As I've been obliged to write for many Halloweens now: Other people's identities are not your costume.
This continues to be a difficult concept for many people to grasp!
Here, however, is a thread to share ideas for non-appropriative costumes. Yay!
What are costumes you have worn yourself, are planning to wear, have seen other people wearing, etc. that don't borrow someone else's identity?
The last time I attended a Halloween party, I went as Grumpy Cat! A hat with cat ears (procured from Etsy), some face make-up to recreate her markings, and a white t-shirt onto which I'd spray-painted NO. Easy and fun.
Showing posts with label Halloweenies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Halloweenies. Show all posts
Discussion Thread: Non-Appropriative Halloween Costumes
Great Job on Halloween, Everyone!
For 11 years, we lived in a house on a fairly busy street, so we rarely got trick-or-treaters. Now that we live in a neighborhood, we get a lot more visitors on Halloween, which we love.
Iain handing out candy last night was basically the cutest thing ever. He kept complimenting the kids on their costumes in the greatest way.
"What do we have here? Some astronaut business?! Great job! And what's this — a scary witch?! Great job! Excellent work on your outfits, everyone!"
My husband just described an adorable trick-or-treating baby who shyly reached for a treat as a "tiny candy zombie" and now I am dead. 🎃👻💀
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) October 31, 2017
He was also handing each of them whole handfuls of candy. They were pretty excited to arrive at our house!
And no wonder, because Iain does Halloween right: Tons of candy and a major self-esteem boost for every kid who comes to our door.
GREAT JOB, IAIN!
[Shared with Iain's permission.]
Discussion Thread: Non-Appropriative Halloween Costumes
As I've been obliged to write for many Halloweens now: Other people's identities are not your costume.
This continues to be a difficult concept for many people to grasp!
Here, however, is a thread to share ideas for non-appropriative costumes. Yay!
What are costumes you have worn yourself, are planning to wear, have seen other people wearing, etc. that don't borrow someone else's identity?
The last time I attended a Halloween party, I went as Grumpy Cat! A hat with cat ears (procured from Etsy), some face make-up to recreate her markings, and a white t-shirt onto which I'd spray-painted NO. Easy and fun.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Racism; violence; guns] Your first must-read of the day: "The everyday trauma of being a black man in America." Jonathan Capehart is always a must-read, but this one in particular. Every word.
[CN: Misogyny; objectification] Your second must-read of the day: "Stronger Together." A statement written by the incoming recruits on the Harvard women's soccer team, in response to a "scouting report" written by the men's team, sexually objectifying and ranking them. "[T]o the men of Harvard Soccer and any future men who may lay claim to our bodies and choose to objectify us as sexual objects, in the words of one of us, we say together: 'I can offer you my forgiveness, which is—and forever will be—the only part of me that you can ever claim as yours.'"
[CN: Segregation; racism; classism] ICYMI: At Colorlines, Kenrya has the full clip of John Oliver's terrific weekend segment on school segregation.
Variety has endorsed Hillary Clinton for president, marking the first time in its 111-year history that it has made a presidential endorsement.
[CN: Racism; xenophobia; threats] Seethe: "For Helping Immigrants, Chobani's Founder Draws Threats." I guess I need to buy some Chobani yoghurt.
[CN: Appropriation; racism] An entire galaxy of NOPE: "Rachel Dolezal memoir to explore 'discrimination while living as black'."
[CN: Homophobia; misogyny] Goddammit: "Boy Who Wore Hillary Clinton Costume for Halloween Attacked by Trump Trolls and Homophobes."
[CN: Video may autoplay at link] In better political Halloween news: Trick-or-treaters put on a dance performance to "Thriller" for President and First Lady Obama at the White House Halloween bash, and it was amazing!
What have you been reading?
Open Thread: Halloween!
Happy Halloween!
I know Halloween has become many people's favorite holiday of the year, and I also happen to know that some Shakers take Halloween very seriously! So here is a thread to talk about Halloween, and please feel welcome and encouraged to share descriptions and/or pictures of your costume.
This year, I'm fixing to go as one of the most elusive and terrifying creatures in modern history: A visible Hillary Clinton supporter!
But, obvs, this is the best costume of all the costumes this year or any year:
No offence, but Dog Jareth is the only costume that matters pic.twitter.com/KSZyZvcFGP
— Crayon to Crayon (@CrayonToCrayon) October 30, 2016
[Tweet features an image of a small dog dressed as David Bowie's character from Labyrinth.]
A++++++++++++++++++
Fatsronauts 101: Fat Halloween
[Content Note: Fat hatred.]
Halloween is right around the corner—and thus Halloween costume parties—and, every year, after Halloween, I see pictures circulated on social media, without their subjects' consent, of fat adults dressed up as recognizable characters who aren't fat. (Very occasionally, I see this done to fat kids, too.) These pictures are inevitably shared to mock the fat costumed person, often under the presumption that the fat person doesn't understand how they look and frequently accompanied by resentful accusations that the fat person is "ruining" the character.
Don't do this.
Let me tell you that fat people dressed as thin characters understand we look different than the thin character. It's not that we don't know how we look; it's that we don't care what you think.
And why should we, when you think that a fat woman dressed up as Trinity or a fat man dressed up as Spock "ruins" the character? That's a garbage opinion. You're telegraphing to us that your opinion shouldn't be valued.
I have seen arguments on social media in which mockers of fat costumed people justify their mockery, their assertions that the characters are "ruined" by fat people, on the basis that "Batman could never be fat" or "Wonder Woman could never be fat," literally without a trace of fucking acknowledgment that Superman and Wonder Woman could never exist at all. It's a fantasy.
What they're saying, with their also-bullshit contentions about what fat bodies can and cannot do (which are almost always wrong), is that a fat body ruins the fantasy for them. Which is really their problem. Not the fat person in the costume.
And frankly, if one can imagine a man who can lift an entire skyscraper with one hand, but couldn't lift his own ass into the air if it were fat, one really doesn't have much of an imagination.
But the problem isn't a lack of imagination so much as it is a lack of decency. All year long, fat people are expected to hide ourselves away from view—to not take up space; to speak softly; to exercise, but not in public; to cover ourselves in yards of fabric to conceal the shapes of our bodies; to carry ourselves hunched and bowed, so that we might be smaller and convey the shame we are obliged to communicate for our very existence—and it's the same on Halloween. Best that we don't show ourselves at all, and certainly not dressed as a thin character.
The message is clear: You don't deserve to be that character, because you are fat.
Fuck that.
We aren't required to wait to live our lives, to do the things we want to do, unless and until we lose weight. We can live and do and thrive right now.
The public mockery of fat people in thin character costumes is explicitly designed to shame us back into hiding, into not living, unless and until we earn the right of participation by making ourselves thin.
I repeat: Fuck that.
And then there's this: I am a fat person who actively wants to dress up as fat characters for Halloween. And before Melissa McCarthy made it so that I could be a cop, a spy, a goddamned Ghostbuster, three whole characters, there wasn't a hell of a lot from which to choose. Not if you want to dress as a person. A fat person. Like yourself.
So, you know, if you're mad that a fat woman like me comes to your Halloween party dressed up as a fat Lara Croft, direct your ire at the rest of the fucking world, which denies us a delicious array of visible fat characters we can cosplay.
And if you really want to be mad at a fat Halloween costume, how about the costumes that treat fat people's personhood itself as a costume?
Because, honestly, if you're angry about a fat person dressing like a thin fictional character, but not angry about thin people dressing like fat people as though we're monsters, you have derailed.
[Originally posted October 27, 2015.]
I Hate This Every Year
[Content Note: Pranks; bullying; hostility to consent; child abuse.]
Pranks are inherently predatory. The entire intent of pranking is to get one up on someone who is vulnerable, by virtue of their trusting the prankster because of an existing relationship or by virtue of being deliberately denied relevant information or by virtue of having an expectation of safety or security or normalcy. Pranks are also, by their very nature, hostile to consent, because most pranks don't work if the person being pranked is able to give enthusiastic consent to whatever is about to be done to and/or around them.
Taking advantage of someone for a laugh, betraying their trust for one's own amusement, is a shitty, bullying thing to do.
And when a parent does it to a child, it's abusive.
So it is that every year I rage*seethe*boil when Jimmy Kimmel's "parents prank their kids by telling them they ate all their Halloween candy" video goes viral. (He also has an equally terrible Garbage Christmas Present prank.) Here is a typical write-up of this year's video, headlined: "Jimmy Kimmel makes kids cry again with 5th annual Halloween candy prank."
And, naturally, the fact that he's "making kids cry" is supposed to be hilarious: "'I Told My Kids I Ate All Their Halloween Candy' challenge is back for its fifth year and it's better than ever. The Kimmel Show says they received a record number of submissions this year. Like the years before, the videos were filled with many tears, screams and tantrums. Watch the hilarious video..."
I watched the video, which I will neither post nor transcribe, and I did not not find it hilarious, because, as you well know, I am the Most Humorless Feminist in all of Nofunnington. And I seem to lack the circuit in my humor center that makes one laugh at image after image of tiny children being hoodwinked by their parents in the cruelest way, so those children can be the butt of a joke on national television.
One of the most casual forms of emotional abuse that parents commit on their children is the denial of their pain, because it seems trivial. It is crucial for parents to validate children's feelings, even and especially when they are upset. Here, parents set out to deliberately cause that "trivial" pain, and then laugh at their children experiencing it.
The thing about parents pranking their kids—and I cannot believe I need to write this—is that it fundamentally shatters children's security and trust in the idea that their parents will not harm them. (Which, in some of these families, may never have existed in the first place.) The takeaway for a child whose parents like to prank them is that their parent(s) might harm them, and no amount of "JUST KIDDING!" can fully repair the crack in the edifice of what should be an inviolable trust.
Parents who prank, tease, and ridicule their own kids, even if they're "just kidding," do so at the risk of their kids' ability to feel safe even in their own homes. That is not a risk any parent should be willing to take with a child.
And somehow, I don't imagine that "but I only did it so people could laugh at your despair on NATIONAL TELEVISION!" would bring a whole lot of comfort.
Parents—or other older family members, guardians, adult friends of the family—playing pranks on kids is also a dangerous communication—even if an unintentional one—that consent doesn't matter.
Kids who are taught by the adults they are meant to trust that consent doesn't matter are more likely to themselves be hostile to other people's consent. It's tough to, for example, convincingly teach your kid not to bully other kids while simultaneously teaching your kid that whether someone wants something done to them doesn't matter, as long as it's "funny."
And kids who are taught that consent doesn't matter are also more likely to have difficulty drawing boundaries for themselves, because they haven't learned they're even allowed to have inviolable boundaries. Particularly if a child's protests to pranking have been met with shaming that implies they're humorless or oversensitive or unfun, a child will also learn that speaking up on one's own behalf, in one's own defense, will yield more harm, rather than less.
Certainly, there are people who were pranked by their parents as kids who feel quite strongly they enjoyed the familial pranks and have no lasting effects from it. And maybe that is absolutely true for every one of those people, and maybe some of those people are less respectful of others' boundaries than they have really investigated. Either way, it's irrelevant.
The point is that parental pranking stands to communicate to a child that consent doesn't matter. And that is a very dangerous message to convey to anyone. Ever.
Stop it, parents. Just stop.
Fatsronauts 101: Fat Halloween
[Content Note: Fat hatred.]
Halloween is right around the corner—and thus Halloween costume parties—and, every year, after Halloween, I see pictures circulated on social media, without their subjects' consent, of fat adults dressed up as recognizable characters who aren't fat. (Very occasionally, I see this done to fat kids, too.) These pictures are inevitably shared to mock the fat costumed person, often under the presumption that the fat person doesn't understand how they look and frequently accompanied by resentful accusations that the fat person is "ruining" the character.
Don't do this.
Let me tell you that fat people dressed as thin characters understand we look different than the thin character. It's not that we don't know how we look; it's that we don't care what you think.
And why should we, when you think that a fat woman dressed up as Trinity or a fat man dressed up as Spock "ruins" the character? That's a garbage opinion. You're telegraphing to us that your opinion shouldn't be valued.
I have seen arguments on social media in which mockers of fat costumed people justify their mockery, their assertions that the characters are "ruined" by fat people, on the basis that "Batman could never be fat" or "Wonder Woman could never be fat," literally without a trace of fucking acknowledgment that Superman and Wonder Woman could never exist at all. It's a fantasy.
What they're saying, with their also-bullshit contentions about what fat bodies can and cannot do (which are almost always wrong), is that a fat body ruins the fantasy for them. Which is really their problem. Not the fat person in the costume.
And frankly, if one can imagine a man who can lift an entire skyscraper with one hand, but couldn't lift his own ass into the air if it were fat, one really doesn't have much of an imagination.
But the problem isn't a lack of imagination so much as it is a lack of decency. All year long, fat people are expected to hide ourselves away from view—to not take up space; to speak softly; to exercise, but not in public; to cover ourselves in yards of fabric to conceal the shapes of our bodies; to carry ourselves hunched and bowed, so that we might be smaller and convey the shame we are obliged to communicate for our very existence—and it's the same on Halloween. Best that we don't show ourselves at all, and certainly not dressed as a thin character.
The message is clear: You don't deserve to be that character, because you are fat.
Fuck that.
We aren't required to wait to live our lives, to do the things we want to do, unless and until we lose weight. We can live and do and thrive right now.
The public mockery of fat people in thin character costumes is explicitly designed to shame us back into hiding, into not living, unless and until we earn the right of participation by making ourselves thin.
I repeat: Fuck that.
And then there's this: I am a fat person who actively wants to dress up as fat characters for Halloween. And before Melissa McCarthy made it so that I could be a cop, a spy, a goddamned Ghostbuster, three whole characters, there wasn't a hell of a lot from which to choose. Not if you want to dress as a person. A fat person. Like yourself.
So, you know, if you're mad that a fat woman like me comes to your Halloween party dressed up as a fat Lara Croft, direct your ire at the rest of the fucking world, which denies us a delicious array of visible fat characters we can cosplay.
And if you really want to be mad at a fat Halloween costume, how about the costumes that treat fat people's personhood itself as a costume?
Because, honestly, if you're angry about a fat person dressing like a thin fictional character, but not angry about thin people dressing like fat people as though we're monsters, you have derailed.
Non-Appropriative Halloween Costumes
Yesterday, in comments of my post about another appropriative Halloween costume, Shaker yazikus asked for a thread to share ideas for non-appropriative costumes. So here it is!
What are costumes you have worn yourself, are planning to wear, have seen other people wearing, etc. that don't borrow someone else's identity?
Last Halloween, I went as Grumpy Cat! A hat with cat ears (procured from Etsy), some face make-up to recreate her markings, and a white t-shirt onto which I'd spray-painted NO. Easy and fun.
And Again
[Content Note: Pranks; bullying; hostility to consent; child abuse.]
Every year, late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel invites parents to "prank their kids" by telling them they ate all of their Halloween candy, then film the kids' reactions and send them to his show so they can be compiled into a supercut of upset kids at which everyone can laugh.
This year's video is going viral, just as the video does every year. And every year, I get emails about it.
The thing about parents pranking their kids—and I cannot believe I need to write this—is that it fundamentally shatters children's security and trust in the idea that their parents will not harm them. (Which, in some of these families, may never have existed in the first place.) The takeaway for a child whose parents like to prank them is that their parent(s) might harm them, and no amount of "JUST KIDDING!" can fully repair the crack in the edifice of what should be an inviolable trust.
Parents who prank, tease, and ridicule their own kids, even if they're "just kidding," do so at the risk of their kids' ability to feel safe even in their own homes. That is not a risk any parent should be willing to take with a child.
And somehow, I don't imagine that "but I only did it so people could laugh at your despair on NATIONAL TELEVISION!" would bring a whole lot of comfort.
Stop it, parents. Just stop.
And you, too, Jimmy Kimmel. You're urging parents to harm their kids and then broadcasting the "hilarious" results on national television. None of these children can consent to what's happening to them. None of them can consent to their pain being broadcast for strangers' amusement.
Stop it.
Halloween
Well, Happy Halloween, if you care about it! Are you going to any parties, or having a party? Are you taking anyone trick-or-treating? Do you get lots of trick-or-treaters? If you're wearing a costume for any reason this Halloween, what is it? Discuss!
I Get Letters
[Content Note: Fat hatred; misogyny.]
Today, I received an email from someone who had found my Halloween post from last year, in which I explain why "fat lady" is a contemptible Halloween costume. And my correspondent did not like it AT ALL!
They informed me that they were going as a Fat Lady for Halloween this year, and it was OKAY because it's a fat lady from a CARNIVAL, which HONORS fat ladies, and I am terrible for not appreciating the nuance in fat lady costumes etc.
#NotAllPeopleWhoWearFatLadyCostumes!
All the mirthless laughter in the multiverse at the idea that a Freakshow Fat Lady Carnival costume honors fat women, when the entire context of traveling sideshow fat women is mockery and exploitation.
Now, I don't know how this person just happened to stumble across a year-old post. Maybe it was because someone they knew just posted it on social media. (Possibly even in indirect response to their announcement of their costume—and it was easier to yell at me than confront their friend.) Or maybe they were googling fat lady costumes and found my post. (And needed to yell at me for making them feel guilty.) But somehow, they came upon it, and their response was not to listen to a fat woman explaining why fat lady costumes are indecent, but to yell at a fat woman that she's wrong.
Welp, I'm certainly convinced!
I repeat: My body is not your costume. My identity is not your costume. My life is not yours to treat as a joke.
In the News
Here is some stuff in the news today...
[Content Note: Guns; death] A thirteen-year-old boy was shot and killed Friday in Gary, Indiana, by a neighbor who became enraged that the boy laughed at him. The man and his girlfriend were tearing through the neighborhood demanding to know who'd burglarized their home, and the teenager laughed, and so the man shot him nine times. What the everloving fuck is wrong with people?
[CN: Guns; death] A second victim of Jaylen Fryberg has died: 14-year-old Gia Soriano was shot in the head by her classmate, and has succumbed to her injuries. Zoe Galasso, who died at the scene, was dating Fryberg's cousin, Andrew Fryberg, who was also shot. Jaylen reportedly targeted Zoe and Andrew because he had a crush on Zoe and was jealous that she was dating his cousin. And still we are not having a serious conversation about violent male entitlement. Or gun access.
[CN: Misogynist terrorism; abduction; sexual violence] Human Rights Watch has issued a report, "Those Terrible Weeks in Their Camp," on the abductions of hundreds of women and girls in Nigeria by Boko Haram, which includes details of their horrific treatment and recommendations for the Nigerian government and police, Boko Haram, the international community, and the International Criminal Court moving forward.
[CN: War on agency] "All four of Tennessee's major papers have spoken out to oppose Amendment 1, a dangerous anti-abortion measure that will be decided by voters this fall." GOOD.
[CN: Appropriation; racism; fat hatred] Halloween is definitely in full swing: Here, a "fat woman" is suggested as a DIY Halloween costume representing "a woman who has it all": "Whether 'having it all' means not having to choose between a cupcake or a cookie — why choose when you can have both? — or not having to choose between having a child and getting that well-deserved promotion, you can taylor this costume to represent whatever the term means to you." The fuck. And here, Howa details being interviewed by police after talking to nursing students who "dressed up in hazmat tonight for their Halloween party. Ebola Nurses, they said. ...One of our student leaders calmly addressed the two young women and explained to them how offensive their costumes were. ...We left them and after half an hour we were approached by a police officer. A police officer (Officer H.) came into the center to talk to us. He informed us that the student Nurses called the police because we 'posed as a threat' to them." Good grief.
[CN: Class warfare] "7 things the middle class can't afford anymore." Yep.
[CN: Images at link may be NSFW.] I love these paintings of naked women of all ages by artist Aleah Chapin. Naturally, she's getting a shit-ton of pushback, basically for the deeply transgressive action of publicly displaying real naked female bodies doing things other than posing as sex objects.
[CN: Guns; death] This is a real headline: "Tired, Tense: Pistorius Survives First Night of Five-Year Jail Term." (A sentence his defense team is appealing.) I really don't give a fuck if Oscar Pistorius is not enjoying jail, y'all.
[CN: Animal abuse] The ASPCA, in conjunction with the US Attorney's Office for the District of South Carolina and the FBI, has rescued dozens of dogs from a dogfighting ring. Those poor dogs. They're in good hands now, at least.
And finally! Here is a really nice story about young football players being exceptionally decent human beings to each other. KIDS THESE DAYS!
How to Celebrate Halloween for Real Jesus-Loving and History-Hating Christians, by Kirk Cameron
[Content Note: Christian Supremacy.]
Hey, remember how in his new movie Saving Christmas, former teen TV hunk and current peddler of nonsense Kirk Cameron introduced us to the FACTS! about how Christmas doesn't have pagan roots and something something Christmas dancing? Well, he's got some FACTS! about Halloween for your faces, too:
In light of his new film "Saving Christmas," Kirk Cameron is also speaking out on Halloween celebrations, urging Christians to participate in the holiday this year.Yep. Just like it does every year, thanks.
..."The real origins have a lot to do with All Saints Day and All Hallows Eve," the actor told The Christian Post. "If you go back to old church calendars, especially Catholic calendars, they recognize the holiday All Saints Day, with All Hallows Eve the day before, when they would remember the dead. That's all tied in to Halloween."
..."Early on, Christians would dress up in costumes as the devil, ghosts, goblins and witches precisely to make the point that those things were defeated and overthrown by the resurrected Jesus Christ," Cameron continued. "The costumes poke fun at the fact that the devil and other evils were publicly humiliated by Christ at His resurrection. That's what the Scriptures say, that He publicly humiliated the devil when He triumphed over power and principality and put them under his feet. Over time you get some pagans who want to go this is our day, high holy day of Satanic church, that this is all about death, but Christians have always known since the first century that death was defeated, that the grave was overwhelmed, that ghosts, goblins, devils are foolish has-beens who used to be in power but not anymore. That's the perspective Christians should have."
Lastly, the "Fireproof" star urged Christians to use Halloween as an opportunity to inform others about God with the biggest celebration around.
"You should have the biggest party on your block, and you should have the reason for everyone to come to your house and before anyone else's house because yours is the most fun," he told CP. "Halloween gives you a great opportunity to show how Christians celebrate the day that death was defeated, and you can give them Gospel tracts and tell the story of how every ghost, goblin, witch and demon was trounced the day Jesus rose from the grave. Clearly no Christians ought to be glorifying death, because death was defeated, and that was the point of All Hallows Eve."
Halloween arrives on Friday, Oct. 31 this year.
If you're not familiar with the "gospel tracts" Cameron is recommending handing out on Halloween, you can explore two that my nephew got in his trick-or-treat bag one year. They're obviously terrific.
It's obvious why any person who understands FACTS! would easily see how handing out these masterpieces would definitely make your house the most fun on Halloween.
"Do you want to go to that Halloween party the McAtheistmonsters are having? Theirs is known all over town as the best Halloween shindig every year!"
"Heck no! I want to go the biggest and best party on our block, where they are handing out gospel tracts and celebrating Jesus rising from the grave!"
"Graves are very Halloweeny—but isn't Easter about Jesus rising from the grave already?"
"Yes, but SO IS HALLOWEEN! Learn your FACTS!"
Kirk Cameron's history of Christianity reminds me of the dad in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, who can tell you how the root of any word is Greek, including kimono. Give Kirk Cameron a holiday or tradition, and he can tell you how Christians invented it!
Given the success of prosperity gospel, it was only a matter of time before consumerist gospel: You are rich (or not!) because god loves you (or not!), and now you need to go spend all your money buying lots of shit from Walgreens! Just like Jesus instructed! FACTS!
[H/T to Amy McCarthy, who is the worst foolish goblin has-been.]
Pranks Are the Worst, Part Eleventy-Seven
[Content Note: Pranks; bullying; hostility to consent; child abuse.]
Pranks are inherently predatory. The entire intent of pranking is to get one up on someone who is vulnerable, by virtue of their trusting the prankster because of an existing relationship or by virtue of being deliberately denied relevant information or by virtue of having an expectation of safety or security or normalcy. Pranks are also, by their very nature, hostile to consent, because most pranks don't work if the person being pranked is able to give enthusiastic consent to whatever is about to be done to and/or around them.
Taking advantage of someone for a laugh, betraying their trust for one's own amusement, is a shitty, bullying thing to do.
And when a parent does it to a child, it's abusive.
So it is that every year I rage*seethe*boil when Jimmy Kimmel's "parents prank their kids by telling them they ate all their Halloween candy" video goes viral. (You may recall my previously writing about his equally stellar Garbage Christmas Present prank.) Here is a typical write-up of this year's video, in which one inevitably finds lines like, as here: "Keep your eyes out for the girl at 2:30, who is truly heartbreaking."
Heartbreaking is an appropriate word for what happens, which I will not post or transcribe. Suffice it to say that many of these kids—including the girl at 2:30 and the boy who admonishes his mom after she reveals she was just kidding, "Well, that's not very kind!"—are more decent human beings than their parents.
Kimmel says his show received "an avalanche" of submissions from parents willing to play this dirty trick on their kids.
The thing about parents pranking their kids—and I cannot believe I need to write this—is that it fundamentally shatters children's security and trust in the idea that their parents will not harm them. (Which, in some of these families, may never have existed in the first place.) The takeaway for a child whose parents like to prank them is that their parent(s) might harm them, and no amount of "JUST KIDDING!" can fully repair the crack in the edifice of what should be an inviolable trust.
Parents who prank, tease, and ridicule their own kids, even if they're "just kidding," do so at the risk of their kids' ability to feel safe even in their own homes. That is not a risk any parent should be willing to take with a child.
And somehow, I don't imagine that "but I only did it so people could laugh at your despair on NATIONAL TELEVISION!" would bring a whole lot of comfort.
Stop it, parents. Just stop.
Discussion Thread: Halloween Costumes
If you are dressing up for Halloween this year, for a party or to take a younger person trick-or-treating or to answer your door, what is your costume going to be?
Photo of the Day
"I am the one who knocks...and says TRICK OR TREAT!"
Justin at Laughing Squid writes: "Winnipeg, Canada-based artist Tripperfunster has carved a Halloween pumpkin and made it look like teacher-turned-meth-cook Walter White from AMC's Breaking Bad." THE BEST.
Discussion Thread: Gross Halloween Costumes
[Content Note: Racism; misogyny; appropriation; objectification.]
Every year (or most years? some years) we have a thread about various inappropriate Halloween costumes. I thought it would be a good time to open a thread for general discussion, since we're nearing Halloween and because in the last week I saw two related things I wanted to share.
1. The Evolution of Halloween Costumes, From Girls to Women, which shows the differences in what costume-makers imagine a female person should look like as a nurse, bee, cat, etc. when a little girl, a tween, a teen, and an adult woman. It's one of those things we all know intuitively, but it's fascinating to see it put together like that.
2. Over the weekend, I watched the Halloween episode of Chopped, a cooking competition show on the Food Network, which originally aired in the US last Tuesday. In the opening segment of the show, the three judges were wearing costumes, and Chef Marc Murphy's costume, such as it was, was "Mexican."
I took this picture and sent it to Deeks, who also loves Chopped and was appropriately contemptuous with me. We chatted about it on Twitter a bit at the weekend, too, where Amadi joined in our disdainful snarling.
It is incredible (if unsurprising) to me that in the year of our lord Jesus Jones two thousand and twelve there are still people who think that wearing stereotypical markers of another ethnicity is a "costume." I hope Chef Aarón Sanchez gives Murphy an earful of whatfor next time they judge together.
ANYWAY! Have you seen any objectionable/inappropriate/contemptible costumes so far this year? What are your least favorite class(es) of costumes generally? Ever wear a costume you now regret? Do you have trouble finding prefab costumes for your kids that aren't terrible? Discuss.
