Food For Thought/Thought for Food No. 1: Cosplay is Not Consent

Hey there fellow Otaku & Metalheads.

I stated in my original statement about the Heavy Metal Otaku blog that I didn’t really want the harshness of reality to be on here. Sure, I’ve commented upon the death of someone, and perhaps an act of terrorism, but I wanted my reviews to be an escape. A way for people to have fun, and not think about how bad life can. In recent memory, I thought that, perhaps talking about real life once in a while can help. Perhaps by talking about real life, maybe we can learn something, and fix what’s wrong in the process. I’ve dubbed this post series Food for Thought/Thought for Food, wherein I’ll be talking about more real things, whether in geek culture, pop culture in general, or more real life stuff.

A fair warning: chances are I’ll be using more...colorful language from time to time. Not only that, I might trample on something personal that you hold deal. It may be accidental, it may be on purpose. Sometimes when you’re doing a little remodeling, you got to get some demolition done to make it look a little better. That said, let me get my first Food for Thought/Thought for Food out there!

As you can tell by the title, today’s first FoT/ToF is about something we’ve seen on the internet: Cosplay is Not Consent. You’ve seen the stories, you’ve probably heard from a friend or two, and maybe you have seen a picture or two. Women cosplayers getting harassed by guys, and even a small few men getting harassed by girls/women, this is seriously a dark issue. Sexuality has always been around in cosplay, whether people want to hear that or not. There had been women dressing up as more evocative characters, and men donning the outfits of male characters (or female if they crossdress) since the dawn of cosplay. In recent years, however, things have taken a bad turn. Both Women & Men are being looked at more sexually because of their costumes, and certain individuals are getting too close for comfort.

There have been stories from some con-goers about getting ask inappropriate questions, getting molested, or worse, getting raped because of their costume! I had a friend come out of the closet in February of last year about getting raped at a convention back in 2014, and (as far as I know) hasn’t gone back to one because of PTSD. Because of this, conventions & cosplay groups have stepped up their game, and have begun a campaign of “Cosplay is not Concent”. In fact, New York Comic Con has begun putting up signs like these around their con space.

Now that’s quite reasonable. A few simple words, and that’s that. However, even this isn’t enough for some people. Take a look at what some jerk online did! Just a heads up, you might want a barf bag for this.

On my personal facebook page, I ranted about the both of these, and I was furious while doing so. The cosplay community wasn’t like this for my first two cons: this way all the way back in 2009, and while the art of cosplay was certainly popular, it wasn’t completely in the mainstream. I didn’t see any perverts, and the girls & women didn’t seem threatened. Flash forward to now, and it seems like a day can’t pass without some issue in the cosplay community. To see what some of this community is turning into, and I weep like God when Lucifer was cast into Hell.

So in a strange way, I also seem to weep when I see signs like the ones at New York Comic Con. We as a community shouldn’t have to be told this. Issues within cosplay are ever so slowly being turned into PSAs that seem to talk down to people, and Cosplay is not Consent is perhaps spearheading this. I’ll admit that perhaps I’m being a little judgemental, but I’m not necessarily the only person thinking this: I’ve seen comments on a couple posts having similar discussions like the one I have here, and the sentiment is the same. An awful problem, but perhaps we’re hearing about it too much & being talked down to in a sense.

My advice is this: just be respectful. Don’t add anymore fuel to the fire, as there’s been enough already poured on as it is. We should know what boundaries are in this day & age.

So this was my first Food for Thought/Thought for Food. I don’t know how often I’ll be doing this series, as the idea just came to me on a whim. Whenever something comes my way, and it sparks something in my brain, maybe I’ll say something about it. In the meantime, we’ve got more of the Summer of Thrash to enjoy!