The Most Important Rule for Last-Minute Halloween Costumes

With Halloween quickly approaching this weekend you may be finding yourself in a costume rut, scavenging the remnants of pop-up Halloween stores for the perfect last minute ensemble. Harley Quinn outfits sold out weeks ago, your life is too much of a mess to do anything remotely DIY, and there may not be that many options left this late in the game. But do you know what costumes you are guaranteed to still find in stock? “Native Tribal Rhythm,” “Exotic Middle Eastern Princess,” and of course “Virtually Any Representation Of Black Culture In Which The Guy On The Insert Photo Is White For Some Reason.” There’s probably a lot of scary clown masks that have been picked over as well, but that’s beside the point.

You may be wondering exactly why these particular choices are the ones that have been left behind, and that’s because of a little thing we know as cultural appropriation. Cultural appropriation is the adoption or use of the elements of a culture by members of another culture. The appropriating culture is usually power dominant, and they are often exploiting said elements for purely aesthetic or humorous reasons without recognizing the struggles and systematic oppression that the appropriated culture has experienced.

In the last several years we have seen the concept of cultural appropriation gain traction in both the media and society, thus becoming a hot topic that the majority of young people seem to have at least a basic grasp of. Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few years, you’ve probably come to understand that culturally misrepresentative Halloween costumes are insensitive and disrespectful. It’s for this reason that these get-ups are still in abundance at many behind-the-times Halloween stores, often due to people being more aware and increasingly passing them over for far superior options – such as Sexy Avocado, or Sexy Big Bird. Hopefully, if sales for these offensive costumes dip downwards far enough, production and sales of them will cease altogether!

So what can you do to help this cause in your scrambling moment of costume-searching desperation? It’s easy. Don’t appropriate. Trust me when I say that even the most ‘basic bitch’ pair of cat ears will look far better on your head than any Made-in-China feather headdress ever would. Because no costume, perhaps not even a clown costume, is more insensitive than one that disrespects an entire culture.   

Picture Credits:

Cover Photo, Article Picture

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