ExposedNYC

I’ve heard so many reports lately about how Halloween has become just an excuse for women to dress provocatively (notice that I did not use the term “slut” or “whore” to describe them). Can we give the girls a break?! My first response to a Google search of the terms “Halloween” and “slutty” is to zoogstercostumes.com, which has an entire section entitled “Slutty Halloween Costumes”. My problem is, the costumes come with names like “Red Hot Mama”, “Sexy Santa Claus”, and “Country Cutie”. So, which is it? Are the girls who don these outfits slutty, or are they hot, sexy, and cute?

Page Rockwell deemed the holiday “Slut-O-Ween” on Salon.com, James Poling at metadish.com called it “Dress Up Like A Whore Day”, and Nina Lalli wrote a tyrant about it in the Village Voice last week, telling women flat out, “Don’t be a slut for Halloween”. The problem with this request? Halloween is supposed to be the one day out of the year where you can wear anything and you’re not supposed to be judged.

Okay yes, I agree that it’s silly to wear a blue bikini, throw on a hat, carry around a pair of handcuffs and call yourself a cop, but so what? Is it really less disturbing than a grown man running around pretending to be Sponge Bob Square Pants? I can’t think of a single costume a guy could wear that would earn him the title of “slutty”. Women are labeled and criticized for the way they dress and the amount of sexuality they exude every single day. Doesn’t it say something in our society that the first taboo every woman is dying to break when given no boundaries is the persecution of being openly sexual? Give girls one day to live out a fantasy and feel desirable wearing whatever they want.

What irritates me more than anything is that we are constantly finding new ways to put women under attack. Have we criticized the gobs of men (and women) over the years who have dressed like Jason, Freddy, or worse, real life serial killers? Do we claim that this is their way of expressing their inner homicidal tendencies? No, we accept it as part of a holiday and assume that they will go back to their normal selves the next day. Who’s to say that it’s less empowering for a woman to exude control over her sexuality than to exert the ability to disgust or intimidate someone with a gory or violent costume?

I will agree that the holiday has lost some of its originality. I spent many years as a child creating arts-and-craft projects and make-up experiments to create the crazy ideas I came up with. What I am bothered by is the lack of creativity it shows when changing the plastic ears on top of your head defines your costume. If you’re going to dress sexy, be a Playboy bunny, a Victoria’s Secret model, or a dominatrix and go all out! Bill Maher, one of my favorite political voices of our time, cracked me up when on his HBO show Real Time he said “Ladies, nurses don’t wear fishnet stockings. Kittens don’t own pushup bras. And real French maids don’t shave their underarms.”

My favorite Halloween costume I saw this year was a woman getting off of the subway last Saturday in a homemade Ricky Bobby jumpsuit. I had to respect her for taking the time to cut out and glue Wonderbread labels and nametags all over a pair of white coveralls, not to mention cross-dressing. This woman is my hero, not for being covered head to toe, but because I can almost guarantee that no other woman in the room had on the same outfit. Sadly, I’d still be shocked if she got hit on more than the Naughty Nurse.

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