Halloween or Slut-o-ween?

“Halloween is the one night a year when girls can dress like a total slut and no other girls can say anything
about it…” (Mean Girls)

It’s that time of year again: Halloween. And time for us all to once again to contemplate the age-old question of “what should I be?” For most college-aged females, the answer to this question appears to be quite simple; tack the word “sexy” onto any noun and bam! You’ve got a costume. It seems that the general rule of thumb for women’s costumes these days is: the sluttier the better. For this reason, Halloween is often given the moniker “Slut-o-ween.”

In my own plight to find a costume, I spent some time perusing the Internet, and what I found reaffirmed my belief that all women’s Halloween costumes must be slutty. Spirit Halloween Shop offers women an array of what they like to call “Women’s Costume Basics.” These “basics” include an abundant selection of corsets, booty-shorts and something called “adult-tutus.” You can also find costumes from the Dallas Cowboys Adult Cheerleader to the Cirque de Sexy Adult Women’s Costume (whatever that is). Each of these ensembles, which include barely enough fabric to cover one half of any female body, sells for upwards of fifty dollars.

Now, a little bit of sex appeal has never hurt anyone, but it is important to know when and where to display it. The preoccupation with needing to be sexy on Halloween has lead to the production of some woman’s costumes that can only be seen as ridiculous. Online stores like Yandy.com have taken the “sexy” factor to such lengths that it is comical. I had quite a chuckle while scrolling through pages of their ridiculous costume offerings. There are some real gems, like the Sexy Honey Badger or the Sexy Grapes (who knew that grapes were sexy?!). I also stumbled upon some costumes that are genuinely scary. I stifled a small shriek upon finding the “Working Late” costume. Let’s just say that it would be much more economical to walk around wearing a tie and a pair of underwear than it would be to pay for this costume.

What makes these mass-produced, cookie-cutter, “sexy” Halloween costumes so frightening is that there is really no point to their sexiness; they are often times revealing just for the sake of being so.
I would be a hypocrite to say that wanting to look put-together and attractive on Halloween was outrageous. But when did it become socially appropriate to walk around wearing little more than a bra and call it a costume? How can someone possibly be comfortable strolling around campus with eighty-percent of their body exposed? And, finally, why can’t our Halloween costumes actually have some degree of creativity?

How about instead of resorting to purchasing prefabricated costumes, we put a little thought into Halloween again. It is one thing to expose a little skin in an attempt to put together an interesting or funny costume; it is an entirely different story to “slut-ify” a costume just for the sake of being “sexy.” •