Women Spotted at Comics Convention

Andrew Wheeler

Andrew Wheeler spent 16 years as a book club editor, most notably for the Science Fiction Book Club, and has been a judge for the 2005 World Fantasy Awards and the 2009 Eisner Awards. He is now Marketing Manager for John Wiley & Sons.

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7 Responses

  1. Christopher Moonligh says:

    It takes guts for a woman to weir that out of the house. Especially when she looks good in it. I have nothing but respect for women who make comics, and admiration for those female fans who dress up. We should make them feel at home.

  2. Adriane Nash says:

    I guess I'm bitter. I still feel like an outcast, invisble half of the time at conventions. It was like pulling teeth to get free handouts from the 'booth babes' among others Friday at WWC. These costumed gals seem to spend far more time posing for pics than shopping or acting like fans. And do Campbell and Marie think of themselves as "the 'Brangelina' of comics" for more tabloid reasons? Where does the celebration of comics end and a hunt for zlist 15 minutes begin?And that braod going on about wanting more blonde characters needs to expand her library, As brought up by a fan at the DC Nation panel at one point there were 7 females on a team and 5 were blondes. And considering only 16% of the population is naturally blonde, I'd put saving the world above dye jobs.Again maybe I'm bitter

  3. Elayne Riggs says:

    Comics shouldn't be about one gender ogling the other. Comics should be about telling great stories, and comic conventions should be about celebrating that storytelling. Everything else is superfluous and gratuitous and, frankly, insulting to half the population.

    • Mike Gold says:

      Which half? Clearly, subtracting the number of men, women and children who do dress up from the total number of attendees reduces the number of people of either gender who are potentially insulted to less than half. And I think it's a leap to assume all of either (or any) gender who are not so attired are offended.People dressing up in costume at a convention is a convention. Nobody forces anybody to do it (presumably), clearly a lot of people have a lot of fun playing dress-up, and it is perfectly legitimate to assume that it is okay to look at those people who do don costumes in such circumstances.This isn't restricted to comic book and science fiction conventions. I know one woman who loves to dress up in 1950s fashions when she goes out in public. She is making a statement about herself and her iconography, but mostly she is making a statement about what she thinks is cool for herself — people who come across her can take it or leave it. As long as people act politely, I don't see the problem. It's a free speech issue for both the costumed and the public.

  4. Elayne Riggs says:

    Well, we're pretty much in agreement then in terms of how to treat someone in costume. If more fanboys acted with common courtesy rather than knee-jerk lechery I don't know if I'd be so turned off by the idea of booth babes.As to my other point, I still think costuming is fairly superfluous to and has little to do with storytelling, but obviously lots of folks disagree or we wouldn't have that Stan Lee "Who Wants to Be A Superhero" show. And frankly, who in their right mind wouldn't adore ComicMix friend Fat Mama?

    • Christopher Moonligh says:

      When I was younger, I was very, very goth. I liked Sandman, The Cure, Poe, horror movies, goth clubs, bats, and on and on. I felt I dressed goth so that others who liked the things I did could spot me easily. I also drew a lot of ridicule. "Why?" I thought. "What is it to them how I dress? Whey can't these upstanding clean cut people show everyone else that their momma raised them right?" But I kept dressing that way, because it made me happy. I understand what you mean when you talk about "knee-jerk lechery." For me it was knee-jerk hate. I don't dress that way anymore, but I still love it, and I think that others should be able to be themselves and love it, too.

  5. Christopher Moonligh says:

    …and if anyone wants to know more about our rebel princess in the above photo, they can find her @http://www.myspace.com/rebel__princess