Halloween is exciting for a multitude of reasons. While some people enjoy carving pumpkins, others love Halloween for the obscene amounts of candy that come from trick-or-treating, or simply because "Hocus Pocus" plays nonstop throughout October. However, as much as I love baking pumpkin seeds and watching what is probably the best Halloween movie ever made, my personal favorite aspect of this spooky holiday comes from dressing up. I celebrated my Halloween in the vicinity of multiple animal onesies while simultaneously surrounded by superheroes and zombies. From Fetty Wap and his Trap Queen to “Netflix and Chill,” this weekend was a testament to just how imaginative and resourceful college students can be. Likewise, this weekend also revealed that there is a darker, much more judgmental side to Halloween—especially when it comes to how women choose to dress.
On various social media platforms, I have seen multiple posts refer to certain costumes for women as "slutty." These posts reference costumes that usually reveal cleavage and fit so that the curvature of a woman’s natural figure is emphasized. Essentially, they are short and tight outfits that prove impractical for a cold night, and these outfits have only one purpose: to make the wearer look sexy. Cady Heron said it best when describing how "The Plastics" dress for Halloween: “Halloween is the one night a year when a girl can dress like a total slut and no other girls can say anything about it.” From the posts I have seen on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and more, Cady Heron was incredibly wrong. Other women can say something about it, and other women are proving the most vocal about "slutty" Halloween costumes.
This past weekend, I witnessed numerous degrading posts created to make a comparison between what is "modest" and what is "slutty" when referring to Halloween costumes. Choosing "comfort" over "promiscuity," the women who posted these images and statuses belittled other women for showing too much skin or wearing too little clothing. Women who dressed provocatively were called "sluts" and "whores," while the women who shamed them with such negative terms basked in the self-righteousness that came with self-proclaimed modesty.
This constant use of "slut" or "whore" to describe other women does not make one woman better than another. Rather, it creates a division amongst women and perpetuates the false notion that women can be separated into opposing categories of "virginal" and "slutty." It is this competition among women that hinders the female gender as a whole, allowing real problems to pass by unnoticed. On one hand, I firmly believe a woman is much more than just her body, and that solely emphasizing the female body continues a blatant objectification of women. However, wearing a tight dress does not mean that a woman is a "slut," and a woman flaunting her curves for one night does not warrant slut shaming.
I have experienced both sides of this discussion. I have celebrated Halloween as a silly taco, and I have also dressed as Sleeping Beauty scantily clad in a silk nightgown and robe. While no one had a problem with the dancing taco, I received multiple comments on my sexy Sleeping Beauty costume because my breasts were a little bit perkier than usual. Perhaps my chest made people feel uncomfortable, or maybe they simply forgot that, as a woman, yes, I do have boobs. Either way, I felt the judgment of trying to be sexy for one night. So I ask, after this Halloween weekend, why are people so bothered when women defy traditional standards of modesty, and why do they feel the need to openly shame these women?
