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You are here: Home / Politics / Glibertarianism / Open Thread: The Cosplay Scourge

Open Thread: The Cosplay Scourge

by Anne Laurie|  October 12, 20147:49 pm| 132 Comments

This post is in: Glibertarianism, Popular Culture, Ever Get The Feeling You've Been Cheated?

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Generation gap in action: http://t.co/gesF2B8lp5

— Noah Smith (@Noahpinion) October 11, 2014

broomhida comic art con 73I went to the 1973 NY Comic Art Convention, in my homemade Shanna the She-Devil costume (which drew very little attention, since it was the year of the Heidi Saha/Destiny costume-call “scandal”). The high point, for me, was asking Sergio Aragones to sign my program book. (Several of his Mad co-workers immediately grabbed it and added their own mini-sketches, including one editor, because nobody ever asked for his signature.) I remember everybody was very excited, because an almost unimaginable number of memberships had been sold — “almost a thousand”, IIRC, which I probably don’t. Even our fertile imaginations could hardly have imagined the NYTimes business section’s discussion of this year’s NYCC, forty years later:

… The event, which celebrates the crossroads of comic books and pop culture, draws such huge crowds that the 151,000 tickets sold out in hours this year, leaving many fans clamoring for a way to immerse themselves in their favorite tales of science-fiction and fantasy. But even as the convention expands, it faces criticism that it has lost its focus.

Ticket sales for conventions like New York Comic Con totaled about $600 million in the United States last year, according to a study by Eventbrite, an online ticketing and events service. Revenue from ticket sales for the New York convention increased 40 percent this year over 2013, and ReedPop, the convention’s organizer, says it wants it to grow even more.

The problem is that attendance, which was 133,000 last year, has reached the capacity of the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center, where the convention opened on Thursday and will run through Sunday.

So this year, ReedPop broadened the scope of New York Comic Con, adding a weeklong series of events, called Super Week. “The investment is well north of a million dollars to get this going,” Lance Fensterman, the global vice president of ReedPop, said of Super Week. “We were not shy about launching this thing. It’s 110 events in 25 venues all over the city.”…

Little did I know that I was an early indicator of the sapping of America’s precious bodily economic fluids, according to James Pethokoukis…

Why the rise of cosplay is a bad sign for the U.S. economy
Imagine you’re a college graduate stuck in a perpetually lousy economy. That’s a problem Japanese twenty-somethings have faced for more than 20 years. Two decades of stagnation after the collapse of the 1980s real-estate and stock bubbles — combined with labor laws making it tough to fire older workers — have relegated vast numbers of Japanese young adults to low-paying, temporary contract jobs. Many find themselves living with their parents well into their twenties and beyond, unmarried and childless. Then again, they do have plenty of time to dress up like wand-wielding sailor girls and cybernetic alchemist soldiers from the colorful world of anime cartoons and manga comics…

It’s hard to blame them. After all, it’s not that these young adults in Japan are resisting becoming productive members of the economy — it’s that there just aren’t enough opportunities for them. So an increasingly large number of them spend an increasingly large amount of time living in make-believe fantasy worlds, pretending they are someone else, somewhere else. This is a very bad thing for the Japanese economy.

And guess what: America has a growing number of make-believe “cosplay” heroes, too. Many of the 130,000 people who attend the San Diego Comic Con every year invest big bucks in elaborate outfits as a way of showing off their favorite Japanese characters, as well as those from American superhero movies, comics, and “genre” televisions shows such as Game of Thrones…

When you’re disillusioned with the reality of your early adult life, dressing up like Doctor Who starts looking better and better. It’s not to say that all or even most cosplay aficionados are struggling to find work. It’s only to say that any rise in people fleeing reality for fantasy suggests problems with our reality…

To which Rob Bricken, at io9, responds: “That is possibly true, although it does kind of stereotype people who enjoy cosplay as poor bastards who have been trapped as immature man-children and women-children unable to cope with our current harsh economic reality, as opposed to, you know, PEOPLE WITH A FUCKING HOBBY… “

And that’s the problem, isn’t it? If you’re James Pethokoukis, DeWitt Wallace Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, gainful employment is the true (libertarian) heart of Our American Spirit, and anything you’re not getting paid for is a dangerous distraction. For most of us, most of the time, having a job that pays enough to support us and hopefully our hobbies is important, but it’s not how we measure our personal worth. Once you start thinking of cosplayers as a dangerous economic indicator, I think you’ve turned economics into a form of religious belief.

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132Comments

  1. 1.

    Bobby B.

    October 12, 2014 at 7:53 pm

    Hell hath no fury like a SheldonCooper scorned.

  2. 2.

    GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)

    October 12, 2014 at 7:55 pm

    As a gainfully employed Gen Xer, I don’t understand Cosplayers.

    I’m encouraging my son, soon to graduate from HS to pursue a nursing degree so he can be confused by Cosplayers as well.

  3. 3.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    October 12, 2014 at 8:02 pm

    Cosplayers

    Oh, I always thought that referred to the cast of the Cosby show. Could never figure out why such a small group of people got so much attention.

  4. 4.

    Scott S.

    October 12, 2014 at 8:05 pm

    I’m a gainfully employed Gen Xer, and I think cosplayers are awesome.

    Also, cosplayers are great for the economy, because they spend money on fabric and paint and plastic and metal, and then they spend money on convention tickets and hotels and food and other products and souvenirs at the convention.

    Saying cosplayers are bad for the economy is like saying hobbies in general are bad for the economy. It just don’t make no sense.

  5. 5.

    Botsplainer

    October 12, 2014 at 8:05 pm

    I went to the 1973 NY Comic Art Convention, in my homemade Shanna the She-Devil costume (which drew very little attention, since it was the year of the Heidi Saha/Destiny costume-call “scandal”)

    Pictures? Asking for a friend…

  6. 6.

    MattF

    October 12, 2014 at 8:07 pm

    If a few of them decide to become pastry chefs, then it’s all OK with me.

  7. 7.

    Felonius Monk

    October 12, 2014 at 8:08 pm

    And how does James Pethokoukis not think that being a DeWitt Wallace Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute isn’t cosplay because it certainly isn’t gainful employment.

  8. 8.

    Iowa Old Lady

    October 12, 2014 at 8:10 pm

    And besides that, get off his lawn!

  9. 9.

    Tara the Antisocial Social Worker

    October 12, 2014 at 8:10 pm

    Between cosplayers and Mr. Pethokoukis, I’m thinking the latter is the one with too much time on his hands.

    It’s only to say that any rise in people fleeing reality for fantasy suggests problems with our reality

    How does that differ from “fleeing reality for fantasy” by reading a novel or watching a movie?

  10. 10.

    Corner Stone

    October 12, 2014 at 8:11 pm

    Speaking of cosplay, this accented blonde that does the new Vi@gra commercials makes me want to buy a convention ticket to somewhere.

  11. 11.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    October 12, 2014 at 8:11 pm

    Meh, I don’t know, the fact that more than a decade before the great recession things like this happened would tend to post-hoc-ergo-propter-hoc-fallacy this whole notion:

    in 1994, when Star Trek reruns still aired in 94% of the United States, over 400,000 attended 130 conventions.

  12. 12.

    revrick

    October 12, 2014 at 8:12 pm

    All economics is some form of religious belief. It cosplays as a science.

  13. 13.

    Ruckus

    October 12, 2014 at 8:12 pm

    I think you’ve turned economics into a form of religious belief

    .
    Isn’t that what conservatives have done? They have no knowledge of cause and effect, they have no useful knowledge of economic thought and they prove this every day. Their sum total of economic thought is, they believe what they are told by some one else who believes because they can’t possibly be wrong, because they believe. That is a religion.

  14. 14.

    Mike in NC

    October 12, 2014 at 8:14 pm

    Perhaps the Japanese should consider launching a Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere V2.0 initiative to put people back to work.

  15. 15.

    mdblanche

    October 12, 2014 at 8:15 pm

    @Scott S.: But it’s a hobby that’s big in Japan. Japan has displeased John Frum who is withholding his cargo from them. If we start doing the same thing, John Frum will withhold cargo from us too. What part of “we’ve turned economics into a form of religious belief” don’t you understand?

    @revrick: Say, isn’t this the time of the year when they announce the winner of that big economics award that cosplays as a Nobel Prize?

  16. 16.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    October 12, 2014 at 8:16 pm

    @Corner Stone: Did you know that putting the arobase symbol in that made it a “mail to” link? So when I clicked it set me up to send mail to “Viagra”? Trying to tell me something?

  17. 17.

    piratedan

    October 12, 2014 at 8:19 pm

    yeah…. Cosplay as a dangerous economic indicator versus the big screaming elephant in the room like CEO compensation, fucking asshats. The damn sonafabitch probably even got paid to write that. Sometimes I think that there’s a helluva career choice in being a paid lackey for the 1% but I prefer to believe in a bit of free will and not be proficient in determining what nuts are present in the shit that I would have to eat to be a professional toady.

  18. 18.

    SiubhanDuinne

    October 12, 2014 at 8:19 pm

    I always want to pronounce it “co-splay,” as in “splay together.”

  19. 19.

    Hillary Rettig

    October 12, 2014 at 8:23 pm

    The fact that he holds a chair commemorating a founder of that icon of the premodern age, Reader’s Digest, just adds relish.

  20. 20.

    divF

    October 12, 2014 at 8:27 pm

    Although I’ve been an avid science-fiction reader practically since I could read, the only World Science Fiction Convention I ever attended was Noreascon 1971 in Boston. The high points for me were sitting listening to RA Lafferty chatting with a bunch of fans, and purchasing on behalf of a friend back in Berkeley a copy of All-Star Comics #4 ($65 seemed like a lot of money at the time). I missed the MIT students marching around the hotel chanting, “The Ringworld is unstable!”, though. In spite of my indulgence in a non-paying hobby (reading for pleasure), I have been a productive member of society for most of my adult life.

    Still, the independent issue of what becomes of the younglings these days is troubling. The number of careers that have the potential for making a living wage is rapidly decreasing. As I see many of the 20-somethings around me struggle to survive, I feel like we’re losing a generation. Living at home with your parents (and your parents being sufficiently prosperous and sane where that is a possibility) is among the better outcomes. Also common is living on the street while working a minimum wage job (or jobs), or engaging in various degrees illegal and / or dangerous activities (e.g. selling drugs or sex).

  21. 21.

    revrick

    October 12, 2014 at 8:31 pm

    @Ruckus: Unfortunately, it’s not just a game conservatives play. The belief that you can extract infinite growth from a finite planet is a whopper even economists like Krugman buy into.

  22. 22.

    M. Bouffant

    October 12, 2014 at 8:33 pm

    Assuming you didn’t hoick Broomhilda there, you might enjoy the rest of these.

    (Sorry kids, no She-Devils.)

  23. 23.

    revrick

    October 12, 2014 at 8:34 pm

    @mdblanche: You mean the Sverige Riksbank prize in economics in memory of Alfred Nobel? That one?

  24. 24.

    M. Bouffant

    October 12, 2014 at 8:35 pm

    @divF: Uber drivers. Taking in boarders in the spare room, or AirBnB. Everything you’re fortunate enough to own will be for sale or lease, & not on your terms.

  25. 25.

    Brandon

    October 12, 2014 at 8:39 pm

    James Pethokoukis is saying something stupid? Now where have I heard that before?

  26. 26.

    Steeplejack

    October 12, 2014 at 8:41 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Conversely, and not for the same reasons, I am liking the “super creepy Rob Lowe” ad for DirecTV. Genius moment when regular Rob Lowe stiffens as creepy Rob Lowe puts his hand on his back.

  27. 27.

    Ruckus

    October 12, 2014 at 8:44 pm

    @revrick:
    What type of growth are you thinking about? Physical, as in using more energy?
    Economic, as in growth in value?
    These are not the same things.

  28. 28.

    Steeplejack

    October 12, 2014 at 8:44 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    [. . .] over 400,000 attended 130 conventions.

    Which works out to about 3,100 people per convention. Not the same thing at all.

  29. 29.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 8:55 pm

    Hell, I *accidentally* dress like the Tenth Doctor all the time.

    This guy writes for the “AEIdeas” blog, that’s all you need to know about his ideas.

  30. 30.

    Corner Stone

    October 12, 2014 at 8:55 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    Conversely, and not for the same reasons, I am liking the “super creepy Rob Lowe” ad for DirecTV. Genius moment when regular Rob Lowe stiffens as creepy Rob Lowe puts his hand on his back.

    Those are horrible commercials. For him. Does no one else remember the sex tape he made with the 16 yr old girl?
    He’s kind of a scumbag, and creepy in real life.

  31. 31.

    Brendanyc

    October 12, 2014 at 8:59 pm

    What the heck is cosplay?

  32. 32.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 9:00 pm

    @Brendanyc: Dressing up like a character you like when it isn’t Halloween.

  33. 33.

    MomSense

    October 12, 2014 at 9:00 pm

    If the cos players are having fun, then more power to them.

  34. 34.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    October 12, 2014 at 9:01 pm

    @Steeplejack: Well so how many Comic Cons are there annually? About a dozen, in the US? Do they all get numbers like that one in NY?

    There were 130 Star Trek conventions that year, was what amazed me.

    So yeah it looks like about 15 Comic Cons in various cities. Since NY is obviously being touted for the immense numbers, I’d be curious to know what the total for all of them was. If it were 100K each, then it would be three times what Star Trek attendance was in 1994, but I bet it’s not that high, thus closer to parallel with that 400K. Could be wrong of course.

  35. 35.

    gene108

    October 12, 2014 at 9:01 pm

    Has anyone informed the AEI dude about LARPers? Cosplay in action.

  36. 36.

    Gex

    October 12, 2014 at 9:03 pm

    Conservatives always have to divide and gin up culture wars. Take the little differences between us about the things we enjoy and make them into some good guys vs. bad guys issue. From what I can tell it is people who are so individually lacking in a healthy sense of self who need to fit in with a herd and decide that there is a right way to be and those who diverge don’t simply have different interests, but are actively wrong and bad.

    It’s tiresome.

  37. 37.

    Baud

    October 12, 2014 at 9:04 pm

    Balloon Juice needs a convention.

    Everyone can come naked while carrying the mop of their choice.

  38. 38.

    Steeplejack

    October 12, 2014 at 9:05 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Yes, I remember the sex tape. He appears to have been rehabilitated, by Hollywood standards. And, perhaps fortunately, I have never met him “in real life.”

    Funny ad is funny.

  39. 39.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 9:06 pm

    @Baud: but I wanted to cosplay as mcardle

  40. 40.

    Baud

    October 12, 2014 at 9:10 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Ok. You come as mcardle. I’ll come as the cat whose ass needs shaving.

  41. 41.

    srv

    October 12, 2014 at 9:11 pm

    Krugman is right again, he’s been saying “Look at Japan” for years, and years, and years as to where we are headed.

    Honestly, we need comics where the bad guys are Austerians and K-Thug theatens the world with his Liquidity Trap Ray… Gen. Von Mises, Milton Freakman…

    I’m sure you cosplayers can come up with something.

    Then maybe the kids could learn something. Comics used to TEACH things!

  42. 42.

    PhoenixRising

    October 12, 2014 at 9:12 pm

    @Baud: Jesus. People. You had me at naked with mops.

  43. 43.

    Applejinx

    October 12, 2014 at 9:13 pm

    Dude, I’ve cross-gender fursuited (and carried it off alarmingly well). Fretting about cosplay is for wusses XD

  44. 44.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    October 12, 2014 at 9:13 pm

    @srv:

    we need comics where the bad guys are Austerians and K-Thug theatens the world

    Say it, and it appears.

    I always spell it “Austerions” now, ever since seeing that.

  45. 45.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 9:13 pm

    @Baud: not sure who’s getting the better end of that bargain tbh

  46. 46.

    Steeplejack

    October 12, 2014 at 9:15 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    Well, the story that Anne Laurie quotes above says the San Diego Comic Con also had about 130,000 attendees. So that’s 263,000 people at just two events.

    There were 130 Star Trek conventions that year, was what amazed me.

    Fine. Your comment just sounded (to me) like you were scoffing at 130,000 people at an event because 400,000 people went to 130 events back in the day. I just reflexively did the math and thought it was sort of an apples-to-oranges comparison.

    I’ll get off your lawn now.

  47. 47.

    Corner Stone

    October 12, 2014 at 9:17 pm

    @Steeplejack: Sorry, those ads aren’t funny. The word you’re looking for is “creepy”.

  48. 48.

    Brandon

    October 12, 2014 at 9:17 pm

    @Applejinx: Despite the fact that I couldn’t tell if this was sincere or a joke, I laughed all the same. Well played.

  49. 49.

    Violet

    October 12, 2014 at 9:17 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: There are a ton of Comic Con type things, even if they’re not official Comic Cons. A friend’s kid is into cosplay and gaming and they go to these things all the freaking time. My friend reports that they’re packed. At this point they could easily do one every weekend, sometimes two per weekend, and that’s just within reasonable driving distance. We’re not talking a long drive or a flight.

  50. 50.

    Corner Stone

    October 12, 2014 at 9:18 pm

    @Baud:

    Everyone can come naked while carrying the mop of their choice.

    I think the males should wear bottles of mustard in strategic locations and females can have the arugula leaves.

  51. 51.

    Howard Beale IV

    October 12, 2014 at 9:19 pm

    What he didn’t dare say in his article–this isn’t a bug, it’s a feature.

  52. 52.

    Roger Moore

    October 12, 2014 at 9:21 pm

    @Baud:
    Having been to a Balloon-Juice meetup or two, I strongly recommend against the naked mopping cosplay, at least as a universal theme. Not that there aren’t some people who could carry it off, but more of us would look better in a body cast- which is a better representation of Cole anyway.

  53. 53.

    MomSense

    October 12, 2014 at 9:21 pm

    @Baud:

    My son was stopped by the police this summer driving home from his girlfriend’s house. He was pantsless and not wearing shoes. Somehow he managed not to get a ticket

  54. 54.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    October 12, 2014 at 9:21 pm

    @Steeplejack: Hah.

    Well I just picked one of the other ones on that list at random and Baltimore, for example, says its attendance is around 15,000. So I’d be amazed if the total going to them were more than 400,000.

    So, well sure it is apples to oranges, if the thesis above was “more people go to single conventions now”. However I thought it was more about claiming that young people have more time on their hands and less to do, based on the evidence that a few hundred thousand attended conventions like that. I wasn’t scoffing at anything, just saying nah, that’s nothing new really, four hundred thousand went to Star Trek conventions alone, in 1994.

  55. 55.

    Steeplejack

    October 12, 2014 at 9:22 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    I brook no dissent from a man who can’t keep his periods inside his quotation marks. And who “shutters” rather than shudders.

    Yes, I went ad hominem. Sorry, feeling feisty tonight.

  56. 56.

    srv

    October 12, 2014 at 9:23 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: LoL

  57. 57.

    Steeplejack

    October 12, 2014 at 9:25 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    I agree it’s not really anything new, but I do think more people are doing it now. The Internet has made everything more popular, in terms of letting people know where and when there are other like-minded people doing like-minded things.

  58. 58.

    Baud

    October 12, 2014 at 9:25 pm

    @MomSense:

    They give tickets for not wearing pants?

    @Major Major Major Major:

    If I leave the convention with a shaved ass, I’ll consider it a win.

  59. 59.

    Corner Stone

    October 12, 2014 at 9:26 pm

    @Steeplejack: That wasn’t actually a statement. It was a quotation. I don’t think I have any reason to keep anything inside of the quotation marks.
    And I shutter at the thought of what kind of asshole the feisty you wants to attempt to be.
    Yeah, “attempts”.

  60. 60.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 9:26 pm

    @Steeplejack: I do prefer punctuation outside of the quotation marks unless it’s part of the quotation personally, but then again I’m a programmer so delimiters have an overly important space in my brain

  61. 61.

    Villago Delenda Est

    October 12, 2014 at 9:27 pm

    If the vile neofeudalists who pay the salaries of the AEI lackwits were so fucking concerned about cosplay types not putting their noses to the grindsxtone, they can demonstrate it by embracing equality and opportunity for all, especially the brown, the female, the gay, etc.

    But it’s all just moral scolding from fucking Death Eaters.

    Mass drivers on AEI and all the other reactionary “think tanks”. Only way to be sure.

    Wipe them out. All of them.

  62. 62.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 9:28 pm

    @Baud: I guess a mcardle cosplay would have no win condition… so… you win by default

    unless I get hired by some major publication to opine on, what don’t I know anything about, astrophysics

  63. 63.

    Corner Stone

    October 12, 2014 at 9:29 pm

    How the hell did Sproles just run right into that dude?

  64. 64.

    Violet

    October 12, 2014 at 9:31 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: Is mcardle still a thing?

  65. 65.

    Frankensteinbeck

    October 12, 2014 at 9:32 pm

    Conservatives are assholes. They look for any excuse to punch someone and laugh, like playground bullies. They don’t care if it’s justified. They only care about the vision of themselves as superior that exists in their heads.

    @Gex:
    Yep. Anxiety and conformity play in as well. If they’re not part of the herd, they might be the Other, and get treated like they treat the Other.

  66. 66.

    MomSense

    October 12, 2014 at 9:32 pm

    @Baud:

    They probably should but he was stopped for speeding and when the cop approached the car he noticed that he wasn’t wearing pants or shoes.

  67. 67.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 9:33 pm

    @Violet: sadly, yes. She’s at bloomberg or something now

  68. 68.

    zattarra

    October 12, 2014 at 9:33 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: I’ve been doing conventions like these for 3 decades now. I was active going to these things in 1994 and am active today. There are many more conventions and many more people going to these things then their were 20 years ago. Trust me, this stuff has exploded. But it isn’t a free time thing, it’s an enjoying it thing. When they say 130 Star Trek conventions in 1994 they are counting all the small conventions – the weekend few hundred people stuff. That happens today also. But today from April to October there are major comic conventions almost weekly and the attendance on the larger ones is 50,000 plus people a con. Smaller named conventions like Baltimore (not considered one of the top conventions) may get around 15k. in 1994 they wouldn’t have seen 5K there.

    And there really aren’t standalone sci-fi conventions anymore. Not major ones. They’ve all blended together. So you will have major comic conventions and William Shatner as a guest. The days of Creation Sci-fi type shows are mostly done. And 30 years ago those creation shows were sci-fi themed shows but still with large comic dealer presence.

  69. 69.

    Roger Moore

    October 12, 2014 at 9:35 pm

    @MomSense:

    He was pantsless and not wearing shoes. Somehow he managed not to get a ticket

    He probably explained to the cop why he was pantsless, after which the cop gave him a high five and let him go on his merry way. It’s all part of the bro code.

  70. 70.

    Violet

    October 12, 2014 at 9:35 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: That’s discouraging. If you’re a mcardle costume for Halloween are you a pink Himalayan salt shaker spewing out vomit?

  71. 71.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 9:36 pm

    @Violet: only after midnight. Before that I’m just a pink Himalayan salt shaker talking nonsense

  72. 72.

    Roger Moore

    October 12, 2014 at 9:36 pm

    @Violet:
    You forgot the broken calculator.

  73. 73.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 9:37 pm

    @Roger Moore: ack, my gastritis!

  74. 74.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    October 12, 2014 at 9:37 pm

    @zattarra: Okay I defer to your far superior familiarity with the subject. So “it’s not a free time thing”, then you don’t buy the claim being made in the piece at the top, that the numbers are related to economic stagnation?

  75. 75.

    Violet

    October 12, 2014 at 9:39 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: Nonsense, vomit–it’s all the same when you’re mcardle.

    @Roger Moore: If you’re going to add a broken calculator accessory, you’ve got to add the heated blender.

  76. 76.

    Roger Moore

    October 12, 2014 at 9:42 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:
    And shouldn’t you actually be a salt pig?

  77. 77.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 9:43 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: To put on my serious hat (removes golf cap), no.

    The nerds are ascendant. The internet helped a lot. I’m not saying we’re winning–not like there’s a contest anyway–but it’s kind of been a weird thing to witness. I’m gay and a nerd and geek and whatever, and I’ve actually found geek acceptance lagging behind LGBT acceptance over the last ten years or so. Kind of odd. I also stick to gay friendly parts of the country, so ymmv.

    But it’s now “ok” to be out and proud as a cosplayer or lgbt fella or whatever much more so than it used to be. I think that’s what’s really going on.

  78. 78.

    cckids

    October 12, 2014 at 9:43 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    And who “shutters” rather than shudders.

    I keep seeing that more & more lately. WTF, people? It isn’t rocket surgery.

  79. 79.

    Violet

    October 12, 2014 at 9:44 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim: From what my friend reports–and my friend is the mom and is NOT into this scene at all, so she’s had to learn everything as she goes with her kid–there’s crossover between gaming culture and comic culture. Plus Japanese anime and manga (her kid wants to learn Japanese). The gaming companies seem to have their own “tours” where they introduce new games and people come to those shows or conventions or whatever they are dressed as their favorite characters from the games. Her kid does cosplay as gaming characters.

  80. 80.

    Steeplejack

    October 12, 2014 at 9:44 pm

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    I don’t think the attendance numbers are related to economic stagnation at all. Just wanted to clarify that. It’s as zattarra says: more people are going to more events, for probably the same reasons of “popularity” that affect any cultural phenomenon.

  81. 81.

    Ruckus

    October 12, 2014 at 9:45 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est:
    I’m thinking M1 tanks, direct assault. Less room for error, 50s for any that can still run away.

  82. 82.

    MomSense

    October 12, 2014 at 9:45 pm

    @Roger Moore:

    Yup that is exactly what happened.

  83. 83.

    Suffern ACE

    October 12, 2014 at 9:48 pm

    I agree with him 100%. People who spend large sums of money on something are such drags on the economy. And I also agree that cosplay is for people facing unfortunate futures, which is probably why the largest chapter of the world cosplay society is in Damascus.

  84. 84.

    Gvg

    October 12, 2014 at 9:53 pm

    Hmm, I was never able to go to a convention con until I had a regular job and wages to spend on things like gas, tickets and motel rooms. I stopped because I really don’t do meeting strangers well and just prefer the books but how on earth does this guy think jobless or under employed living with the help of parents add up up to people with money for fancy priced tickets, high rent area hotels and costumes that cost some money? he doesn’t know what he is talking about. there is an economic stagnant wage poor job demand problem but cosplay doesn’t have diddly to do with it.

  85. 85.

    Anne Laurie

    October 12, 2014 at 9:53 pm

    @Botsplainer: Tell the truth, I don’t think any survived! There were no cell cameras, of course, and film-plus-developing was expensive by our standards. I know there were a couple Polaroids taken by a friend at another con, but even if I could find them, 40-year-old Polaroid prints are probably pretty well shot.

    I was built like Lena Dunham in those days, but I didn’t have any tattoos. I did add a mini-skirt to the halter-top-swimsuit original (per the Steranko cover), because even in those days my thighs weren’t my best feature. So, y’know, only a friend would bother taking pictures, and then probably only by request!

  86. 86.

    Steeplejack

    October 12, 2014 at 9:53 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Well, the language “English” has different rules for delimiters than, say, C or Java. I don’t see why it’s hard to follow the rules for one but not another. Except that for programming languages a compiler or interpreter will kick your ass but for English you can just say, “Whatever, man.” Or, sorry, “Whatever, man”.

  87. 87.

    Steeplejack

    October 12, 2014 at 10:00 pm

    @Anne Laurie:

    Man, I was just thinking about Jim Steranko last night and the great work he did on Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD and other Marvel classics. Oh, if only my parents hadn’t thrown out all those comics I avidly collected in the ’60s.

  88. 88.

    Major Major Major Major

    October 12, 2014 at 10:01 pm

    @Steeplejack: it’s also a Natural language, and those don’t have rules, just conventions. And they change. All the time!

    Languages and currencies are both convenient mutual hallucinations.

  89. 89.

    Ruckus

    October 12, 2014 at 10:01 pm

    @Anne Laurie:
    Not necessarily true with the Polaroids. I have a few that are 40+ yrs old and they are still pretty good. Not brand new good but better than some photos of around the same time.

  90. 90.

    Anne Laurie

    October 12, 2014 at 10:03 pm

    @Baud:

    Balloon Juice needs a convention.

    Everyone can come naked while carrying the mop of their choice.

    Some of us can come as Tunch. Or Steve. Or Lily…

  91. 91.

    Anne Laurie

    October 12, 2014 at 10:07 pm

    @Roger Moore:

    Not that there aren’t some people who could carry it off, but more of us would look better in a body cast- which is a better representation of Cole anyway.

    Old, old grouch about late-night skinny-dipping at sf cons: “Most fans see better with their glasses on, and look better with their clothes on.”

  92. 92.

    HinTN

    October 12, 2014 at 10:13 pm

    @Corner Stone: She’s hooking drunk young men, not the typical olds. Makes my skin crawl.

  93. 93.

    EriktheRed

    October 12, 2014 at 10:14 pm

    @Tara the Antisocial Social Worker:

    Or believing in Ayn Rand’s philosophy, for that matter.

  94. 94.

    Corner Stone

    October 12, 2014 at 10:18 pm

    @HinTN:

    She’s hooking drunk young men, not the typical olds. Makes my skin crawl.

    That certainly sounds awful. If you could kindly tell me where, so I could make sure to alert the relevant local authorities?

  95. 95.

    fidelio

    October 12, 2014 at 10:22 pm

    @revrick: Take a good long look at Calvinism, the branch of Christianity that’s done so much to shape the U.S., from early Massachusetts to the Prosperity Gospel, and tell me there’s no economics in that flavor of religion.

  96. 96.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    October 12, 2014 at 10:27 pm

    @cckids: I just assumed it was used ironically. Apparently, that was silly of me. But people, please, punctuation marks go inside the quotation marks. Coders get a pass, because it’s some kind of best practices habit or something.

  97. 97.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    October 12, 2014 at 10:27 pm

    Dungeons and Dragons started in the 70s, The Society for Creative Anachronisms stated in the 60s and before that there various secret societies like the Freemasons. Welcome to the party 200 freaking years to late Mr Pethokoukis

  98. 98.

    Botsplainer

    October 12, 2014 at 10:44 pm

    @Anne Laurie:

    I was built like Lena Dunham in those days, but I didn’t have any tattoos.

    Ink is sort of a lately thing, anyway. I’ve got a standing “every other week” Friday tat appointment the past couple of months. I’ll take stock by spring, decide where to go from there – by then, I’m basically half sleeved on both arms, got the upper back stuff well under way, and maybe a dab of chest and calf work.

    It beats getting a 25 year old and red convertible.

  99. 99.

    Botsplainer

    October 12, 2014 at 10:47 pm

    @Corner Stone:

    Those are horrible commercials. For him. Does no one else remember the sex tape he made with the 16 yr old girl?

    To be fair, he was maybe 22 when he did that.

  100. 100.

    Corner Stone

    October 12, 2014 at 10:51 pm

    @Botsplainer: Ok. So he was 24 and having sex with a 16 yr old.
    Good enough.

  101. 101.

    Villago Delenda Est

    October 12, 2014 at 11:03 pm

    If you’re James Pethokoukis, DeWitt Wallace Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute you’re projecting. AGAIN..

    This is why the heads of every one of these asswipes would look so much better on pikes than on their shoulders.

  102. 102.

    gorram

    October 12, 2014 at 11:50 pm

    @Scott S.: I know more than a few people who are perpetually broke *in spite* of being gainfully employed because of their cosplay habits. Plus, not only are there all the costs associated with making the costumes, cosplayers are honestly the people keeping local convention centers and tourism alive in some towns. I’m not sure if there’s a more capitalism-friendly habit in the Zeitgeist.

  103. 103.

    Arclite

    October 13, 2014 at 12:20 am

    I went to the 1973 NY Comic Art Convention, in my homemade Shanna the She-Devil costume

    Pictures, or it didn’t happen. =D

    I love how Anne Laurie was born like 40 years before her time.

  104. 104.

    Arclite

    October 13, 2014 at 12:31 am

    @GHayduke (formerly lojasmo):

    As a gainfully employed Gen Xer, I don’t understand Cosplayers

    As a gainfully employed Gen Xer, I wish I had time and energy for cosplay. I have so many ideas. But with a middle management position in a tech firm, two young children, and living in a small apartment, no time or space.

  105. 105.

    Amir Khalid

    October 13, 2014 at 2:49 am

    @a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
    Per the worldwide (i.e. outside-of-America) rules, and I’m outside of America right now, punctuation goes outside the quote marks unless it is part of the quotation. I am pleased to see this much more logical approach gaining traction in America.

  106. 106.

    Ruckus

    October 13, 2014 at 3:03 am

    @Amir Khalid:
    I was always taught outside unless part of the quote. That’s how I’m going to continue to operate because it makes the most sense. Word and grammar usage is different, even in english speaking countries. Just one example the word pissed. In the UK it means drunk, as in piss drunk. In the US it means mad. Both useful meanings but one is actually logical, especially if you drink a lot of beer.

  107. 107.

    Steeplejack

    October 13, 2014 at 3:09 am

    @Amir Khalid:

    Right. And from the front-page story on today’s Guardian Web site:

    “The healthcare workers who cared for this individual may have had a breach of the same nature,” Frieden said. “It is certainly very concerning and it tells us there is a need to enhance training and make sure protocols are followed.

    “The protocols work .  . but we know that even a single lapse or breach can result in infection.”

    But further down in the same story:

    Frieden said that so far they had found only one such person, who was “under active monitoring”, but “it is possible that other individuals were exposed”.

    WTF? There appear to be different rules for complete-sentence quotes and just-a-phrase quotes. How is that clearer or more logical than the current common U.S. usage? And please spare me the Grauniad jokes.

    I accept that there are national/regional differences in accepted style, but all too often what is in play is not someone following a different style but just their indulging in a sort of libertarian “I can’t be bothered with the rules” carelessness.

  108. 108.

    Amir Khalid

    October 13, 2014 at 3:26 am

    @Steeplejack:
    Those last two quotes you cite perfectly illustrate the rule about punctuation not original to the quote staying outside the quote marks. In the latter example, the writer implies makes it clear that he is not quoting to the end of the speaker’s sentence.
    ETA: The American “punctuation always inside” style doesn’t let you make that kind of distinction.

  109. 109.

    Steeplejack

    October 13, 2014 at 3:41 am

    @Amir Khalid:

    Oh, poppycock. It is clear that “under active monitoring” is a phrase extracted and quoted for effect, however you punctuate it, but how do you get that the punctuation of

    “it is possible that other individuals were exposed”.

    “makes it clear that he is not quoting to the end of the speaker’s sentence,” in supposed contrast to the first paragraphs’ punctuation? That is a finer level of sawdust-sawing than even I am used to.

  110. 110.

    sm*t cl*de

    October 13, 2014 at 3:42 am

    It’s only to say that any rise in people fleeing reality for fantasy suggests problems with our reality…

    Shriners, Masons, Order of the Elks and Kiwanis, on the other hand, are pillars of social capital.

  111. 111.

    sm*t cl*de

    October 13, 2014 at 3:49 am

    And who “shutters” rather than shudders.

    I blame the vogue for “shutter” instead of “shut” or “close”. Apparently it is more vivid, more visual to describe a company as ‘shuttering’.
    Don’t start me on ‘gifting’ when you mean ‘donating’.

  112. 112.

    Chris

    October 13, 2014 at 4:01 am

    @divF:

    Absolutely, in re your last paragraph – see “lost generation” and other Krugmanisms.

    The cost of college is making it even worse, because it means that even for those who do get settled, their first decade or two in the professional world is going to involve a ton of money that might otherwise have gone to buying a car, an apartment… or saving for retirement… is simply being gobbled up by the need to pay back the thing that got them started in life.

  113. 113.

    Chris

    October 13, 2014 at 4:13 am

    @Gex:

    Indeed it is.

    I remember when evangelicals were explaining to me that Halloween was dangerous because it released evil spirits, and I should be careful of not partaking in the festivities. I’ve heard the same thing about yoga.

    This is why you can’t keep them happy. It really doesn’t matter how many issues you give in on or how completely you give in on them, they’ll still find something, however innocuous, to waggle their finger at for insufficient Christianness/work ethic/wev.

  114. 114.

    Amir Khalid

    October 13, 2014 at 4:16 am

    @Steeplejack:
    Your mileage clearly varies, but to me (and to The Guardian) it isn’t sawing sawdust to make that distinction.

  115. 115.

    Chris

    October 13, 2014 at 4:28 am

    @srv:

    Oh, the traditional Bond villains still do a perfectly good job of portraying things. (The series itself seems aware of it, seeing as their Mad Billionaires have moved from being reculsive weirdos like Stromberg and Drax to rock star CEOs in plain sight like Carver or Greene).

    Not technically a comic book, but close enough…

  116. 116.

    Chris

    October 13, 2014 at 4:36 am

    @sm*t cl*de:

    It occurs to me that conventions like these aren’t too different from what David Brooks claimed to want in that column he wrote a few weeks ago about “friendship camps/retreats” for adults to get away from work and bond (“develop social capital.”)

    Of course, this is doubtless too unserious and frivolous a way to make friends for him.

  117. 117.

    NotMax

    October 13, 2014 at 5:10 am

    So old that remember the regular Phil Seuling ‘conventions’ held in a church basement in NYC.

  118. 118.

    Fred

    October 13, 2014 at 6:11 am

    You met Sergio Aragones? That’s marginally like meeting God. Or at least his right hand.
    My first MAD Magazine was #2. The one with Alfred E Neuman as the headless horseman.

  119. 119.

    sm*t cl*de

    October 13, 2014 at 6:23 am

    “friendship camps/retreats” for adults to get away from work and bond (“develop social capital.”)

    Don’t mention Bohemian Grove!

  120. 120.

    NotMax

    October 13, 2014 at 6:24 am

    @Fred

    Many years ago, when the San Diego con was still held in the old El Cortez hotel, found myself in an elevator with Mark Evanier and Sergio.

    One has to understand that the elevators in that ramshackle structure were notorious for being very, very slow.

    Got a decent belly laugh out of both of them by opining that they could knock out 5 or 6 issues of Groo in the time it would take to get to their floor.

  121. 121.

    Alex S.

    October 13, 2014 at 6:47 am

    @Scott S.:

    Very good argument! People need to spend the money they make. The whole point of an incentive-based economy is that people spend the money on something they want (i.e. not on student loan debt, rent, health car, insurance,…). This IS the economic point of hobbies.

  122. 122.

    Alex S.

    October 13, 2014 at 6:50 am

    Also, I like how this guy manages to cram a reference to labor regulation in there, because suddenly, it’s the older workers who are the problem. They should be easier to fire, or something like that.

  123. 123.

    revrick

    October 13, 2014 at 8:11 am

    @Ruckus: How are they different? Every increase in value I can imagine requires some input of energy.

  124. 124.

    contract3d

    October 13, 2014 at 8:13 am

    Y’am confused…

    How is LARPing any different from all those Civil War (and Revolutionary War) re-enactments?

    And also, how come no one re-enacts the War of 1812?

    Oh yeah – we lost.

  125. 125.

    contract3d

    October 13, 2014 at 8:20 am

    @revrick:

    Hmmm. Not engaging in the original argument here, just addressing your (rhetorical?) question in the abstract…

    “Every increase in value I can imagine requires some input of energy.”

    Look, it takes some amount of energy to turn a milligram of sand into a milligram of silicon substrate. Call it constant, roughly.

    In the 70’s that milligram of silicon was a NAND gate. Today it’s a 32bit CPU. Increase in value, much? Increase in energy, not so much.

    Honest. I was there. Look it up.

  126. 126.

    Mike in NC

    October 13, 2014 at 8:50 am

    @contract3d:

    how come no one re-enacts the War of 1812?
    Oh yeah – we lost.

    Well, not really. Charlton Heston and Yul Brynner won the war, according my to childhood afternoon TV watching.

  127. 127.

    NobodySpecial

    October 13, 2014 at 9:14 am

    It’s hard to blame them. After all, it’s not that these young adults in Japan are resisting becoming productive members of the economy — it’s that there just aren’t enough opportunities for them.

    Wonder what caused that? Fucking idiot, how does outsourcing work?

  128. 128.

    jon

    October 13, 2014 at 10:02 am

    Cosplayers: Learn to sew and craft costumes and weaponry that looks authentic enough or purposely inauthentic, attend conventions with like-minded fans of characters, often appear in charity causes such as walks/runs/hospital visits (look up the 501st, seriously,) and do it themselves. A blight on the world, surely. Also bad for the economy.

    Sports fans: Drink beer, travel hundreds or thousands of miles to see athletes run or drive around for a day, overeat, yell, scream, get emotionally attached to the results of sporting events, pay lots of money to corporations that run parking, concessions, and the teams, or they watch on television. Great for the world and the economy.

    Corporate raiders: drink wine and brandy, travel around the world on the pretext of having a business meeting so it’s tax-deductible, attend meetings with fellow-minded people who want to get rich, purchase corporations and skim away the pensions (legally, because Fuck You) and anything else worth taking, sell the parts, fire the workers or rehire them at a lower cost, and demand efficiency or else, profit, ????, profit, ????, profit, repeat. AWESOME for the world and the economy.

  129. 129.

    Lurking Canadian

    October 13, 2014 at 10:04 am

    @contract3d: plenty of people re enacting the Slaver’s Rebellion believe they lost, too.

  130. 130.

    feebog

    October 13, 2014 at 10:50 am

    My son and DiL have been into cosplay for years. My DiL even works for a company that specializes in clothes for female Cosplayers. They either make their own clothes or buy at thrift stores and alter to suit the character. They probably spend less per year than I spend on golf.

  131. 131.

    SpotWeld

    October 13, 2014 at 11:59 am

    Cosplay feeds right into the DIY culture that is on an upswing.
    It’s a means of skill-aquiring that was on the decline since we moved out to the suburbs.

    I’m for it. And yeah, I’ve staff cons where people cross-gendered fursuited.

  132. 132.

    Brendanyc

    October 13, 2014 at 2:54 pm

    @MomSense: oh. thanks. i knew it was something (i live in downtown manhattan so i see the comicon folks out and about) but i never realized it was such a big deal.

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