Isn't talking about signalling a way to signal that you want to grow up to be Matt Taibbi? Given that so many fans are high functioning autists I think many of them aren't capable of the kind of cognition that leads to signalling. That kind of talk shows an extreme lack of cultural sensitivity.

I mean, if I cared about signalling I wouldn't even respond to an article that is (1) on medium and (2) requires registration. (The first rule of archive.is is that you never talk about archive.is)

So far as barriers I think there are no barriers, at least in Japan. There is this event

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comiket

which is held in an upside-down pyramid where people sell ero books of every anime and manga including the ones (Sailor Moon, Precure, ...) that are aimed at kids. If anybody was holding down the fort this wouldn't be allowed.