I think another part of it is an intuition about—how do I put this? Not wanting to commit fraud?—or not wanting to commit _obvious_ fraud. The reason I'm so glad that [there's a word for the thing](/2017/Feb/a-beacon-through-the-darkness-or-getting-it-right-the-first-time/) that isn't "crossdresser" or "transvestite" is because it's not about the clothes; it's about wanting to actually have the body of the other sex. The clothes are just a prop. And the prop ... _noticeably doesn't work_. I don't pass; I have _never_ passed. My voice is wrong; my skeleton is wrong; my movement is wrong; my face continues to be wrong despite makeup. At least at Fanime (where everyone _and her dog_ is in costume) there's no pretense that the pretense is anything more than that. If you fool someone—if only for a moment—then great, but if not, then at least you're not fooling anyone about whether you're fooling yourself.
-I'm probably just _bad_ at crossdressing/cosplay? I've never put the kind of _effort_ into, say, a makeup tutorial the way I do for my intellectual endeavors. My Fanime costume was authored by the Amazon product recommendation algorithm: after adding the pink wig to my shopping cart, the "Discover Related Products" sidebar picked out the hoop skirt and the Mr. Universe tee from Episode 48 ["Story for Steven"](https://steven-universe.fandom.com/wiki/Story_for_Steven). (The sword in the photo illustrating this post is borrowed from another cosplayer cropped out-of-frame.) And unless I become more skilled, I feel like I've hit diminishing returns on conventions—like whatever I was going to get out the experience, I would have gotten either this time or one of the last six (previously: as Ens. Silvia Tilly at San Francisco Comic-Con 2018, as _Equestria Girls_ Twilight Sparkle at BABSCon 2018, [as Korra at San Francisco Comic-Con 2017](/2017/Oct/a-leaf-in-the-crosswind/), [as Pearl at FanimeCon 2017](http://zackmdavis.net/blog/2017/05/gems-will-be-gems/), as [Lt. Jadzia Dax (circa 2369) at the _Star Trek_ 50 Year Mission Tour San Francisco 2016](/2016/Dec/joined/), [as Pearl as San Francsico Comic-Con 2016](/2016/Sep/is-there-affirmative-action-for-incompetent-crossplay/)).
+I'm probably just _bad_ at crossdressing/cosplay? I've never put the kind of _effort_ into, say, a makeup tutorial the way I do for my intellectual endeavors. My Fanime costume was authored by the Amazon product recommendation algorithm: after adding the pink wig to my shopping cart, [the "Discover Related Products" sidebar picked out](/images/discover_related_products.png) the hoop skirt and the Mr. Universe tee from Episode 48 ["Story for Steven"](https://steven-universe.fandom.com/wiki/Story_for_Steven). (The sword in the photo illustrating this post is borrowed from another cosplayer cropped out-of-frame.) And unless I become more skilled, I feel like I've hit diminishing returns on conventions—like whatever I was going to get out the experience, I would have gotten either this time or one of the last six (previously: as Ens. Silvia Tilly at San Francisco Comic-Con 2018, as _Equestria Girls_ Twilight Sparkle at BABSCon 2018, [as Korra at San Francisco Comic-Con 2017](/2017/Oct/a-leaf-in-the-crosswind/), [as Pearl at FanimeCon 2017](http://zackmdavis.net/blog/2017/05/gems-will-be-gems/), as [Lt. Jadzia Dax (circa 2369) at the _Star Trek_ 50 Year Mission Tour San Francisco 2016](/2016/Dec/joined/), [as Pearl as San Francsico Comic-Con 2016](/2016/Sep/is-there-affirmative-action-for-incompetent-crossplay/)).
As far as other special events go, I'm flying out to Portland—the real Portland—tonight for a tech conference, and to visit friend of the blog [Sophia](/author/sophia/). You'd think a few days of vacation should do me good—I've been an psychological wreck all year (I mean, even more than my average year) over having accidentally catalyzed a civil war in my local robot cult—except that the same cultural forces that have subtly-yet-fatally corrupted my beautiful robot cult, just _own_ the open-source tech scene outright, which is likely to present a source of additional stress. The spirit of bravery that sings, [_I will fight for the place where I'm free—for the world I was made in_](https://genius.com/16627280), must subsist in a brain wracked by constant emotional pain that—sometimes—is just tired of fighting.
projects / Ultimately_Untrue_Thought.git / blobdiff