Personally, I don't really think the language that Tony used was the best but it is his personal take on things. He's got every right to voice them. That said though, he should expect he backlash that's going around out there due to the way it was phrased. I mean he attacked an entire segment of cosplayers, like that's going to over well? No, it's not at all.
Here's the original rant:
I cant remember if Ive said this before, but Im gonna say it anyway. I dont give a crap.I appreciate a pretty Gal as much as the next Hetero Male. Sometimes I even go in for some racy type stuff ( keeping the comments PG for my Ladies sake) but dammit, dammit, dammit I am so sick and tired of the whole COSPLAY-Chiks. I know a few who are actually pretty cool-and BIG Shocker, love and read Comics.So as in all things, they are the exception to the rule. Heres the statement I wanna make, based on THE RULE: “Hey! Quasi-Pretty-NOT-Hot-Girl, you are more pathetic than the REAL Nerds, who YOU secretly think are REALLY PATHETIC. But we are onto you. Some of us are aware that you are ever so average on an everyday basis. But you have a couple of things going your way. You are willing to become almost completely Naked in public, and yer either skinny( Well, some or most of you, THINK you are ) or you have Big Boobies. Notice I didnt say GREAT Boobies? You are what I refer to as “CON-HOT”. Well not by my estimation, but according to a LOT of average Comic Book Fans who either RARELY speak to, or NEVER speak to girls. Some Virgins, ALL unconfident when it comes to girls, and the ONE thing they all have in common? The are being preyed on by YOU. You have this really awful need for attention, for people to tell you your pretty, or Hot, and the thought of guys pleasuring themselves to the memory of you hanging on them with your glossy open lips, promising them the Moon and the Stars of pleasure, just makes your head vibrate. After many years of watching this shit go down every 3 seconds around or in front of my booth or table at ANY given Con in the country, I put this together. Well not just me. We are LEGION. And here it is, THE REASON WHY ALL THAT, sickens us: BECAUSE YOU DONT KNOW SHIT ABOUT COMICS, BEYOND WHATEVER GOOGLE IMAGE SEARCH YOU DID TO GET REF ON THE MOST MAINSTREAM CHARACTER WITH THE MOST REVEALING COSTUME EVER. And also, if ANY of these guys that you hang on tried to talk to you out of that Con? You wouldnt give them the fucking time of day. Shut up you damned liar, no you would not. Lying, Liar Face. Yer not Comics. Your just the thing that all the Comic Book, AND mainstream press flock to at Cons. And the real reason for the Con, and the damned costumes yer parading around in? That would be Comic Book Artists, and Comic Book Writers who make all that shit up.
There are a ton of new people getting into cosplay/comics these days thanks to the huge popularity of The Avengers, Iron Man, Thor and Batman trilogies. I mean even a movie like Cowboys vs Aliens can get made these days...so there are destined to be many people getting into things that may never have before and many take the "Halloween" route with things and go as "Sexy Whatever". I know that most really devout cosplayers aren't really huge fans of these people too, but usually it's with the caveat of "Well...maybe they'll learn". Most just don't care that much to rant on it I guess. I mean once something gets so popular, and cons these days are extremely popular and growing, you're going to get a kind of laissez faire crowd showing up. It's inevitable, to think otherwise is a bit naive as well.
I think he's also forgetting an important thing here. You're also going to get people that may look "average" who look better dressed up. Pssst, Tony...that's the case for most people and why wouldn't they feel good about it? 90% of the reason people cosplay at all is at some level for a little attention. Hate to break it to ya there, but it is. No one does it to go completely unnoticed. Some may just get the attention more because they look better in the cosplay. That's no reason to go all crazy here either.
I get that he's going after cosplayers that are there only for the attention, but generally you don't cosplay something you don't like. At least I've run into very few. Maybe this is a problem at places like SDCC or NYCC and Dragon*Con but it's not that common from what I've seen out there, in the crowd, not behind a table.
Sure, in a perfect world people who cosplay something would know the material and be respectful/playful with the character they're portraying, but we don't live in a perfect world. There's no reason to assume that either here. Some people may believe that the overly slutty/seductive cosplay out there is wrong or whatever, the truth of the matter is that you really have to blame the people creating the characters in a lot of cases. I mean that's where these cosplayers are getting the ideas from a good bit of time. Maybe not always, but it's fair to say that there's quite a bit due to how female characters are drawn and stylized in games, movies and comics. Tony has actually been one to speak out against this practice as well and loves the fact that more women are attending cons too to be perfectly fair.
However, I don't really think that this was the best way to go about things. Personally, I would've handled it a bit different. There's always going to be people at cons who are just there for attention or what have you on both sides of the sexes. That said, instead of lashing out like this, maybe a more subtle approach would have been better. Either way, people are talking about the issue now and maybe that was the intent all along...
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