I don't see anything wrong with using Halloween as an excuse to dress sexy if that's what one really wants to do--Halloween is all about doing harmless things that don't fit one's day-to-day persona, and getting away with it with no social consequences--but I have to say that there's a weird fetish aspect to all this that has developed that I don't really like very much.

Cheers,

TH

I don't have an issue with dressing sexy for Halloween perse, either. I just don't like how it highlights the social realities and it perhaps reinforces it by saying, "you can be sexy for one night ... but it is for everybody else's consumption".

Also, it gets me angry that at all the Halloween stores (MI has many, many), there is a "sexy costumes" section ... for women. It is huge and there isn't one for men. The only thing that comes close for men is the novelty one, where there are costumes like wet t-shirt girl and all. Gets me so angry.

Anyway, I'm being Lara Croft. I wish there was something else but I wanted to be a woman that kicks ass, plus I love how in the movie she went to Cambodia (I love Cambodia). Its hard to find superhero, kick-ass women. At least they had The Bride from "Kill Bill" though...

I'll be honest: the trend toward sexy costumes for women on Halloween really does bother me. Halloween used to be about creativity and being a little bit dark and scary. There's nothing creative, dark, or scary about sexiness. It's just another way for the patriarchy to trick women into thinking that being 24/7 sex objects is really just plain good old-fashioned fun.

And yet, here's my problem: I like the fun, sexy Halloween costumes. I *don't* like being stared at by creepy men, every other one of whom seems to have decided to dress up as John Holmes (oh how original). So I figured out a way to reconcile these problems -- dress up however I want, but tell everyone I'm a post-op transsexual... I could be any cute girl you know. That oughta freak out most of the creeps anyway.

But on a more serious note, I agree, these costumes aren't subversive at all. Calling a sexy witch "subversive" is stupid. "Subversive" would be a costume for women that consisted of a fat suit to go underneath a crop top and Arabian Night pants, complete with a servant fanning her and peeling grapes. Or the sexy country bumkin girl... complete with hick teeth and a lazy eye. Playboy Lite isn't subversive. Shocking people out of their everyday expectations is.

I only started browsing the women's section for costumes two years ago, and was annoyed at how all the women's costumes were all 'sexy'. I don't want to look sexy on Halloween, I want to look SCARY.
So, the past two years I've eschewed store-bought costumes for homemade. They usually turn out better anyway.

My friend is having a birthday that night, and her invitation says "no SEXY costumes! you live in Brooklyn, so you can dress like a slut the other 364 days of the year." Brilliant!

I just find women who tart it up that one night of the year to be a bore. It's like the Victoria's Secret of holidays; cheapness targeting repressed, suburban married people.

Besides, it's the innovative costumes that get you laid: feral animal, lab bunny, food poisoning, mail bomb (with Unabomber date), etc. This year my friend and I are going as Siamese twins joined at the ass cheek...I see your "sexy" and raise you, "profoundly disturbing."

This reminds me so much of Mean Girls.
Every year I am totally like Lindsay Lohan turning up in a full on hag costume (or something) in the midst of a crowd of Playboy Bunnies.

I'm going to be Frida Kahlo for Halloween. Even though I personally find Frida dead sexy, I probably won't get the kind of unwanted attention I might get if I went as a pin-up girl or Little Bo Peep.

I don't like the trend of super sexy Halloween costumes, either. It's hard to articulate why it bothers me. I feel like I did when I was a kid, and one September it was suddenly expected that I should be wearing strappy sandals and halter tops when I really would rather have been playing tether ball or something.

For me, Halloween is about returning to my childhood--playing make-believe and seeing how creative and hilarious everyone can be when they let loose. I don't want to dress like I'm going clubbing on Halloween; I want to dress like a bag of jelly beans or a mummy or a coke can or something.

Sure, I can see an argument for how "exploring the construction of female sexuality" with your Halloween costume might be a feminist act. But the caption is on a photo of a woman dressed as a sexy witch. Not much subversion going on there.

Agreed. RETCH.

I loved the Mean Girls bit. Buffy also dealt with this, in the Halloween episode from season two, IIRC.

BTW, the virgin/whore costume is brill. Someone should totally do that.

The virgin/whore thing puts me in mind of an old SNL bit, back when Mike Myers used to do Sprockets. Who remembers Whore/Nun?!

I'm being Little Red Riding Hood. I enjoy the history of her story, but there's nothing especially subversive about my costume in and of itself. It's not a "sexy" version, anyway!

I read two academic essays a while ago about the purpose of rituals like Halloween. I'm sorry I don't have them on hand to re-read and I'm sure I'm going to fuck up the details. I can't even remember the authors' names. Anyway, one paper stressed the way power relations were reversed. Kids running around, demanding candy or punishment, parents appeasing them. It is supposed to remind those in charge of their vulnerability. In this case, women dressing extremely provocatively with no social ramifications. I guess men are supposed to be threatened by the unbridled sexuality of supposedly "nice" girls? The other essay argued that power-reversal rituals just let repressed people blow off some steam and ultimately just reinforced the satus quo. That seems to be the case here and it seems especially grotesque. Even if, as someone said, "repressed suburban married people" try to be subversive by being sexual, it is a sexuality that is pre-approved and servile. It feels so pathetic.

The virgin/whore dichotomy is about as tired and played out as it gets. There's nothing approaching new about it. The nice girl in front of your mom/tiger in the sack is one of the oldest and most ridiculous (and prevalent) oppressive myths out there. That being nice and naughty somehow passes for "balanced personality" points only to our sophomoric immaturity on a grand social scale.

Nun/whore might be a more inventive take on this idea, but only if it was done ridiculously, a la SNL.

Raabia, I agree with you. There's nothing subversive about an attractive young woman wearing a sexy costume. Subversive would be having a man dress up as Little Red Riding Hood and having his date dress as the wolf. Maybe there are gay couples out there who do that, but I suspect even the most progressive males I know would still be too chicken to challenge society in that manner. And yet something that scary is *exactly* what Halloween is about.

Even though I'm a woman of color I'm going as Alex from A Clockwork Orange this year. See if I can't get a bit of the ole in-n-out that way;)

I did the sexy thing, as one year I was a belly dancer, I just thought it would be cool to go with my not so flat tummy and people loved it and I did feel sexy. Though it was October in Los Angeles and it was COLD because we went to the parade they have in West Hollywood and there was a drag queen who was dressed as Akasha from Queen of the Damned, totally put my ass to shame but she was hot.

Carlos Mencia had a bit about renaming holidays on his show and I believe Halloween was "Women Get To Dress Up Like Whores Day" the joke being that it was the only day women could do this with "permission". It was always a joke amonst my female friends for years that Halloween was considered this, like Ann I don't know why NYT is just now realizing it.

"I wonder if they also sell a Virgin/Whore costume -- Purity Ball gown on one side, and thigh-high vinyl boots on the other?" Nice! And you're right, Ann, this article is very cutting-edge. I hadn't heard anything about this trend.

Raabia: I recall this phenomenon being described as "Halloween immunity" in "Queen Bees and Wannabees," because on Halloween in junior high you get to dress like a slut without actually BEING a slut. UltraMagnus, I agree that the NYT is covering this a bit late. They must have really been reaching for a story, because you don't get much less "with it" than a book that considers itself revolutionary for stating that teenage girls are mean to each other (and that was, what, 1999?).

Anyway, I definitely see the connection between Halloween and the Feast of Fools, slaves in the Antebellum South getting the week off to eat and party, etc.: the experience just shows everyone how wacky things would be if the roles were reversed permanently.

Yes, Jane Minty, it's the New Year's Eve of dressing "slutty" (i.e. amateur night). And your friend is indeed brilliant.

What's subversive about playing directly into the male fantasy of what's sexy? A pseudo-corset and high heels may be pleasing to the male gaze, but they do jack-squat for my own orgasm. I don't care what day of the year it is.

Want to be subversive about unbridled female sexuality on Halloween? Show up in your most comfortable sweat pants which are drenched in lube and vaginal secretions, due to the fact that you have been pleasuring YOURSELF for the last two hours, with nary a dong in sight. Nothing like good, healthy, female masturbation to share the crap out of asshats who think their rod should be dipped in gold when they die. Trick or treat.

I'm going as my inner geek. (And no, not my 'sexy' inner geek.)

Law Fairy -
Now I get it! Last year for Halloween I wanted to dress as Hugh Hefner and have my boyfriend dress as a "bunny." I thought it was hilarious but he was not having any of it. I could not figure out what he was so uncomfortable about. I don't think he could really articulate it either. I never put a "challenging gender roles" spin on it, because for god's sake, its Halloween! Until now, I was bewildered as to why he would let such a great costume idea go to waste. :D

Not you're whining about Halloween costumes? Way to fight for women's rights. LOL.