Man, WisCon is awesome. So, I'm totally going to talk about some of the panels I've been to (I say this every year, don't I? But I mean it this time! Please believe me?) and stuff, but first, I'd like to try to start a discussion here.
I went to a panel today titled "Monstrous females and female monsters" (or perhaps it was vice versa - I'm too lazy to look it up right now) and I ended up ducking out early for various reasons (mostly my phone died. Yarg!). This is a topic which is near and dear to my heart, though. I LOVE female monsters - I love monsters in general, but there's something really enchanting to me about the lady ones. I was taking pictures of every single gorgon depiction I came across in the British Museum, and let me tell you, that was a lot. So. The first question that was posed to the panel was this:
What makes a monster?
And I find this really fascinating. What's a monster, as opposed to say, a person who does monstrous things? Is a witch a monster? How about an evil queen? Is there a monster spectrum along which someone can fall? Does a monster have to have something weird or inhuman about their body? Is it a factor of how scary they are, how dangerous?
Now, the panelists came up with some answers to this question, and I have some thoughts of my own, but I want to hear what you think! What makes a monster? Talk to me.
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