Cosplay has the ability to transform cosplayers into their heroes, whoever they are. But things haven’t always been that ideal. Unfortunately, body shaming and bullying and abusing are very real and prominent issues for cosplayers at conventions. The sting of negative comments can carry over into regular life for some and even lead to anxiety or depression (Arielle Lien and psychologist Dr. Beth Murphy).
Katie Mellema (Fig.22) an experienced cosplayer, shared some insight into this issue in an article on Cosplayers vs. the World: Social Issues (Volume I) by Jade Chambers (2013). Fig.22 Cosplay Photo of Katie
She recalls “I remember going to the mall with a friend and walking past a cosplayer in Lolita dress. I applauded her courage and sense of style while my
…show more content…
As a result, fans or the audience forget that there are individuals inside those costumes. They are overwhelmed by the fact that their favourite character has come to life and end up crossing their limits. Sometimes audiences assume that cosplayers are dressed up in a provocative manner of because they are “asking for it”. This causes sexual and verbal harassment. Women have been groped, and men have been put down for not fitting or perfectly fitting a certain costume. Thus, certain organizers are trying to bring awareness to this issue by implementing anti-harassment policies. In New York’s Comic Con, attendees can see a large sign that says ‘Cosplay is not Consent’, and that everyone should be treated with respect. (2014)
Harrassment is not limited to just female cosplayers. Male cosplayer John of “Moderately Okay Cosplay” has been groped multiple times while dressed as anime and video game characters. “It didn’t really affect me much. It surprised me more than anything, like a ‘Did that just happen?’ type of thing,” he said.
Fig.24 Cosplay is not consent
Cosplay which is short for “costume play” allows an individual to basically be someone else, typically an anime, cartoon, or even video game characters to name a few. Along with the costume they take on that character’s personality and role play as them. Some will make the costumes themselves while others will buy pre-made ones. There is quite the amount of work and dedication that goes into doing this, not just for the sake of the costume looking accurate but the
Decora girls in Tokyo and Cosplay girls in america have a varying amount of similarities. Cosplaying is when people wear accessories or costumes and dress up as their favorite anime or comic book character. Very similar to Decora where these groups wear accessories and express themselves while standing out in society. Cosplay is a form of expression for this small group in american culture that is very similar and can fit into american culture very well.
The outfit we may choose to wear causes certainly, absolutely no harm to others surrounding us. Thus, what may be the point? Why must they enforce it? Therefore, now is our time, as students of Westlake High School, to stand up for what we believe in and declare we be given the right to wear whatever we may please. Under certain circumstance of course, nothing outrageous, or whore-like. And as for males of our society, no pants must expose thou of thy nature below the waist.
Therefore, to dress up like someone is to essentially become that person. What’s the line between this and normal acting?
Body shaming is even more difficult to people that feel insecure about their body every day. “In a society that puts so much emphasis on body image and beauty, it is so easy to get caught up in self -condemnation and body shaming” (Aceves). Society concentrates more on how the person looks physically. Instead of, accepting them on how they are and concentrating on other things. For that reason, people who feel offended thru others want to be accepted by them. They start to stop eating, they become bulimic, anorexic or fall into depression. Just because they want to look at how society wants them to look.
With staff telling female students to cover their bodies in schools, many girls fall victim of body shaming.
Most of the time our outwards appearance aims at at creating our very own handcrafted message. We want to portray ourselves to the world as a specific image. We choose our outfits, polish our
In modern day society, a woman is encouraged to dress in provocative attire, is given restrictions in what she wears, and is notified that wearing clothes that shows one’s shoulders is inappropriate, which remains the contrary for men. To start off, female students are not permitted to wear certain attire at school as it is claimed to distract their male classmates. For example, a 16 year-old female, attending a public high school in London, Ontario, “was called to the principal’s office and told to cover up, for wearing a grey skirt and black and turquoise top” ('They were sexualizing my outfit': Toronto students). The fact that an appropriate-length skirt is considered inappropriate and distracting to such an extent that the girl was pulled out of class, conveys that there are unreasonable rules put on the female students regarding clothes. This incident also portrays gender discrimination since women are advised to cover up their shoulders and legs, instead of teaching men to not objectify women. Likewise, several business owners encourage their female staff to dress in provocatively revealing attire in order to lure male customers. In May 2001, a female employee was discriminated due to her refusal to dress in attire which made her uncomfortable. When the woman, whose name is Andrea Mottu started her job as a bartender, she was informed that
During our life we construct many different identities of who we want to portray ourselves as to the rest of society; fashion plays a vital role in generating who we are. With the ideas from Storry and Childs they state that “the way that we dress can either serve to confirm or to subvert various facets of our identities, such as our gender,
The fashion industry plays a huge role in portraying bad images of ideal beauty, which in turn affects today’s society perception of their own body image. Not only are women affected by what is seen and heard about how the perfect body should appear, children of young ages are now feeling insecure and obsessed with their bodies before they reach teenage years. This ‘ideal image’ the fashion industry continues to enforce only focuses on very thin models who seem to be in shape and are very healthy. Furthermore, many people think of the influence from the fashion industry as being human representations (models). Because of the rising problem with the image of beauty within the fashion industry, it is shown that even mannequins and non-human representations (mannequins, dolls, photoshopping) of bodies play a significant role in women’s body image; which causes problems to the individual. (Anshutz & Engels, 2010). Body image and self-satisfaction, eating disorders and non-human representations all can cause harm to the individual, if prolonged.
Harassment usually is instigated by heterosexual males either trying to pick up a female or teasing a homosexual. Harassment usually begins in the
Relating to the Audience: How many of you was ever made fun of because of the way you look? How many has something that they are insecure about? You’re not alone, we all have that one thing we are self-conscious about. I know the feeling.
This paper will be discussing the cosplay, or costume play, subculture. In this paper, it will also go over who makes up this particular subculture, what it takes to be a cosplayer, what this subculture does for society, how society sees those who participate in it, how and when it came to be, most famous cosplay costumes, and what this subculture provides for those who take part in it.
Statement: Cosplay’s popularity growth is fast and there are lot of questions in the mind of people about cosplay. It’s meaning and reason varies from person to person and there are negativities to it.
Body-shaming has been tied to many different disorders like anxiety, depression, anorexia and more. “According to the National Association of Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders (ANAD), at least 30 million people of all ages and genders suffer from an eating disorder in the U.S., resulting in at least one death every 62 minutes” (Abrams). Teenagers seeing photoshopped celebrities everyday on their screens and in magazines makes them believe that’s what they need to look like when in reality their body is perfectly fine. School is a place where teenagers are stressed with the constant strain of trying to be the best out of all of their peers. It is seemingly obvious that some sort of standard needs to be met in