It's hard to ignore the "killer clown" epidemic that has spread across the U.S. over the past few weeks. I myself struggle with ignoring the updates. Social media cannot seem to escape its sudden fascination with the clown appearances, and every day there's always a new video being uploaded, a new photo being posted, or a new sighting being reported.
As someone who is terrified of clowns, I despise this current event. Pictures and videos appear on my Facebook Newsfeed, and warnings from Twitter are constantly causing my phone to buzz. I'll be the first to admit that I take these updates seriously, but that might only be because of my fear, not because I'm being rational about the situation.
Either way, it needs to stop.
I'm not sure if this is a practical joke, or some kind of sick hoax. I'm not even sure if these sightings are real, or if they're just a child's mind running away with some Halloween fantasy. But I do know that whomever thought it would be funny to chase children to bus stops in costume, or stand in a forest with face paint on, beckoning children to come join you, is not in their right mind. This is no joke. It's traumatizing.
But, I get it. I do. The remake of Steven King's It is coming out soon, and with Halloween right around the corner, it's almost too easy to grab a clown mask and join in on the prank. But, coming from someone who freaks out every time they see a round, red nose attached to a face that has a smile engraved with paint, I cannot support this. I cannot bear to even hear about it.
You're instilling fear. Fear and paranoia. I don't know how many conversations I have overheard, people claiming that if they saw a clown, you bet that they would shoot them or run them over or whatnot. By encouraging fear, we're encouraging violence. Retaliation. In desperate measures we resort back to our basic flight vs. fight behaviors, and I do not have the ability to say that I wouldn't hurt a clown if he came after me.
The masks and face paint are becoming tokens of fear. I'm scared to walk around on campus, or drive alone late at night. As if our world already doesn't have enough to worry about, now people have to make sure that clowns aren't following them. This paranoia is consuming the nation. And, if this is all just some sick joke, I hope the ones behind it find it funny when they're arrested, or when some young adult is hurt because he wanted to play a prank on his friends.
Not only is this epidemic giving clowns a bad name, but they're playing on the fears and stigmas that have been crafted since the mid seventies. The only way to stop it is to get to the root of the problem. So, please, stop sharing the videos. Don't repost the pictures. Call the police if you see a clown. Don't take matters into your own hands.
We need to stop this before it gets worse. Let's send the clowns back where they belong.
