Friends of Lulu Done and Gone

No one should be surprised after the news earlier this month that Friends of Lulu, the non-profit organization dedicated to getting more girls and women involved in comics, officially lost its non-profit status, but I have just heard from one of the interim group Directors that the group is “pretty much dead”. I’m not surprised, although I was hopeful something could be saved from the ruins the previous president left behind.

No official announcement will be made. I have asked about plans for the group’s archives, but no answer is available yet.

I suppose the argument can be made that the group was a relic of another time, both in terms of the classic feminist approach and formed during a very different comic industry. In a period where manga and webcomics and graphic novels are economically viable, where no one has to be dependent on the older direct market/corporate comic system, where women and girls of all interests are finding each other on the internet, is a group like Friends of Lulu still needed?