I dress up in costume frequently and voluntarily. My costumes are of the designer label in animal pajamas, SAZAC.

Being that I weigh 250 lbs and even if I can find a bikini to fit me as an infographic said "Every body is a bikini body", it's the jelly rolls of my body that causes detraction.

So, I would dress a little more sexy in my costumes, besides showing off cleavage and panties and the legs connected, but as people can be cruel in cosplaying, I just can't stand negative criticisms.

I dress up for shits and giggles to keep people guessing. Especially when I get silly and want to challenge normalcy

The thing about cosplay that I was told was it doesn't matter the size, color, gender or age of the cosplayer...it really should be about having fun. The "cosplay hate" has to end.

To my fellow members, do you agree or disagree that cosplay and dressing up in costume only belongs to a distinct class, or does this ideal of "You can't dress as that" is stupid, outdated and needs to go?

Share your experience with dressing up.

I'm part of a cosplay group on facebook and every day it's people asking who they should and shouldn't cosplay as and posts on "body shaming" and "cosplayer hate". I never throw in my two-cents because I don't really know how I feel about it.

I think it's good when people feel like they can freely express themselves. My first cosplay was a very simplified Reborn from Hitman reborn - of course, it wasn't very accurate because for one, I'm not a toddler, for two - I have very long ginger hair and for three - I'm female. However, I enjoyed wearing it (I was a huge Hitman Reborn fan at the time), so I would call it a 'successful cosplay'. Which I think is good. I see loads of people dressing up and having fun at comic-con, and I often travel from con to con when I have the money (I was suppose to go to Telford MCM next month, but sadly I can't due to uni work) and you get tired of seeing the same old 5 characters (Link, Finn, Deadpool, L from death note and a Pikachu onesie) so really I encourage people to dress as whatever they want at comic-con, or anywhere really, because it means I can take more interesting photos and marvel at cosplay no matter how 'bad' or 'good' people think it is - to be honest, when I walk up to people and ask for a picture, it's more about how much I love the anime/manga/videogame they're from, so you can imagine after the first 2 or so Links, I'm pretty bored of seeing them no matter how 'good' or 'bad' they are. Last con I went to was Manchester expo, and I took a total of.... 10... pictures. That's it - and 3 of those were pictures of my little sister dressed in a princess dress trying to eat a cookie the size of her head. So yeah, cosplay for me is more about seeing a bunch of art, not the same thing over and over again - so yeah.. I dunno where I'm going with this tangent but ok.

Though, I do admit that there is slight more enjoyment in seeing someone of the same age/race/gender as the character they're cosplaying. Yes, I enjoy creative freedom and cosplays can still look amazing even if the cosplayer isn't all that accurate, but at the same time - they're not that gender, and I really do enjoy seeing someone cosplay something exactly. I would never ever tell someone off or shame them for being the wrong gender or age or bodytype or whatever, because quite frankly sticking to stuff like that really does limit characters. I've done four cosplays (5 if you include the "pokemon trainer" I was when I didn't have time to make a proper cosplay), and after realizing that I can't stand wearing wigs (especially not 1 meter long bright blue wigs ) and I have a bit of a phobia of dying my hair, I've always felt very limited - especially because for the life of me I can't straighten my hair, it just goes right back to curly again in minutes - and lets face it, how many long curly haired ginger characters are there?! but the sad part is, if I cosplay anything that doesn't fit with my long hair/feminine body/gender - I don't get as much attention. and although I don't really do it for the attention, I feel really sad when I work all the way up to 6am the day of the con making a costume, that no-one ever asks for a picture of me with, even though that one year that I bought a costume and threw it on without putting any effort in, I ended up posing for loads of peoples pictures.

Then again, being 'accurate' isn't always the case. A lot of times when I'm watching videos after comic-con, I notice that they only really take pictures of the attractive female cosplayers, instead of those most accurate - and yknow I get that if you're attractive you have full right to flaunt it, but again last cosplay I worked so super hard on my costume, and I got like 2 pictures... and I never even managed to track them down afterwards. Because of that, sometimes I just think "is it even worth all this effort?" - because I've kinda lost interest in cosplaying as a whole, it's not worth the hours of work for me. Yes, I have fun running around all dressed up, but is it really all that worth it when no-one wants a picture with me, no-one is cosplaying anything new and interesting, and all the stalls at cons are terribly over-priced. I'm considering just wearing normal clothes to Birmingham comic-con, it would save a lot of time packing.

That being said, I love dressing up. Sometimes I dress up around the house. I have a collection of onesies and once a month me and my friend dress up in onesies and have a sleep-over. I dress up in 50s style dresses whenever I'm cleaning the house (otherwise I usually just get bored and give up) and I really enjoy the whole feel of being someone other than myself once in a while, it's very therapeutic.

I dress in onesies on especially cold days and when I must leave the house, I choose fluffy fleece ones and I wear them around town. I feel like my perspective changes when I take on the animal the onesie resemble. I feel like I come out of my shell when I dress up.

So the psychological benefits are best when you are stuck in a rut. I see the advantage to temporarily suspend your normal ego.

When did cosplaying turn into supermodeling?

I once tried to copslay Stocking in her school uniform from "Panty and Stocking with Garterbelt" for a university event, but I didn't have the Zorro-colored hair to match. Managed to borrow a sword from someone at the event and got a few photos, but I feel awkward posting them. Still have the clothes in question, I might redo the cosplay in future since I now have purple clip-ins to mimic the inner layer.

In real life, I tend to dress in the nerdiest style I know, or in mild Gothic. Then I get scolded for dressing in the latter, as my mother can't stand dark colors or nail polish or makeup. She thinks young ladies should wear bright colors.

If I, who looks like this -
https://fbcdn-sphotos-e-a.akamaihd....b05b7e01130c59f(Picture a fat body, too)

Want to dress like an anime woman who looks like this - http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net...&path-prefix=es

And someone has a problem with that - THEY CAN SUCK MY DICK... WHICH I DON'T HAVE, BUT STILL!

Seriously. Yeah, it's cool when someone fits the skin, sex and body type, and on rare occasion face of a character perfectly, but that's not NORMAL. The majority of cosplayers look nothing like the characters they portray and anyone who has an issue with that must have an issue with cosplay as a whole, which basically means their opinion on the subjects doesn't matter. Also most cosplayers don't care about being dead-on. They're just having a bit of fun. Making the costume, and acting like their favourite characters for a bit, around and with other people who appreciate it - That's the core of cosplay.

Aside from Halloween-related shenanigans, the only costuming I've done has been for LARPing, and I honestly think that seems more fun than cosplaying. When you LARP, you create an original character for the game your'e playing, so you can be really creative, take on a persona that's nothing like your own, and have it "match" you perfectly -- after all, there's nothing to compare it to except the vision in your head.

Cosplaying seems neat and I like seeing the costumes, but trying to match a character from some other source just isn't as interesting to me as creating something myself.

Meh - I put on a costume every day I go to work: I pretend to be a mature person. The joke's on them!

I would cosplay, but seeing as I don't have the time, I have to resort to drooling over images of people who actually do.

I think cosplay looks fun. I've never tried it, although we had a fancy dress night out for work, and I went as Sarah from Labyrinth. I love Labyrinth, but I had actually wanted to go as Audrey from Little Shop of Horrors. I changed it to Sarah because I have lost my figure (I have gone from a size 10/12 to a 14 over the last 5 years) and felt that her outfit was more forgiving. I was as accurate as I could afford (replica waistcoats are very expensive, so I just bought a plain beige one), I even bought a wig and her jewellry, down to the ring she pays the birdman with for information. I thought people would be impressed, but only one person knew who I was, and I got no male attention all night, it was like being invisible. Obviously I had fun with my work mates, but it was really disappointing considering all the effort I had gone to.

There are certain things I wouldn't wear now, not until I have lost the weight. It just doesn't look nice, and makes me feel uncomfortable and self-conscious.