With updates about the upcoming election flashing before every television channel imaginable, it’s easy to miss out on other news. However, one piece of news catches your eye: clowns. You investigate, thinking that it’s weird to see something so abnormal and rarely talked about on the news. You may think it's a hoax, but your friend tells you the complete opposite. Besides, what could possibly be wrong with a clown? Everything. When you hate clowns, everything is wrong with them.
When you hate clowns, the idea of individuals running around in costumes terrifies you. You have a flashback to the first time your eyes ever viewed one. You were young, and a man with white face paint and a big red nose was approaching you with his arms out (in anticipation for a hug most likely). You didn’t know what to do, so you screamed. You screamed like your life depended on it, and you ran for the closest pair of legs you could hide behind. Now, it’s not so easy. Giant pairs of legs don’t exist for you to hide behind. Only light poles are around, but there are probably clowns hiding behind that.
When you hate clowns, you feel like your life is becoming the plot of a new horror movie. You see a storm drain across the street as you are walking to class and you quickly take a detour, doing whatever you can to avoid the possibility of a hearing your name echo throughout whatever is below. When driving home to your small town, you speed down the back roads just in case a wild clown comes running at your vehicle with a knife. This sounds highly unlikely, but even the unlikeliest of things happen in horror flicks. You don’t know whether the path you’re taking is leading you to life or death, death being caught by a red-mouthed menace. You’re jittery every time you make a move, and the classic scary movie music is constantly on replay in your head. You repeat these behaviors the next day, then the next day, and then the next because like all thrillers, you never know when it's going to end.
When you hate clowns, you become paranoid the moment the sun sets below the horizon. Your house or place of residency soon turns into something straight out of The Purge. All the blinds are closed, and you imagine large metal bars are lining each and every window and door in an attempt to protect you from whatever forces the outside world may bring your way. Every point of entry is locked and the only light in the house is coming from the television screen flickering before your eyes. You huddle up on your couch or bed the way you use to huddle into your parents in your youth when a storm was approaching, scrolling through whatever social media feed your shaking hands can tap on. Updates are posted every fifteen minutes with sightings of clowns and you only pray that none of them are near you. You go to bed once you feel it’s safe, but even you know that it will never be safe.
However, all this fear goes away when you realize just how disgusting it is that people in this country think it’s okay to terrorize young children by dressing up as clowns. You and other members of society will never understand why some individuals on this planet think it is socially acceptable to dress up in a Halloween costume in the middle of the day and attempt to lure children and teenagers into the woods. You will never understand why these individuals think it's funny to chase after someone in their car with a crowbar swinging around them as they run. This is a game none of us want to play. What's the prize? There is no prize. There is no glory or fame. Those participating in these behaviors are not winning anything, and these pranksters need to realize it before they or someone else become hurt.
