Graham Johnson Illustration

oh wow, that would be an excellent project

I’m a lot more excited about the project now than before I’d thought of doing this. Obviously I’ll need to work on my environment skills a LOT (Ever wonder why I generally do blobby colour wash backgrounds? wonder no more! Although you probably guessed) and it’s not the sort of story I normally write so that might take some work, but it’s definitely something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.

lilprince:

iandsharman:

lilprince:

there are a few things that trouble me from time to time

one of them is that a lot of geek guys seem to think it’s ok to treat geek girls differently, like we are some sort of weird alien thing or some precious rare thing. We are neither of these. We are pretty often just like geek guys. Maybe a little less into the skimpy costumes but otherwise. We like to talk about the canon that’s been fucked up or why Batman would beat everyone or which characters are over used. I dunno, I just don’t get why we’re a different species. 

I also don’t get why we have to prove ourselves. If a geek guy has an opinion on a character then great but if a geek girl does, well she damn well better be able to prove she knows every little detail about what she’s talking about. 

Geek guys seem to seperate geek girls into three boxes box a) girls who are just there because their boyfriend/brother/male friend wants to buy comics box b) the sterotype “ugly” geek girl and box c) “beautiful” cosplay girls. I bet that most geek girls are none of these. We’re just people. There seems to be an assumption that a “good looking” (I’m putting all of these words in ” ” because they are all completely subjective and stupid terms) girl cannot be there for her own reasons, she must be with a dude. Or they are perfect women who cosplay geek guy’s favourite character and thus becomes something to be put on a pedestal and sometimes that can be more than a little creepy. 

All of these boxes are sexist. We shouldn’t be geek guys and geek girls we should just be geeks. All one and the same. 

I hope this has made a little sense and hasn’t been an inarticulate rant. 

See, I’ve always gotten on well with women/girls/people of a female persuasion. I’ve always had female friends. That’s been true at conventions too, we’ve pretty much always had women hanging out at the Orang Utan Comics table. What’s always pissed me off is the people who assume that they’re there for some reason other than that they’re simply my friends. If they’re pretty then I MUST be trying to get into their pants…I couldn’t possibly be talking about Batman with them, could I? Or creating a masterpiece like this:

The stuff I’ve been asked at times…the comments I’ve overheard…honestly…they’d make your skin crawl. I’ve also seen girls get completely ignored simply because they weren’t wearing a “sexy” costume. Seriously, I’ve seen guys walk up to three girls and ask for a picture with two of them, completely ignoring one girl because she wasn’t “hot” (and, actually, the girl in question was gorgeous…the fools!).

I’ve seen “geek guys” treat women like they can’t possibly know anything about comics, when the woman in question actually writes comics. I’ve seen guys ask me about a comic I have never read and never worked on rather than want to talk to the woman standing next to me who actually wrote it.

Guys, you need to grow the fuck up and look beyond the fact that 50% of the world’s population have boobs…and accept that some of them actually know more about Batman than you.

The cosplay photo incident brings a really major point about the “beautiful/sexy cosplay girls” thing. I’m really not a big fan of it. I think this stems from my own issues and experience so I’m not going to go there but I do think it makes a very valid point. If a girl isn’t in a “sexy” costume at a con or isn’t “pretty”, it is very likely she will be completely over looked, because she isn’t an object of desire. Most girls aren’t dressing up so that guys can stare at their boobs, or be groped (there may be some who want that attention but I highly doubt the majority are), I know that I wasn’t the few times I’ve worn more feminine costumes. And yet. Girls are dressing in costumes because they like the character, because they want to feel like that character for a day. Yes, ask for pictures, I’m sure that they’d love that, but don’t creep them out. Also, don’t make a point about telling a girl who isn’t in a “sexy” costume or is cosplaying as a guy that “it’s such a waste” “you’d look so hot as *insert character here*” etc etc because there is probably a reason and they are not going to appreciate that. It is not cool to tell a girl that. Geek guys, please don’t say these things, you are basically telling that girl that you want to see them in skimpy costumes. Not cool. 

Having just read this back, it sounds like I’m having a go at either one person or all people. I’m not. It just seems to have come out like that (oops).

Anyway, more rant. Sorry. 

I know I try to keep my blog reasonably work orientated (Believe it or not, I know it hasn’t seemed that way lately, sorry) but this stuff is pretty important, I’d say.