There's a lot of hate and drama and back stabbing and rumors going around the cosplay community right now. And it seems that the past few years, the desire to be "cosfamous" has brought about a rift in our community. Personally, I felt it started with the Facebook purge. Everyone with the last name "cosplay" was then forced to make a page or do without. This page frenzy brought about the like frenzy. I have been a Cosplayer in the community for about 5 years now. I had a personal site for cosplay, a deviant art account, flickr the whole nine yards. But when I got my Facebook page 4 years ago...almost no one had one. I invested in cosplay business cards and networking and when I reach 50 likes that first year I thought I was the bees knees. Then the face book purge happened and suddenly my little page seemed insignificant. I had 700 likes when that happened. Then suddenly, all my friends who had gotten deleted starting making pages and within days they were all in the thousands and my little page sat at 700. I was crushed and tried even more to make myself more "popular." I wanted the likes cause I felt like if I didn't have any likes I was just a face in shadows that no one wanted. I would bust my ass making a costume only to have a "sexy" version of my same costume show up at a con and then nobody wanted my photo anymore cause the girl next to me showed more skin. This got me to wanting to do a swimsuit set of a cosplay. I thought "surely if I do a swim suit I'll get a lot of likes! People tell me how pretty I am all the time!" That bombed miserably. No one wanted them. I made a print shop hoping they would sell and not a soul bought one. Yet another thing that made me sad. Why didn't people "like" me...as the years went by here are some things I noticed: 1. The bigger your boobs the more likes you get (sex appeal it happens) 2. I used to see "future cosplay plans" or "dream cosplay" albums all the time on Facebook. Suddenly those went away as people seemed to think that if anyone cosplayed something they did then it was no longer fun. "Oh? Musable is cosplaying Rikku? I don't want to cosplay it anymore. She's cosplaying supergirl? I want to cosplay supergirl so I can show her how much better I am than her. ". So those albums all went away....no one really had them for fear someone would back lash or comment on how they weren't good enough for something or how someone else would be better. 3. The term "elitest" came around. Used to be a perfectionist I guess...but there is nothing wrong with wanting your cosplays perfect. It seemed as if everyone wanted to either be an elitest or they wanted to hate on them. I try to stick in the middle but it didn't work out that way. 4. But I think the most prominent reason was that my page made me sad because I was comparing myself. Looking at their pages saying "all she used was hot glue and safety pins and her page has 12k likes! I actually take the time to make my stuff and use almost no hot glue or safety pins! People like this crap?!" It went on like this for years... But then something has happened this summer that changed my view on cosplay. It seems as if more people have decided not to care. That inspired me to not care either. "She made her cosplay out of hot glue and safety pins? Well when it falls off at the con and her boobs fly out that won't be my picture to get off the internet." "She did a lingerie shoot? Well atleast that won't show up when people google search my name...after all the world seems ok with bikinis but the second you throw a bra and panties on it becomes a sex thing." This whole not caring thing then started to inspire me. I put back up my own "future/dream cosplay albums" and then I saw other friends putting their albums up as well! And the best part was...everyone was nice about it...I didn't see hate or anything and it actually got me not to focus on how many "likes" my page had...cause the few people that did...were actively commenting and posting. And that's way more meaningful than having 12k likes. I feel like the cosplay community is finally turning around. I see less people giving up on cos fame and more people focusing on fun and craftsmanship. The fact that I keep seeing these "cosplay" albums come back up just reassures me that people are coming back around and that it's a community I am excited to be a part of again. If you read this whole entry congrats! You win a cookie...for your browser. Also tell me your thoughts on cosplay pride? Do you think it's starting to change?
