Michigan Journal

Issue date: 10/30/07 Section: Features

Media Credit: Google

Media Credit: Google Lindsay Lohan's "Mean Girls" character goes all out, dressing up to spook instead of look sexy. Her costars sport the show-all costumes that have become a key part of Halloween festivities.

Halloween, once considered a holiday of haunting and bewitching, has recently earned itself a less-than-favorable reputation. For teens and 20-somethings, Halloween is no longer about pumpkin carving, trick-or-treating or scary costumes. Instead, candy and haunted houses have been traded in for cocktails and house parties, and the aforementioned scary costumes have been replaced with skin-bearing ghoulish get-ups.

Originally donned by Celtic tribes hundreds of years ago, Halloween costumes were meant to be scary, not sexually suggestive. The costumes were worn to spook the ghouls that would supposedly roam the earth in search of humans. The terrifying costumes would scare the satanic spirits, thus saving the Celtic people from any harm.

But as time has passed, western culture has largely strayed from such superstitions, causing Halloween costumes to lose their significance.

Although Halloween costumes no longer serve such an important purpose, they have acclimated to the capitalist economy, marketing Halloween outfits to trick-or-treating toddlers. The shift is understandable. It even provides an excellent experience for children and their parents, but how have Halloween costumes come from pudgy pumpkins and pretty princesses to skanky sailors and naughty nurses?

Stores and Web sites, such as Lover's Lane and BuyCostumes.com, now offer an overwhelming array of sexy adult costumes, making it seem as though Halloween costume ideas are limitless. But actually only a small percentage of young adults can pull off these costumes. With most of them only being sized up to a medium, full-figured consumers are left searching for something to wear. Although some stores do offer plus size costumes, the variety is less than extensive. Rendered optionless, Halloween celebrators are either forced to suck themselves in to a costume made for the body of Nicole Ricci or dress in a not-so-revealing costume. As shown below, wearing an actual costume as opposed to a slutty one can be quite an uncomfortable conundrum, causing people to feel secluded and left out at parties.

Furthermore, realistically speaking, these costumes are in no way practical. Halloween and the weekends that accompany it tend to be the coldest, rainiest days of the month, so walking around in belly shirts, booty shorts and high-heels is bound to be a sure way to catch pneumonia.

College students across the country, mainly men, now refer to Halloween as an excuse for girls to dress up like sluts. At many parties it is even hard to tell what exactly a girl's costume represents. Ladies who throw on a bustier and a pair of fishnet stockings make it difficult for others to determine their declared identity. Many women are calling themselves Victoria Secret angels or Pussycat Dolls in hopes that they can get away with wearing bras and boy-shorts out on the town.

It must be noted that not all sexy Halloween costumes are taken to such extremes, but even most mild outfits are still provocative. This recent trend forces those who aren't willing to bear it all wonder, what's wrong with leaving a little to the imagination?

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