Lessons To Give To The Cosplayers And Makeup Communities

The cosplay and makeup communities have humble beginnings as beloved hobbies with quieter followings. With the rise of social media, both cosplay and makeup (“makeup” here meaning mostly the community on YouTube and Instagram) have skyrocketed in terms of popularity and prestige. In addition to the explosive growth, social media has brought a time of integration to both communities.

With more and more people joining in, it’s now common to be a part of both communities. Many cosplayers have started doing fashion-esque makeup in their spare time, while beauty gurus have begun to dip their toes into the world of cosplaying. Because of this slow merge, it’s become apparent that the cosplay and makeup communities have many things in common (both good and bad) and both have lessons they could either teach each other or learn together.

Similarities

At their cores, the cosplay and makeup communities are about transforming oneself into anything imaginable. They are both artistic hobbies. Both would inevitably have an abundance of similarities due to this, ranging from positive to extremely negative. As stated before, with both communities becoming more popular online, these similarities are slowly coming to light.

The Good

Cosplay and makeup are all about creative expression. Cosplay lends itself to tons of different ways to create and be one particular character, with each person’s costume and interpretation being different from another. In the same vein, makeup is as abundant in creative expression as any other art form (i.e., painting), as more and more people break the mold of “everyday” makeup looks. Since they are such large creative outlets, many people have used them to express themselves, ranging from using makeup and cosplay to explore (and push back against) gender to making political statements.

Because of how individualistic these communities can be, there’s tons of room (theoretically) for everyone. In addition, since there is room for so many different voices and types of expressions, both communities lend themselves to being places full of diverse feedback. With a healthy range of feedback, one can push themselves into bettering their skills in either, which in turn creates a more artful and creative space (leading to a positive feedback loop, in a way).

The Ugly

Of course, no community is without its flaws. The makeup and cosplay communities are no exception. As social media becomes the dominant way to show off one’s skill and meet like-minded people, it also opens the door for both communities’ commercialization. While makeup has always had problems dealing with racism, fatphobia, and other -isms/-phobias, the rise of social media has made these issues way more apparent (and seemingly way more often), as more and more people are outed as bigots.

Cosplay also has its fair amount of issues with bigotry and commercialism. Peple who wish to uphold Euro-centric beauty standards try to pressure members who do not fit that mold (i.e., people of color, plus-size people, etc.) out of the community. Of course, these issues always have and will always be a problem for both communities due to their nature, but the rise of social media has made it easier to see them in plain view, as these problems occur publicly on news feeds and timelines. The public airing of these issues also gives both communities a hostile connotation. Since it’s the negative aspects that end up in the news more often, it can scare off the more marginalized groups within the communities.

Lessons To Learn From Each Other

As these communities grow in size and closer to each other, some lessons both need to learn together before either can be the healthiest community they can be. Of course, the biggest lesson is the need to better combat the bigotry and hostility in both communities. In simple terms, the best way to deal with the dark underbelly of the cosplay and makeup communities is to better listen to those affected by said bigotry.

If no one outside of these marginalized groups admits that there is a problem, nothing can be fixed. Of course, listening here also means doing one’s best to uplift marginalized voices within the communities (instead of speaking for them) and actively and loudly rejecting those who are bigots. Fixing these issues will also take introspection both on a personal level and on a community level. If people can understand why these issues are so prevalent (or, on the flip side, understand why they don’t think these things are issues), it becomes easier to uproot them fully.

Outside of lessons the cosplay and makeup communities should learn together, there are some things they can learn from each other. Even though both are extremely similar in nature, the experiences one could have within them are different. For instance, a lesson the makeup community could learn from cosplayers is how to have a better conversation about the idea of “copying.” Social media makes having your content seen a game of numbers so that the makeup community can be competitive at times.

If two community members upload similar makeup looks within a certain period of time, it can lead to a nasty fight about whether or not the idea was stolen from someone. This is rare (or even nonexistent) between cosplayers. Since the goal of cosplay is to dress up as a character, two people will inevitably dress up as the same character. When that happens, both people usually are excited, as it means they both have something specific in common (the love of whatever character they’re cosplaying). If the two communities interact more, perhaps the makeup community can learn to have that same enthusiastic response.

Let’s Be One Happy Family

Social media continues to connect people globally every day. As this connection grows, hobby communities grow too, since more people find others who share their passions. Cosplay and makeup are no exception. Also, while people find and join these communities separately through Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube, there are a growing number of people joining both or crossing lines to dabble in the other.

A few years ago, makeup gurus on YouTube seemed to only do costumes on Halloween; some are starting to do them in addition to fashion-like makeup. Likewise, cosplayers are picking up their makeup kits outside of the convention setting to do makeup looks to post online. It seems that soon, more and more community members in both will be more like Snitchery, blending their passions together than not. Let’s hope both can better themselves through this integration.