Cosplay Ethics

[ambrmerlinus]

Here on the recommendation of dorothean to propose an idea and ask for advice.

I am giving serious consideration to cosplaying Tavros from the webcomic Homestuck. There are a few logistical problems (mainly, how am I going to make those horns? and get them to stick on my head?), but those can be overcome with time, hard work, and ingenuity. What is really bothering me are the ethical problems.

Tavros is a wheelchair user.

I am not a wheelchair user.

And I really, REALLY don't want to hurt or upset anyone with my cosplay.

Logistically, it is no problem. I have the wheelchair. It is sitting in my living room as we speak. I can reach out and touch it right now.* But still: ethics.

There are several ways I could circumvent this issue. I could portray Tavros from the pre-wheelchair-using point in his canon, but that's such a small slice of the story and it honestly feels like a cop-out. (As in, the only time he is shown in the webcomic as a non-wheelchair-user is when they are explaining how he became a wheelchair user in the first place. Very quick flashback, not really the character as he is best known.)

I could also be Tavros in his post-wheelchair-using incarnation. (He gets robotic legs. The whole situation is problematic at best and disturbing at worst.) While I could conceivably make robotic legs with the magic of the aforementioned time+work+ingenuity equation, again, most of the webcomic deals with wheelchair-using Tavros, not pre-wheelchair-using or robo-legs Tavros.

Alternatively, one could argue that since cosplay is done for fun and not profit, I am not hurting anyone by pretending to be a character who uses a wheelchair. (Unlike, say, the Glee casting department, who went with a non-wheelchair-using actor for a wheelchair-using character and my God does it show in the choreography.) But this feels like misdirection to me, as in, "Okay I might be doing something objectionable but at least I'm not doing something worse like those guys!" Total cop-out, not cool.

I am telling you all this in the hopes of sparking some conversation, getting some feedback from a variety of sources outside my own head, and perhaps talking to people who have confronted this issue in the past and may have some advice.

So... thoughts?

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*Why do I have a wheelchair on hand if I am not a wheelchair user? Short version: My roommate is the president of my school's theater company. The company puts on a production of The Rocky Horror Picture Show every year, and they own a wheelchair for that purpose. I borrowed the wheelchair to do some amateur accessibility testing on my campus... annnd I have yet to return it. They don't need it until September, I'm sure it will be fine.

Comments

[lightgetsin]

Long comment is long.

Just for some background on crip drag that you may or may not know: there is a long and . . . uh, somewhat upsetting history of people acting as "pretenders" for the purposes of sexual fetish. Which, on the one hand, fetish, not my business, carry on. But on the other hand, the little amount of medical and academic literature available in which a few pretenders discuss what they are doing is so fucking disturbing to me because the fetish is framed in the worst of ablist language. Disabled bodies are "wrong" and "aberrant," but getting to pretend to have one feels good because you will be admired as an "overcomer." ...Ick. (I've done a lot of reading and writing on this, can you tell?)

Anyway, so my reaction is colored by the fact that, you know, this isn't that.

And I completely disagree with the commenter above who said that since you're thinking about this as an ethical issue, you'll do the right thing. No. People think about ethics and do the "wrong thing" all the time. Having thoughts is not a free pass. Assuming there even is a "right thing" here.

All that said, my bottom line reaction is that more damage is done systemically by people being too afraid to play in these waters than by the admittedly splashy people who do it and fail. Maybe someone will be offended, you just don't know. And maybe it'll just be because they're oversensitive and primed to be offended by anything, or maybe they'll be able to articulate some fundamental reason from psychology or theory why it's not okay that none of us could think of. I doubt it on that last, but who knows. The point is this is obviously something you want to do, and a character with a disability that you care about, and whose representations in fannish and media circles you want to participate in. Which is awesome. So you might offend someone, but I personally think the really ethical thing to do would be to be brave and try it anyway. Do it for the systems!

[aron_kristina]

I'm assuming you meant my comment, and I said 'good choice', not 'right choice', because, as illustrated by the discussion here, is no right and wrong in this case.

And I only meant that comment to apply to ambrmerlinus specific question, not every choice ever. That said, I rarely think there is a right choice, more like good choices and not so good choices. Or in some cases bad choices and choices.

[lightgetsin]

specific question, not every choice ever.

Yes, I know, and though I apologize for mischaracterizing your adverbs, I still completely disagree with you. Op isn't immunized from failing or creating offense just by having seriously thought about the ethics here. Nor does engaging in ethical debate ensure zie will make an ethical decision. Thinking about these things is cool -- thinking about them with as much consideration and engagement as the op has is awesome -- but it's not a panacea. Ethical discussion is very helpful (and in cases like this often quite awesome), and it will hopefully help the op decide what is the comfortable choice in the circumstances for zie. But if the op does unfortunately end up confronting a situation where zie has to defend the cosplay (which would surprise me, but hey, you never know), "but I thought about it hard first!" is not a get out of jail free card, and it doesn't mean the cosplay was by definition a good choice to start with. My off-the-cuff bet is that the op is far more sensible than that, but then again I am shocked every time some otherwise really clued-in feminist blogger or fandom person (just to take two completely not random examples) is challenged on something which may or may not be faily and responds with, "but I thought about it first! I had a discussion! So of course it was okay!" That is how this line of thinking becomes disruptive and faily in itself.

[sophygurl]

And I completely disagree with the commenter above who said that since you're thinking about this as an ethical issue, you'll do the right thing. No. People think about ethics and do the "wrong thing" all the time. Having thoughts is not a free pass. Assuming there even is a "right thing" here.

Word.

Thinking carefully about a thing might make one more likely to get it right, but is certainly not a guarantee. That line of thinking always gets under my skin.