[Spike Spiegel]

The thing is, I've never seen any of that Twitter/4Chan level of toxicity in any of the actual comic shops I've visited in either of the two cities I've lived in over the past six years. I've even met owners and clerks with neon dyed hair and hipster glasses who looked like your stereotypical "Tumblr in Action" types, and they were always civil to me.

If someone picks up an issue of their favorite comic and they find they don't like the script, the art, or the creative direction, guess what? They can drop it from their pull list until it improves or they find something better. Caterwauling and harassing someone on Twitter doesn't stop terrible stories from getting published. Refusing to purchase or read those stories does that.

Those "Diversity & Comics" or "Capn Cummings" types of people who have made a career out of b*tching about "muh SJW Marvel" on Twitter and YouTube are still buying all these books they hate in order to show how bad they are in front of a webcam. There's a certain irony there...

Where's the passion? Where's the joy? These characters may serve an allegorical purpose from time to time, but at their core superhero stories are supposed to represent escapism and fun. Reading "God Loves, Man Kills" isn't supposed to be the same experience as reading "Night" by Elie Wiesel.

Maybe the echo chambers of the Internet have imbued both creators and fans with a false sense of self-importance. While both sides of this so called debate whinge about free speech and tolerance, it's hurting and shrinking the industry as a whole.