it wouldn’t be honest or fair to form an opinion on Sheridan’s statements unless we checked it out for ourselves. If Sheridan’s right, he’s right. If he’s not, he’s not, so we decided to verify if Sheridan’s statement is true. Is there a huge market for LGBT, etc., etc. characters in superhero action comics?
The Research
After a reasonable amount of effort scouring Google, the typical research firms like Pew Research, comics journalism news sites, and any academic papers that might exist on the topic, we arrived at a surprising conclusion.
There is no comprehensive demographic research indicating how many superhero action comic readers identify as LGBT and want that representation in their superhero action comics.
However, we found something that gets close. Beginning in 2011, Brett Schenker of Graphic Policy began compiling demographic information about comic fans mined from Facebook and presenting the data on his blog.
In Schenker’s report, he was able to discern the general population size and preferences for Facebook users who express a like or interest in the general topic of “comics.” The category doesn’t distinguish between genres, categories of comics such as indie versus Manga versus the Big 2 versus comics as part of other mediums such as the MCU. Therefore, the population of fans interested specifically in superhero action comics is a smaller subset than the total reported.
The most recent Graphic Policy demographic report that includes “Gender Interest” comes from February 2018 (Facebook stopped providing “Gender interest” in their publicly available data due to privacy concerns after February 2018). The report is illuminating and in stark contrast to Sheridan’s claim about huge interest in LGBT stories.
The report indicates that males and females with same-gender preferences who also showed an interest in the broad category of “comics” range from 0.56% to 1.56%, depending on which slice of the data you focus on.
Looking at the raw numbers, the absolute maximum of all non-straight comic fans falls well under 1,000,000. If you filter that number down based on how many of those fans buy comics regularly and how many are interested in superhero action comics, that number will likely drop significantly.
In short, the only report we could find that even remotely seeks to answer the question of how many people are interested in LGBT superhero action comics refutes Sheridan’s claim utterly.
Link to the report: https://graphicpolicy.com/2018/02/01/demo-graphics-comic-fandom-facebook-us-edition-9/
The Caveats
Does this report end the conversation about the demand for LGBT-centric superhero action comics? No, of course not, but the report is all we have to draw conclusions unless someone commissions a research institute for something better.
However, the conclusion we reached with the data available is far from perfect.
- Not all comics fans are on Facebook. The report samples a population of 61,000,000, which is no small number, but the data is still limited to one platform.
- Facebook’s interest category for “comics” doesn’t delineate between what type of comics (e.g. WebToons, Manga, Indie, Marvel, DC, etc.). It’s reasonable to assume superhero action comics are a smaller number than the 61,000,000 total, but we can’t say for sure how much smaller.
- The data is (as of this writing) five years out of date. It’s unlikely that interest in LGBT-centric superhero action comics would swell massively in five years, but we can’t say for sure.
- Facebook’s method for expressing interest in “comics” and “gender interest” is not a definitive metric. Someone who is interested in comics may not necessarily buy comics with any regularity.
The Verdict
We can say with confidence that no reputable research organization has compiled a comprehensive report to quantify how many comic readers are interested in LGBT-centric superhero action comics.
The one source we could find that quantifies comic interest that overlaps with same-gender interest ranges from 0.56% to 1.56%, hardly a huge number.
So, when the topics of representation and LGBT demand in comics come up, and someone tells you there’s a huge, untapped market, now you better.
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