This year will be the first year I’ve attended Detroit Fanfare Comic Con, and I’m pretty excited to be involved with it. I have the feeling it’s going to be a great experience, and there’s going to be a lot of fun things to do. A 24-hour game room, the zombie walk, and an adult costume party. Well, it’s a comics convention, so obviously I want to dress in the costume of a comics character. Red Sonja is amazing and kickass, so why not dress up as her?
I’m going to do it. I’m going to wear that chain-mail bikini and get a long, red wig. The works. But I have a confession to make: I am completely terrified to do this.
I work a lot in feminist theory and body politics, and one of the biggest arguments for body-positive imagery is that no matter what your body “type,” you can wear whatever you want, and if anyone else has a problem with that, they can simply not look at you. No big deal. Our acceptance of “beauty” is based entirely on social pressures and print and film media, and not everyone fits into that particular pinhole of “beauty.” In fact, only approximately 4% of the female population in the United States can look anything like a Hollywood actress or a model. The other 96% fall somewhere between “average” and “morbidly obese,” modifiers based on completely bunk science in the first place. But I digress.
I am not skinny. I am also not fat. According to the BMI, I am most definitely obese; I stand at 5’5” and weigh 190lbs (whew, I can’t believe I just put that out there in the Internet for the world to see). And yet, I’m perfectly healthy (for the most part, despite a chronic illness that has nothing to do with weight and everything to do with my reproductive organs wanting to kill me); my blood pressure is actually low, my cholesterol is “beautiful” according to my doctor, and I can do moderate exercise without becoming winded or my heart rate soaring out of control. All told, I actually rather like my body. I’ve got curves, I have great breasts, and I like my chest-waist-hip proportions.
But no amount of self-confidence can outweigh (pun intended) the fact that, according to mainstream societal standards, I’m just another overweight woman. And as much as I’d like to say that I’m educated about the system and I know precisely why the media capitalizes on making skinny equal to beautiful and I know exactly why the diet industry is so financially successful yet statistically dreadful… I still have that voice in the back of my head. I think we all do. That voice which, when I look in the mirror, sneers, “Look at those rolls of fat. Look how chunky you are. God, your arms are so ugly. How many chins do you have? No one could ever find you attractive.” And I can fight back against that voice and tell it to shut up, that I’m not bending to its will or its whim of what someone else wants me to think is “perfect.”
To add to the inner voice of let-me-make-you-feel-like-you’re-worthless, we have a lot of fat-shaming and slut-shaming going on, even within Geek Culture, which you would think should be one of the most accepting cultural groups around. If you doubt this, watch a few episodes of SyFy’s new series Heroes of Cosplay. So it’s not enough that I’m playing directly into the panopticon of perceived perfection, I’m also being bombarded with very direct statements telling me I can’t do X because Y says so, and if I do X, Z will happen.
With all of this in mind, I’ve been bouncing back and forth as to whether I want to dress up in a Red Sonja costume or figure out a reason to wear a high-necked Victorian dress that covers every part of everything on my body. Strangely, there’s no in-between in that. And my thoughts have split down the middle; one perspective is telling me that I can do whatever I want, dress however I want, and enjoy being myself and showing everyone else that they can all back off with their judgment, because I’ve got much more important things on my mind other than whether some random stranger finds me to be visually pleasing; the other perspective is telling me that dressing in something that shows off my body is purposely opening myself up to the very condescension and convoluted thinking that I’m planning on spending the rest of my life to fight against.
In the end, I’ve made a pretty public declaration that I will be rocking a Red Sonja costume, and this is for two reasons: one, I can do whatever I want; and, two, if you’re going to walk the walk, you have to talk the talk. I know precisely how uncomfortable I’m going to be with my body on display. But I also know that I have amazing friends and colleagues, many of whom are proud of me for making the decision to wear the costume and who have told me that I’ll look great. So when you’re hanging out at Detroit Fanfare this year (and you better be!) and you go to the adult’s costume party and you see a short, solid Red Sonja hanging out with the coolest geeks you’ll ever meet, feel free to come up and say hello. Also, let me know how the chain-mail turns out, because I’m hoping to get the costume at the Renaissance Festival and I’m pretty sure the artisans are going to do the most kick-ass job imaginable.
