Costumes

 Lots of fuss this time of year, every year, about insensitive costumes and stereotypes.  I don't really take offense at stereotyped costuming because I understand that it's all in fun and no one with more than 5 brain cells believes them.  However,  I thought I'd toss out a few work-arounds just in case.  

The witch, for example, goes back to earth religions (most obviously Wicca) and therefore could be seen as insensitive to modern adherents of those faiths.  If you want to be a witch for Halloween, yet still be thoughtful of your witchy friends and neighbors, consider choosing a specific witch from pop culture.  Wicked Witch of the West and Witchypoo even have the whole pointy-hat thing going on.  Variations could be a more colorful or modern take like one of the Halliwell sisters or a Hogwarts professor.   Mix up the tropes - maybe the Neutral Witch of the South? 

The cultures native to North America seem to take a beating every fall.  Often costumes include things that, in the real world, are sacred.  Those beautiful feathered headdresses are earned, usually through combat or wise leadership.  Would it be acceptable for me to wear a Medal of Honor as part of a costume?  If you go the buckskin-and-braids route, you're playing with the stereotype.  You can mix it up there - be a "mountain man" or even a "caveman".   Or go specific again.  Little Suzie wants to be an "Indian Princess" for Halloween, go Disney.  Pocahontas in reality had very little in common with the cartoon, and you can make that a teaching moment if you want.  For a real teaching moment, get historical.  Buckskin-and-braids-and baby = Sacagawea. 

The classic hobo, a staple of poor kids and dummies who wait til the last minute, is said to mock the homeless. You can easily turn the hobo into a scarecrow if that concerns you.  

I see stereotyped ethnicities trick-or-treating every year.  I have family and friends who I could claim these people are mocking.  I see it as playful teasing among friends.  I'm a hillbilly/redneck, a mental patient, a single woman over 40, and probably other "costumes" that I can't think of at the moment.  

Some costumes are more problematic than others, obviously.  Usually based on a negative stereotype.  Usually worn by the politically polarized or satirists.  Sometimes just heart breaking (Anne Frank).  Those I advise against across the board.  But let's be honest - almost every costume out there might be offensive to someone.  I suggest we all, on both sides of the issue, be more sensitive to others.  

Sex, Gender, and Shut Up

 Had two different conversations recently that bear on the sex/gender issue.  Now, to review - when I say sex I mean biology or the reproductive act.  When I say gender, I refer to society's notions of how we should look or behave because of our biology.  I'm also going to touch on sexuality, but just a bit. 

The first conversation was with a male teenager.  He's slender and has shoulder-length hair.  Someone tried to shame him by telling him he looks "like a girl from the back".  I say tried to, because the young man really doesn't care!  The incident actually bothers me more than it did him.  Why does it matter to anyone if he looks "like a girl from the back"?  Why would anyone be ashamed of this, as he was expected to be?   The only explanation I can come up with is Toxic Masculinity - one of the media's current hobbyhorses. Long hair on a boy threatened this person's personal image of himself.  Something the media likes to ignore, though, is that Toxic Femininity is also a thing.  So is Toxic Maturity, but I digress.  

Humans of both sexes are from birth (and even before that with ultrasounds) to conform to Gender Roles.  If we don't, we are generally mocked if not outright shunned.  Especially males.  A female child can be a tomboy, after all.  But for purposes of this particular rant, I'm going to be discussing adults or those approaching adulthood.  

My mother used to tell stories beginning with "When I was a little boy..."  not because she was actually male, but because she was commiserating with a male child.  She wanted to get that pesky division out of the way, because the story related to children of both sexes.  She was a female - but never a GIRL.  I have childhood photos of her, and she's wearing a dress (it was the 1940s) but that's where it ended. I probably have peers who thought she was a lesbian.  Yo momma wears combat boots wasn't playing the dozens for me, it was just the truth.  I have no memory of her ever wearing a dress.  A child walked up to her in a store and said "Excuse me, sir..."  She thought that was funny. 

Imagine catcalling a hot chick in an amusement park and my brother, with a full beard and mustache, answers you.  Again, it was funny.  If he reads this, he will laugh heartily at the memory.  The only gender roles we were expected to follow applied to chores, and I strongly suspect that was a holdover from when my parents were married.  

I tell these two stories to show that I've always had a very clear division in my head between Sex and Gender.  And you thought I was digressing again, didn't you?  

The second conversation was with a gay male couple.  These men have two children.  The children have lots of female role models despite the fact that they don't have a mommy.  Even if they didn't, I think they'll grow up just fine.  What is a woman going to teach them that a man or a book can't?

Anyone out there who thinks a parent's genitalia keeps them from parenting, shut up.  My momma wore combat boots and that was not one of the things she got wrong, so shut up.  If you cat-called some hippie dude and are now having an existential crisis, that's your problem, so shut up.  Unless people are hurting somebody, just shut up.  

As always, I invite civil debate of these points.  If you just wanna call names and insult people, shut up.