But what we've seen happen in the past few decades, as I have noted before, is that the center has eroded away, and this has brought the fringes closer to that center. The ones who asked for naked drawings of superheroines at cons, these it seems have become not only the primary audience but also, alas, many of the people producing the books.

The whole "sex sells" mind-set in complete and utter nonsense.  There are thousands of things that are sold everyday and manage to make a boatload of money, and sex (or sexuality) is nowhere to be found in these products or their advertising.

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But the flipside is also very true. Sex is used to sell cars, alcohol, clothing, vacations, beauty and grooming products, etc, etc, etc.

The problem in comics is what the overload of sexually charged material tells us about the target audience. The widest possible readership long ago ceased to be a consideration -- a part of the ever diminishing expectations. Of giving up.

   Some of those examples posted already just about had me choking.  What the (bleep) is that supposed to be?!?!?!

   There was a time when I got fairly excited by the prospect that a character was nude "on-screen", but it was being done in a subtle way that left an opening for my imagination.  Back then, I was a teenager who was probably starting to really wonder what the girls looked like naked, but wasn't fully aware of just what that meant.  As an adult old enough to have had kids on my own (had I managed to hook up), I wonder if I should be handing stuff like this over to my 7-year old nephew.

   Some of this stuff they show characters like the Huntress, Ms Marvel and Starfire in looks like what you'd get in an issue of FHM.  Not very attractive when you recall the girls you saw in high school that made you think "she's pretty".  They didn't need to be wearing butt-floss to attract your attention.  Superheroines could be some sort of ideal beauty, but not six degrees of "slutty".