Halloween has come and gone but that doesn’t mean we can’t ponder the seriousness of cultural appropriation. I’m sure you saw a multitude of costumes on your adventures this year: some humorous, some intricate, some plain, and some terrifying. However, even though the limits seem endless, there are still several costumes that cross lines for being inconsiderate and highly offensive to minority groups and individual people which prove to be tasteless no matter the nature of Halloween. Please consider the following for reflective purposes and all your future Halloween endeavors.
DO NOT DO BLACKFACE
Blackface is not cute. It is not creative. It does not look good. Needless to say, it is incredibly offensive to POC for a multitude of reasons. To put it into perspective, as a white majority who has both explicitly and systematically opressed black people over time (and notice I’m speaking generally, not on an individual basis), wearing blackface as a white person reflects mockery and a lack of respect for people who are born black and ultimately born into oppression. Avoid costumes that are based around being an “African icon” or a black celebrity if you are not a black person, for a person’s skin color should never be adapted into being a costume for Halloween.
DO NOT WEAR TRANSPHOBIC COSTUMES
No, you can not be Caitlyn Jenner for Halloween and wear her “I Am Cait” sash. Currently, the trans+ community is struggling for visibility and basic consideration for their needs in public society (i.e. bathroom use, preferred pronoun use, etc.). By creating costumes that wrongly represent trans+ people, we continue to marginalize and undermine the importance of their stories and reach for respect from others. Most of these costumes will also be packaged by using various slurs against trans+ people or have details on the costume accenting genitalia that would not be correct in lining up with the preferred pronouns of the person the costume is trying to represent. These are all horrible and discriminatory actions made against the trans+ community that are highly offensive and reflect a lack of compassion for trans+ people that continue to fight every day for acceptance of who they truly are.
DO NOT STEREOTYPE ON SOMEONE’S CULTURE
People will always argue over this one. Many will try to explain that they are in costume from a specific culture that doesn’t belong to them because they are appreciating the culture with respect. However, when clothing or sacremental dress from a culture has been either replicated or emulated by costume companies for profit, the importance and spiritual meaning of said cultural garments becomes diminished and the costume then becomes a mockery of values and cultural norms that are very important to minority citizens. Therefore, do not wear costumes that stereotype on Native American people, Hispanic cultures, Asian cultures, Indian cultures, etc. in any way shape or form as such costumes are both racist and distasteful.
DO NOT WEAR A COSTUME THAT REFLECTS ABLEISM
This point is an interesting one because I never really thought I would see a costume that is considered “ableist”, nor did I really think there was any way to create an ableist costume besides choosing to act in a way that is ableist. However, as someone told me this season that they have heard of people throwing around a “Stephen Hawking” costume idea, it’s probably best that I cover this as well. Costumes that make fun of people with disabilities are distasteful for an obvious amount of reasons. Nobody is going to be laughing at whatever joke you’re attempting to make by making fun of disablities that people struggle with daily. I shouldn’t have to say don’t do it but, please, just don’t do it.
Remember, Halloween can be fun and awesome and it is a time to be a completely different person; but it’s not the time to be ruthlessly offensive and careless towards other people.