Will Alison sums up the problem with the direct market succinctly when he mentions what he calls the Iron Triangle:

Readers only buy established franchises, because retailers only order established franchises, because publishers only publish establish franchises.

Publishers blame retailers for not supporting their other books, retailers blame readers for not buying those other books, and readers blame publishers for not putting out other books.

Each side of the triangle is basically inflexible, and each side can place the blame for the industry’s stagnation on the other two sides.

However, Johanna’s observations about the CBG fan awards made me realize that there’s a similar dynamic when the topic is sexism in comics… a self-perpetuating cycle with customers not showing enough interest in comics that appeal to women, publishers not publishing comics aimed at women because they sell poorly and then women being under-represented in comics’ consumer base because they’re not finding enough material that they find interesting.

Then again, does that cycle that explain why women remain a market untapped by American comics publishers or if this is a problem for every comics reader not interested in superheroes?

Another, related cycle centers around sexism in the industry where complaints about sexism get dismissed — which alienates the readers who’d prefer comics to be less sexist, leaving the "Get used to it, its what sells!" crowd a larger part of the customer base.

But then, I agree with David that manga has thrown a wrench into that cycle. Yes, there’s a lot of sexist material to be found in manga, but there’s a lot more that resonates, too. I believe that’s partly because more manga is created to sell to women, which means there’s more changes for female comics readers to find something that resonates. It doesn’t matter so much that there’s sexist manga (or even titles where the issue can be debated) but that there’s more of the "good stuff" to be found from manga publishers than from the industry’s former big two. You can escape the sexism in manga because there are alternatives. Most of the alternatives to sexism in American comics either don’t come out monthly or get canceled quickly.

So maybe there’s an exit from our little room in Hotel La Rut, after all.