A U.S. fad where people dress as clowns in order to scare other individuals has gone viral on social media over the past few weeks. It started in South Carolina where people have been seen wearing clown masks near the woods and trying to lure in kids. Instead of the frightening situation dying down, it has gotten even bigger by spreading to other areas on the east coast and some are now saying it has even spread to Australia. A lot of the clowns even carry weapons to take their scaring tactics to a higher level. Their intent to scare has caused the public to try to defend themselves resulting in injuries. The scariest part of it all is that we don’t know if these people dressed as clowns are just messing around to get a good laugh, or if they are actually serious with an intention to harm.
With all this being said, it’s safe to say it’s a good idea to not dress as a clown this Halloween. To elaborate, here are a few reasons why:
1. People are already walking around with clown masks.
Since there are a lot of taunting clowns walking around, other people won’t know how to differentiate them from you. You don’t want parents thinking you want to lure their children away, or hurt anyone else for that matter. It can also cause you to be injured if someone is that terrified of you and gets defensive.
2. Clowns are already scary.
Clowns have gradually gotten scarier over the years and there are many people that have a fear of clowns. It might be best not to provoke them. They used to be someone fun to hire for a kid’s birthday party.
3. It's a lot of work, anyway.
To make yourself look like a decent clown, you really have to do a good job at the makeup. Also, it can take a lot of effort to convince people you aren’t one of those random clowns wondering the streets to scare people.
4. There's better costumes out there.
It kind of sucks if your plan was already to dress as a clown before all this happened, but there are better costumes out there… for this year at least.
It’s kind of sad when thought about it because a clown used to be someone fun and exciting that we would hire for a kid’s birthday party. Now people are in fear of their safety because of this craze. Even though everyone is hoping it’s just a social media fad, it just might be better to not attract any more attention to the situation by dressing as a clown this Halloween. Even the famous Stephen King, the writer of the novel "IT" which the scary clown movie was based on, posted on Twitter telling the people dressed as clowns to “chill”. So, it’s probably best to listen to him and, chill.
