7/05/2012

Protect Your Fellow Travelers

The past weekend was a ton of fun, and there's very little the people at SuperCon could have done to make it better. But there's one thing I think needs to stop.

By now you've probably seen the Sexy Sax Man on Youtube. If you haven't then go here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaoLU6zKaws It's basically a guy who breaks into a sax rendition of Wham's "Careless Whisper" in any place that he shouldn't break into an sax rendition of Wham's "Careless Whisper."

Well somebody who came to SuperCon has seen it. And he decided to serenade us. 12 thousand times. Which got a bit annoying, but that's not what I think needs to change. The funny thing about Sexy Sax Man is that he's so damn annoying. Annoying I can handle.

What I can't handle is that Sexy Sax Man was not the only person who brought his musical instrument. There was also a guy with a tuba. Now I'm old and I don't watch Family Guy, so for the first three days I didn't know what this strange song I kept hearing was. Until it was explained to me on Monday. Here's the song, and the clip from the show, the person with the tuba was imitating: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KMk1-erNhQ

So what the kid was doing was finding overweight people at the Con and following them around just like Stewie does in the cartoon.

You know the one problem with this: he was following a fat person around the Con playing a song meant to ridicule him for his weight.

There's a word for people who do things like that: bully.

And if there's one place in the world you should be safe from bullies, it's at a Comic Convention (feel free to replace the word comic with sci fi, anime, video game, Star Trek or whatever cult genre you'd like).

Cons are a place where a gay man should be able to dress up like Xena Warrior Princess without being picked on. Where a skinny kid should be able to spike his hair up and hold a crappily made cardboard broadsword and not get picked on. Where a straight guy should be able to have buttons with the My Little Pony characters pinned all over his shirt without being picked on. Where two girlfriends should be able to dress up like Raggedy Ann and Andy and walk holding hands without being picked on. And yes, where an overweight person should be able to walk from one booth to the next without being picked on.

All of us who have an affinity for what the rest of the world likes to call geeky need to stick together. We need to protect our fellow travelers.

In short, we need to demand that our Cons are bully-free zones.

3 comments:

  1. Well said! I thought of that Family Guy tuba man as soon as I started reading this.....but it's a cartoon. NOT something to do in the real world. Especially not at a Comic Con.

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  2. As a fat guy myself, I'd find it funny if the guy did this to me briefly then left (or if he came with his own overweight accomplice to follow around). But I definitely see your point of view. And I agree, bullying in any form or venue is unacceptable.

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  3. @CMAC - I'm sure the kid doing it didn't think through the situation. Probably not a malicious person, just misguided. Thought he was being funny, not mean. But if you put yourself in the place of the person being followed... With all eyes on them, as they realize WHY they're being followed... It's just mean

    @Kevin - I admire your sense of humor and your first name. It's always best to be able to laugh at our own weaknesses (I have plenty). It just isn't cool to grab a stranger out of the herd and bring attention to them for those weaknesses.

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