Thoughts on Hallow's Eve

Not entirely sure what this post is gonna touch on. I'm just gonna use my blog as a vehicle to express my frustrations with Hallowe'en. I love it as a secular holiday. It's a great time for people to express their creativity in countless ways; they can carve pumpkins, make costumes, face paint, host a haunted house, tell ghost stories and countless other things.

So amongst all these possible activities and tradition where did this idea of using Hallowe'en as a reason to dress in barely any clothing come from? I don't understand it. You can ask the vast majority of young women (and the odd cougars) what they are dressing up as and they'll tell you "a school teacher" or "a police officer" or "dorothy from the wizard of oz." And those all seem like perfectly acceptable costumes. Of course, when they show up on Hallowe'en night you see that your school teacher has a plaid skirt and a meter long ruler, your police officer has a badge that says "officer naughty" and a pair of handcuffs and your Dorothy, well... I'll let Paris field That one!

So, why? Why do women do that? It doesn't stop at hallowe'en either. In my university years I was exposed to countless themed parties and events that just perpetuated this degradation of women. "Tennis pros and Tennis Hoes?" Nice. Really nice. But still... why? The question I am askign myself is, was it like this when I was a kid? Obviously when I was young, I didn't pay attention to much other than what I was doing for hallowe'en. As a result, I have no recollection as to whether or not this is a new phenomenon or something that has appeared in the past few years.

My instinct (and discussions I have had with people on the matter) lead me to believe that this is in fact a relatively new thing. What can we credit it to? Well the obvious answers lead me to the beauty industry and the sexualization of the media and music industries. There are other factors, but these are obviously major players. To boil it down western society seems to perpetuate constant feelings of inadequacy in its populace. We are never smart enough, pretty enough, strong enough, skinny enough, nice enough, funny enough, green enough, liberal enough, conservative enough, moral enough, ad nauseum. Particularly with women. Women simply are not pretty enough, skinny enough or sexy enough. So they over compensate. I know countless girls who have told me that they would rather be looked at as an object of sexuality than not looked at at all. We've created a society where women - the bearers of our children- would rather where a low cut shirt and short skirt and have men drool ove them as they would when smelling a porkchop over the BBQ than be loved for who they are.

So how do we solve this problem? Short answer: I don't know.

I really don't. I know it makes me angry. I know it makes me not want to leave the house on Hallowe'en night. I know it makes me wonder if I should have kids because I'd be immersing them in a society that glorifies sexual belittling.

I don't know. Like with so many things in this society, I feel liek we're too far gone.