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I saw a comment on tumblr about Starfire, the character. Now, I love Kory. I think she's awesome. If I was listing great DC females, she'd definitely be on it. Where I differed from the one comment I read was about...that outfit. Yes, Starfire's outfit. It was described on tumblr as "fairly fan service-y" but the commenter liked the way George Perez drew her to look strong and didn't overdo the sexy poses. They said "She’s muscular and bold, and she looks so natural and comfortable in it, as if, yeah, this is what she’s chosen to wear and she’s happy wearing it...Like, as a young and confused teenaged lady reading the Wolfman/Pérez run of Teen Titans, Koriand’r and her obvious happiness in her own skin, how boldly she showed her skin (like, think about it: she’s a warrior and she dresses like that? Conclusion: GIRL CAN WRECK YOUR ASS AND YOU WON’T EVEN SCRATCH HER) and how comfortable she was in her sexuality—gosh, that was freeing. I hate that when I read a comic starring Koriand’r these days, it’s obvious she isn’t dressed or posing for herself, but to pander to the presumed audience of teenage dudes."
And while I'm happy other people can feel that way, I can't even in her better portrayals. And I feel wrong in even trying. Because I think the outfit's just terrible.
As I said on tumblr: I don’t find that outfit freeing. It makes me uncomfortable just looking at it—not uncomfortable in an embarrassed way because she's showing skin, but literally thinking the outfit looks uncomfortable and hard to keep on. Let's take a look at it:
To me, even in this subdued version and with this non-sexual pose, she looks like she’s dressing to pander to the presumed audience of teenaged guys. The skin shown in this outfit always seems to say "look at what you can almost see, boys!" rather than "girl can wreck your ass and you won't even scratch her" (except her wrists? Why the clunky wrist guards with the exposed midriff? I don't even.)
It's not like I expect these outfits to always make sense so I'm not going to argue it from a logical pov. I know that those tiny strips that cover her nipples are never going to shift in battle because they're drawn on and she's not going to be feeling any chafing at the thigh holes because she’s fictional and has super warrior skin or whatever. But I feel it when I look at a character dressed like this.
It bothers me when the explanation for this outfit comes down to her coming from a planet where they're just very casual about nudity. (I find her planet's open attitude about sex to also conform very conveniently to fantasy.) Nothing about this outfit says "casual about nudity" to me. Here's a couple of pictures from people in societies who have different standards of nudity from the west. This first picture was labeled as being a "Swahili girl":
And here's a naturalist:
These women, to me, look "naked." They don't consider it necessary to cover the breasts or in the bowler's case anything else, so they're not covering them. The girl at the top is wearing something around her neck as ornamentation, but not in a way that draws attention to her chest. The bowler is wearing bowling shoes, because they serve a specific purpose for what she's doing. There's nothing particular sexual, imo, about either of these outfits. Particularly the socks and bowling shoes ensemble. Kory's outfit, by contrast, directs the eye to the very parts of her body that the male audience would want to see but that she herself is not supposed to find particularly special.
It's not just that her outfit says "as naked as she can be without getting censored by the publisher," although I think that's part of it. It's that the neck ornament dangles down to draw attention to the cleavage, and the middle section dips, arrow-like, towards the vagina--not at all too badly in this, the non-overly-sexy version, but it doesn't take much for another artist to exaggerate it:
I don't know...I always think that's the kind of outfit that looks most natural airbrushed on somebody's van. Or on the cover of mass market fantasy. Why, if her culture thinks it’s silly to freak out about exposed breasts, do they wear clothing that's supposed to precariously covers the nipples at all times? And btw, have we seen older Tamaranians with the strip clinging to breasts less perky than Kory’s?
I admire Kory for being able to overcome this outfit with her personality, but I’m still angry on her behalf that she has to wear it and can’t bring myself to defend it as being the character’s choice as a warrior or a sign that she’s comfortable in her body. If someone else feels that way, that's fine--I really support them in letting Kory inspire them to feel comfortable in their body too. I think she is comfortable in her body, obviously. I just wouldn't want "feeling comfortable in your body" to become too tied to this kind of fanservice. I guess it feels to me like it gets too tied into saying that it's healthy to dress in the fashion male comic readers prefer as just another form of pressure. It’s like when Demi Moore was prattling on about stripping being empowering. It’s not that I lack respect for someone for being a stripper. I just don’t buy any feminist argument that consists of acting in a way men enjoy in women but don’t do themselves.
For contrast, here are female superheroes that *I* think look comfortable in their bodies:
I look at those outfits and think they look comfortable and easy to move in, and the girl looks comfortable in her body wearing them. Everything that needs support has support, the clothing isn't made up of pieces that look like they could go one way while she's going another. There’s no strapless bodice I’d be hiking up all night or thongs I’d be yanking down. The poses in all 3 pictures to me make the girl look physically controlled and graceful, like a sleek animal ready to spring or in the act of springing, eyes looking ahead because her body is going to go wherever she needs it to go. This is the silhouette I would go for in real life.
That first and second girl, btw, are the same girl in different outfits and I think she's awesome in both. Interestingly that girl, Cass Cain, is also canonically very free about nudity:
I love her scars and her knobby shoulders. In fact, they're more reasons I think she's a great example of "comfortable in her body" because the flaws and signs of a hard life seem like they're part of her appeal. We're looking at an impressive body here, but not an ideal body. It's a distinctive body where the form follows function, too sinewy and muscular to quite conform to the fantasy Kory's does. (Not to blame Kory for that in case anyone takes it as that--this is not a put down of women with softer lines or larger breasts and hips! Those have charming flaws to celebrate too!)
Cass is probably more at home in her body than anyone in the DCU except possibly Dick Grayson, it just doesn't translate into wanting to show as much torso and thigh as possible all the time. Some women do, and that's fine with me, but the percentage of them that exist amongst the superhero set is suspiciously high--on the female side. People sometimes argue that *all* superhero costumes are exploitive because they're tight, but this is disingenuous. All costumes are tight; only female costumes bare skin. It's like wanting to be a superhero is a desire that tends to go along with taste in clothing that is, as Tim Gunn put it when critiquing superhero costumes, "vulgar." I wouldn’t put anybody down for having that style (apologies since the word sounds insulting) but it’s just not that popular outside comics. This isn't about saying women should never bare skin or that bare skin is always exploitive. Just let's not pretend that the pattern of bare skin in comics is driven by things it isn't.
And while I'm happy other people can feel that way, I can't even in her better portrayals. And I feel wrong in even trying. Because I think the outfit's just terrible.
As I said on tumblr: I don’t find that outfit freeing. It makes me uncomfortable just looking at it—not uncomfortable in an embarrassed way because she's showing skin, but literally thinking the outfit looks uncomfortable and hard to keep on. Let's take a look at it:
To me, even in this subdued version and with this non-sexual pose, she looks like she’s dressing to pander to the presumed audience of teenaged guys. The skin shown in this outfit always seems to say "look at what you can almost see, boys!" rather than "girl can wreck your ass and you won't even scratch her" (except her wrists? Why the clunky wrist guards with the exposed midriff? I don't even.)
It's not like I expect these outfits to always make sense so I'm not going to argue it from a logical pov. I know that those tiny strips that cover her nipples are never going to shift in battle because they're drawn on and she's not going to be feeling any chafing at the thigh holes because she’s fictional and has super warrior skin or whatever. But I feel it when I look at a character dressed like this.
It bothers me when the explanation for this outfit comes down to her coming from a planet where they're just very casual about nudity. (I find her planet's open attitude about sex to also conform very conveniently to fantasy.) Nothing about this outfit says "casual about nudity" to me. Here's a couple of pictures from people in societies who have different standards of nudity from the west. This first picture was labeled as being a "Swahili girl":
And here's a naturalist:
These women, to me, look "naked." They don't consider it necessary to cover the breasts or in the bowler's case anything else, so they're not covering them. The girl at the top is wearing something around her neck as ornamentation, but not in a way that draws attention to her chest. The bowler is wearing bowling shoes, because they serve a specific purpose for what she's doing. There's nothing particular sexual, imo, about either of these outfits. Particularly the socks and bowling shoes ensemble. Kory's outfit, by contrast, directs the eye to the very parts of her body that the male audience would want to see but that she herself is not supposed to find particularly special.
It's not just that her outfit says "as naked as she can be without getting censored by the publisher," although I think that's part of it. It's that the neck ornament dangles down to draw attention to the cleavage, and the middle section dips, arrow-like, towards the vagina--not at all too badly in this, the non-overly-sexy version, but it doesn't take much for another artist to exaggerate it:
I don't know...I always think that's the kind of outfit that looks most natural airbrushed on somebody's van. Or on the cover of mass market fantasy. Why, if her culture thinks it’s silly to freak out about exposed breasts, do they wear clothing that's supposed to precariously covers the nipples at all times? And btw, have we seen older Tamaranians with the strip clinging to breasts less perky than Kory’s?
I admire Kory for being able to overcome this outfit with her personality, but I’m still angry on her behalf that she has to wear it and can’t bring myself to defend it as being the character’s choice as a warrior or a sign that she’s comfortable in her body. If someone else feels that way, that's fine--I really support them in letting Kory inspire them to feel comfortable in their body too. I think she is comfortable in her body, obviously. I just wouldn't want "feeling comfortable in your body" to become too tied to this kind of fanservice. I guess it feels to me like it gets too tied into saying that it's healthy to dress in the fashion male comic readers prefer as just another form of pressure. It’s like when Demi Moore was prattling on about stripping being empowering. It’s not that I lack respect for someone for being a stripper. I just don’t buy any feminist argument that consists of acting in a way men enjoy in women but don’t do themselves.
For contrast, here are female superheroes that *I* think look comfortable in their bodies:
I look at those outfits and think they look comfortable and easy to move in, and the girl looks comfortable in her body wearing them. Everything that needs support has support, the clothing isn't made up of pieces that look like they could go one way while she's going another. There’s no strapless bodice I’d be hiking up all night or thongs I’d be yanking down. The poses in all 3 pictures to me make the girl look physically controlled and graceful, like a sleek animal ready to spring or in the act of springing, eyes looking ahead because her body is going to go wherever she needs it to go. This is the silhouette I would go for in real life.
That first and second girl, btw, are the same girl in different outfits and I think she's awesome in both. Interestingly that girl, Cass Cain, is also canonically very free about nudity:
I love her scars and her knobby shoulders. In fact, they're more reasons I think she's a great example of "comfortable in her body" because the flaws and signs of a hard life seem like they're part of her appeal. We're looking at an impressive body here, but not an ideal body. It's a distinctive body where the form follows function, too sinewy and muscular to quite conform to the fantasy Kory's does. (Not to blame Kory for that in case anyone takes it as that--this is not a put down of women with softer lines or larger breasts and hips! Those have charming flaws to celebrate too!)
Cass is probably more at home in her body than anyone in the DCU except possibly Dick Grayson, it just doesn't translate into wanting to show as much torso and thigh as possible all the time. Some women do, and that's fine with me, but the percentage of them that exist amongst the superhero set is suspiciously high--on the female side. People sometimes argue that *all* superhero costumes are exploitive because they're tight, but this is disingenuous. All costumes are tight; only female costumes bare skin. It's like wanting to be a superhero is a desire that tends to go along with taste in clothing that is, as Tim Gunn put it when critiquing superhero costumes, "vulgar." I wouldn’t put anybody down for having that style (apologies since the word sounds insulting) but it’s just not that popular outside comics. This isn't about saying women should never bare skin or that bare skin is always exploitive. Just let's not pretend that the pattern of bare skin in comics is driven by things it isn't.
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There are a couple of points in terms of male/female superhero costuming (and Starfire's in particular) that I find interesting. First off, what is male Tamaranean clothing like? I did a quick Google search because I couldn't remember it from the comics, but there's not a lot of images to choose from. Interestingly, a Google image search for "male Tamaran" comes back with a picture of a female Dick Grayson before it turns up any Tamaraneans and the first Tamaranean is a male Starfire.
The only canon image I could find was of the cartoon show and that one showed the men having chests that were far more covered than the women. That doesn't suggest a lot for the supposed acceptance of nudity in general in the Tamaran society, if only women are uncovered.
I did see several pictures of Starfire's villainous sister though. Blackfire, in stark contrast to Starfire, was covered from head to toe with only her face and hands exposed. I'm not sure what it implies that the bad guy is the only fully clothed Tamaranean woman I can find, but it doesn't seem to be anything good.
The other thing that this brings to mind is that back when these costumes were first developed, male and female costumes had much the same degree of sensuality and bare skin. Men and women both had exposed legs and arms. The standard outfit for any of the teen sidekicks tended towards a leotard and a utility belt and a lot of them kept this look until they were adults. Dick was 19 or so when he became Nightwing and it wasn't until then that he managed to get his legs covered and he wasn't unusual in that regard.
But nowadays, male costumes tend towards long pants and sleeves, or tights at a minimum. The same has not always been said about female costumes, which still tend towards bare skin and often in far more suggestive cuts than we once saw. As you mentioned, they tend towards having certain dips to draw the eye. Instead of solid colored tights, they'll get fishnet stockings. Instead of boots, they've got high heels.
It is very reminiscent of barbarian fantasy models, complete with metal fantasy bikinis with ineffective and bizarrely placed "armor". And they're comics, so some fantasy elements are required. I just wish that this one would be toned down somewhat. It's one thing to accept the implausible in the name of a good story, but I'm a very visual minded thinker and, as a woman with a reasonably large chest myself, I look at outfits like Starfire's or any other wehre a strip of fabric over the chest is meant to offer protection and support and just think "ow." Large breasts + running + weak support = PAIN.
That and it just gives me a strong desire to smack people who say stuff like what that poster commented upside the head with a cluestick. It's just cheesecake. And if you like cheesecake, then more power to you. But own up to the fact that it's cheesecake. (And keep in mind that some of us would love something more substantial to go with.)
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