Yaoi-Con Reflection

Anime conventions usually follow a simple battle plan for the attendees to enjoy. They throw a shopping area, panels covering various anime subjects, guests involved in the industry, video rooms to air anime for people to watch, a live event for cosplayers to show off their hard work in costume, and a venue to host all of these features for attendees to congregate in and mingle among their fellow fans. Despite the various anime titles and genres, there really is not a need to hold anime conventions devoted to a single one of them. This is generally a good thing since Gundam Con, Bleach Con, Baccano! Con, and every other specific anime themed convention would fill up my already filled calendar. As long as fans can find something that satisfies their interests-usually akin to looking for a piece of hay in a haystack during a convention-anime conventions can cast as wide a net as they want.

Then there is Yaoi-Con. As the name implies, the convention caters to fans of yaoi (pronunciation varies among its fans). Usually written by female authors and appreciated by female audiences, yaoi focuses on the homoerotic relationships between males. I see bits of yaoi sprinkled throughout most of the general anime conventions, but it looks like flocks of fans decided that they really needed an entire convention to the subject. It is one of the few anime genre specific conventions that I know of.

Mind you that this will not be one of my usual firsthand accounts of a convention due to the fact that most Yaoi-Con attendees have a policy paraphrased to "what happens at Yaoi-Con stays at Yaoi-Con" and will probably kill me for breaking that policy. Most of the Youtube worthy live events had a no filming policy, which turned my camera into a paperweight during those times. So this is pretty much a personal reflection of the convention.

Being the beer drinking, breast staring, sex with women having heterosexual male that I am, I care as much about the homosexual acts portrayed in yaoi as a cat cares about a brick shaped like an average brick in a brick wall. But the barrage of fellow anime fans and friends getting excited for the convention beckoned me so I dropped $35 for a Saturday day pass to see what I could see. My first thought was "What did I just spend $35 on?" The panels, video rooms, and guests were focused on the yaoi genre, so they were of little interest to me. Attendees who were interested could easily debate over favorite pairings or talk about story developments from the yaoi manga authors. But those types of panels already assume you are on board the male/male love train. The Dealers Room featured lots of yaoi material but also some mainstream goods, which was a good feature for every attendee regardless of interests. A video game room and late night dance also served as general appeal.

The largest draws for Saturday were the Masquerade and Bishie Auction. Like most conventions, Masquerade allows cosplayers to show off their costumes via dazzling walk-ons and entertaining sketches. The main difference for Yaoi-Con is that since attendees are supposed to be over 18, the sketches get to be a lot raunchier with adult subject matter and actions. It nothing else, it is good to see what boundaries they intend to cross outside of pitting two seemingly unrelated male characters into a scene and making out in front of the audience. A time limit may have helped pick up the pacing on slower sketches.

The tagline of Yaoi-Con is "A Celebration of Male Beauty & Passion in Anime & Manga" and nothing personified it better than the Bishie Auction. After a screening process, several men deemed beautiful enough got to strip or perform before getting sold off to the highest bidder. Prices ranged from a hundred to hundreds of dollars that went back to the convention. What winners did with their new boy toys is between them and said boy toys, though there were a few ground rules to discourage actions that could give law enforcement the wrong idea about the convention. Blackmail reciprocity aside, barring video filming was probably the best marketing choice Yaoi-Con could make since the only way to see who put dollar bills down whose trousers or who ended his strip routine wearing a pink thong was to shell out the money for a badge to enter the room and watch.

The convention required attendees to be over 18 years old due to the adult subject matter present. But given how yaoi seeps into anime conventions intended for families anyway, most attendees under 18 are aware of it to various degrees so the restriction seems prudish. But stepping into the convention, it becomes plain that this convention is intended as a giant party full of room parties, scantily clad people of both sexes walking about, the superbly convincing cross-dressers which becomes an embarrassing incident when they reveal themselves after enough flirtation, and plenty of people up for having a strong drink at the bar. It is definitely a shock for the people who arrive at the convention hotel and are not part of the convention.

Despite the lack of interest in the featured genre, I still plan to go to Yaoi-Con for the people. They vary in personality and friendship but they ensure that no convention is ever the same. The same could be said for just about every convention though, so I leave myself wondering how I could get more bang for my buck paying for a Yaoi-Con registration next year.