Given how people generally seemed to like my previous female armor post (save for one comment that argued that criticizing the depiction of warrior women wearing these and stating that in real life warrior women wouldn’t wear anything like that and that these are highly sexualized is slut-shaming of fictional characters), I’m happy to present part two. Originally it was going to be about torso armor, but several people asked for butts. Now, I hadn’t given thought to butts as much, because unlike boobs, that are depicted as existing almost separately from the entire body, butts are more often incorporated into the rest of the outfit.
The most interesting thing about these images (for me) was my own entirely positive initial reaction.
At first glance, I thought it might be a cute little guide to styles of burlesque underpants. (I got a good laugh out of the flavour text beside a depiction of what is essentially a fancy merkin: “Where is the point of disappearance?” ..and chuckled at mentions of crystal and magic jewels.) Reading on, and considering the artist’s own understandably sarcastic statements, I can see it’s actually intended as playful criticism of costumes designed to unnecessarily hypersexualize female characters in sci-fi and fantasy media (comic books, video games, movies, art, whatnot). I have a bit of a nerdy background, so of course the satirical aspect of these drawings struck a chord with me, (and I wholeheartedly agree with what’s being said,) but on the other hand I am an actual seamstress for actual strippers; my clients specifically request cheeky windows, plunging necklines, and short hems that show off some t&a; mystery (“how does it stay up/on?” or “how did it just come off?”) is alluring; properties like fabric transparency and movement are essential to the art of the tease. That flowing long loincloth is an oldschool bump ‘n’ grind panel skirt, for goodness’ sake.
If a real or fictional character’s purpose or motivation, whether onstage or in a comic book, is to actively bare herself and seduce her audience for whatever reason, then YES, go forth and dress that character in designs like these! This sort of costuming IS appropriate for those who choose to reveal their bodies.. it IS NOT appropriate for questing, fighting crime, keeping warm, protecting vital organs from bullets or lasers or spears or maces, flying a spaceship, wrestling dinosaurs, whatever. I’m a big fan of form following function, (for example, while a full-body unitard may be revealing in its way, it would also be totally appropriate when a heroic person of any gender must streamline themselves to move quickly through water or air – I don’t get annoyed by stuff like that,) but when there’s visual dissonance between a superheroine’s costume and the feats she performs while wearing it, coupled with a shameless attempt to make her outfit needlessly revealing and titillating, it irritates me. When an exotic dancer or burlesque entertainer’s attire is cleverly or beautifully revealing and titillating, I nod my head and think “well done” ..because stripping is her superpower, and form follows function in every sense.
That was very well said, thank you 🙂
That post got ten million times better when a person who tailors costumes for strippers and exotic dancers added her thoughts on booty “armor”. Took the liberty of bolding crucial parts.
What is your opinion regarding the Adepta Sororitas’ (Warhammer 40k) armor? The flaws that I can see are their boob-sock-plate-torpedo-things and the general lack of a helmet. Are there any other flaws that you can point out? The ask does not allow links, or I just do not know how to properly add one, sorry. :<
Here’s why I’m not the person to ask such questions, in case you missed the note…
…BUUUUT it just happens that the very first submission to this blog was a very comprehensive article my friend wrote about Sisters of Battle, especially Sisters Repentia.
In short, Warhammer 40k is pretty ridiculous by definition, but regular Sisters have surprisingly decent armor (for the standards of such setting, that is), with the only major fault being the boobplate…
With Sisters Repentia though, as much as the idea of redemption by death is interesting, there is no reason why their death-wish outfits need to be the skimpy, pants-lacking, physics-defying… uh, this:
Edit: Valuable comments by yanavaseva
replied to your post:
And these aren’t even the most blatant sisters repentia outfits I’ve seen. As of regular sisters of battle, sometimes they are drawn with high heels, but on the other hand, sometimes they have helmets and not a boobplate, so this balances it out.
Attractive armor without bikini
ladyofpayne submitted:
Armor bikini shows how tasteless a designer is. If talented artist wants to show attractiveness of a woman he will draw something like this.
GORGEOUS! A bit too skin-tight for my sensibilities, but definitely shows tons of talent and creativity compared to the generic bikini armor.
on a textual level, a female character can dress however she wants and shouldn’t be slut-shamed and hated for what she prefers to wear.
on a metatextual level, she might still have been designed with an intention to provide fanservice.
this means that criticising a design, as opposed to a character, is neither misogyny nor slut-shaming. being displeased about the way a character has been designed is not synonymous with hating her.
have i made myself clear?
CRYSTAL CLEAR.
PS: I love you, durendals. Why didn’t I see this post on my dash ever before? It’s perfection.
Female Armor Bingo media coverage
Good news: my Female Armor Bingo (and its rhetoric spinoff) got featured on a few popular geek sites, including Kotaku and MarySue.
Bad news: no-one asked me about it.
I absolutely appreciate the rise of my work into virality and am very satisfied with how all the articles I found are well-worded and supportive of my cause, but… once I found out last night, I had to personally contact every one of them and ask to edit the contents, so that they won’t feature full-res version of my graphics and would link back to the bingos on tumblr and deviantArt.
All the editors were super cool about it and adhered to my requests (sadly, two of the articles got deleted altogether, which was the least preferred option to me personally).
I’m grateful that everyone apologized, but the fact that I had to ask for this apology was very unprofessional of them.
All of that trouble could be avoided, though, if they contacted me before publishing the articles.
Let’s make it clear why I wasn’t 100% okay with the way things got done before my intervention:
- My graphics were published in full resolution – for everyone to take without the need of visiting my original tumblr (1, 2) or deviantart (1, 2) posts.
That both steals traffic from my sites and leads to random people downloading and reposting my work without credit (FYI: on tumblr the only acceptable form of credit is reblogging the original post, not reposting it as a completely new thread!). - Even though pretty much every article properly credited me as the creator (and linked to my dA profile), many did not link directly to where the original versions of the bingo cards can be found (why it is bad, see above).
- Every site that reported on my bingos gets ad revenue for the views. Considering my images were used in their entirety as part of the articles, it constituted to these sites making money off my graphics.
As far as I’m familiar with copyright law (and as professional artist I need to know the basics), putting my whole full-res graphics in there does not count as quotation or fair use. That’s why I asked every site to replace the images with low-res thumbnails and/or with direct links to where they can be originally found.
As much as I’m grateful the contacted sites changed the articles to suit my requests (even though apparently I won’t see a dollar for the time my full-res work WAS featured), I have to say some peculiar arguments were raised as explanation to using my graphics…
Suggestions that some “news value” makes my work fair use or that I, by putting credit on those bingo cards, encourage sharing of the images around the internet (I do, but not for commercial purposes!). Someone else tried to put the onus on me by claiming I didn’t left any usage instructions, as if “contact the writer and respect copyright” rule didn’t go without saying.
Inspired by that, I will write down usage instructions for my Bingo cards in a separate post and will update the original posts with it as well.
PS: I’m surprised that I haven’t heard of this coverage from my followers. Chances are, some of the newest ones found out about BABD from Kotaku but never mentioned it. Of course you guys aren’t required to message me about how you found me (that would be incovenience to everyone, including me). It’s just unfortunate with such big chances, no-one asked me “Have you seen what MarySue wrote about your bingo?”
Edit: Post Scriptum edited for clarity. Sorry for wording it as if I blamed you guys for not telling me. I really don’t. Plus some few minor wording edits. That’s what I get for writing just before sleep.
Posts I won’t be making
Bringing this back, because many readers clearly have trouble with scrolling a few posts down and reading it, so here:
I am NOT INTERESTED in “Have you seen this particular costume/character/show/game?” messages. I won’t be publishing those asks and my private answers will link back to the post below.
However, IF YOU DO HAVE INTERESTING COMMENTARY on some particular costume/character/show/game and want to share it, then submit it as image post and add your comments in the description. Examples may be positive or negative, as long as there’s something constructive to say about them.
Keep in mind, it must be image + commentary. Chances are, I will not post only images or only comments, because they’re inconclusive on their own (especially if I’m not familiar with what’s submitted, which is not unlikely).
Since the blog almost doubled in popularity since last week, I’ve been getting the same types of asks and submissions, and as far as I’m grateful for attention from you, dear readers, I’ll try to explain why submissions below aren’t what I’m looking for:
voqurnen-jovein submitted:
Female Armor Rhetoric BINGO (PDF) by OzzieScribbler (again, yours truly)
[…]
I only have one bone to pick with this bingo card, and that’s the “male barbarians also fight naked” part. Part of any fictional world are the many smaller cultures and areas that make it up. If a harsh (hot/humid/insert condition that would make being completely clothed impractical) environment has people living there, and the guys are walking around in loin cloths or just enough clothing to be considered decent, then I don’t think its such a bad thing for women to either. It’s when we have guys walking around comfortably in full plate (well, as comfortable as one could be in it I guess) while women are in the whole chainmail bikini thing that I feel we should cry foul. This is just my opinion of course, but consistency is important. Other than that one block, the rest of this is spot on.
Not to be rude, but…
guys are walking around in loin cloths or just enough clothing to be considered decent, then I don’t think its such a bad thing for women to either.
That’s the thing: barbarian women usually DO NOT walk around in loincloths. They wear fur or metal bikinis (scalemail seems to be the standard). If Red Sonja was dressed like Conan, there would be no problem. THIS IS THE DIFFERENCE
[Please give the artist much deserved love!]
Edit: Added deviantArt link to the piece, in case you guys didn’t follow the link above the picture!