Nerd

We were strangers, Starting out on a journey.

“Here she is, back again with another one of her sporadic and preachy essays” I hear you sigh… Or I would hear you, if I was listening, but tonight I’m in no mood to. Something has been praying on my mind over the last few days, made ever more insistent by the fact that I now have fresh, first hand experience with which to feed the flames of my ire. That thing is unsolicited advice. In other words, uninvited criticism, feedback no one asked for, or, really, if we’re being blunt, the smart ass comments no one appreciates receiving. It is a truth universally acknowledged among cosplayers that whomsoever posts a photo of themselves online must be in want of (constructive?) criticism. EH, WRONG! This has actually been discussed a whole lot, by people much more prominent and well loved in the community than little ol’ me but it’s something that has been a particularly frequent topic of discussion among myself and my friends in the last week and I wanted to share some thoughts on the matter. We put photos of ourselves out there online and should, I 100% agree, expect to receive feedback on those photos. Most people, myself included, crave it. It’s a large part of why we do what we do. Feedback, dialogue and constructive criticism are the foundations of a good community, a good final product and a healthy mindset in creators. They’re assets. What is not an asset is something that is far, far too common in the comments section of many cosplayer’s posts and that’s criticism that they never asked for. If someone shares a photo of themselves, anything from a new make up test to a photo from a shoot and they’re pleased with it, proud, eager to share it with the world and at no point have asked for feedback on how they could improve then why do you feel you have the right to offer an opinion? I’m sure I’m repeating myself here because this is something I say a lot, something a lot of cosplayers repeat constantly, but, we stare at images of these characters for hours. Quite literally hours. We spend hours researching and months making our costumes, we know our reference material inside and out, to presume that you know something we don’t is to grossly underestimate us (and it makes us feel pretty bad too). Recently I have seen this crop up a lot on friend’s posts and yesterday I received some honestly quite rude remarks on a photo I shared. The second of these remarks is one I’d like to use as an example of unsolicited criticism. In this case it was the old chestnut of ‘actually, this is how you should be holding your bow/arrow’, a comment that I genuinely expected to receive long before now on any one of the numerous Vex’ahlia photos I’ve shared. Now, if I had asked for tips on how to pose correctly with my bow then that comment would have been completely appropriate, I probably would even have been grateful, but here’s the thing… I did archery seriously for four years and I know how to hold a bow correctly (I competed and everything), I posed in the way that I did because knocking my arrow and drawing the bow properly would have put the photographer as serious risk of injury and I was not asking for feedback. I cannot stress this enough, not once did I ask for anyone’s opinion on my archery technique. And it is this assumption, the assumption that I don’t know any better, that frustrates me beyond all reason. It’s rude, it’s uncalled for and not a single person would think it appropriate in a real life situation. This has turned into something a lot more negative than I originally intended so I’d like to point out that this is something everyone does at times, we’re all in the same boat. I’ve done it, I frequently get very know-it-all about anything to do with historical costume and I’m sure it drives people up the wall. I’m sure you’ve done it too. Most of the time people have good intentions but what I think we need to do as a community is encourage a debate about this in a friendly manner. I am by no means advocating for an end to feedback but what I would encourage is more consideration in the giving of said feedback. So, next time you feel like leaving a comment explaining to a cosplayer that they chose the wrong shade of silk, or that their character wouldn’t stand like that, consider that; A) they probably already know, B) they probably have a very good reason for why they did something differently and C) did they actually ask for your opinion? If the answer to that last one is anything resembling ‘no’, don’t post your comment. This has been another Tilda essay, thanks for sticking around! TL;DR don’t bloody tell cosplayers they’re wrong if they haven’t asked for your opinion. They already know and they’ll be super pissed with you. It’s not worth it.

Informing people on how to conduct themselves in a manner that does not put others at risk or questioning poses or photographs that look like they are taken in an unsafe situation can potentially prevent accidents, because these questions, comments or additions to posts end up educating bystanders.

All of my life, I’ve had to pretend to be something I wasn’t. And to become what I wanted to become, I couldn’t be what I am.