Christmas, Halloween, and the Theory of Sluttiness

In Poland, there’s no Halloween; instead, there’s All Saint’s Day. It’s a day to visit the graves of deceased family members, decorating them with flowers and candles. Costume-wearing, trick-or-treating, and the like aren’t a part of it. I hear these days there are actual “Halloween Parties” in some of the bigger cities, but that’s about it.

In America, when I first heard of Halloween, I was completely confused by it. The whole idea of being given something like candy for the most part for free – I was too young to grasp the idea of dignity – was a strange thing to comprehend. It didn’t, however, take much convincing to get me to dress up and run around the neighborhood ringing doorbells and harassing my neighbors.

I think that the case is similar when it comes to why girls/guys dress up the way they do for Halloween. They’re being given the opportunity to do something that they normally wouldn’t do and, as a result, to receive something for “free.” Even if a girl doesn’t want to be known as a slut, and a guy doesn’t want to be thought of as a freak, they do want attention to be paid to their looks/their clever mind/their sense of humor/some aspect of their personality, and they take advantage of a chance to do so. Honestly, who wouldn’t?

Halloween is, in a way, like Christmas; it allows a person to show who they are in how they celebrate it. During Christmas, it’s all about decorating the Christmas tree and giving the best gift. During Halloween, it’s all about decorating one’s self and receiving the most compliments from others. Just as Christmas decorations and gift giving have grown out of hand, so have Halloween costumes. It’s a natural transition, with each person trying to outdo everyone else and thus get the most out of the given holiday.

Speaking of costumes, girls generally dress up in something cute/pretty/provocative, while guys go with something amusing/unusual/macabre. This is because – again, this is generally speaking – girls want to be though of as being attractive, and guys want to be though of as being cool. They dress according to the type of attention they want to receive. A girl in a gorilla suit is not attractive, and a guy dressed as Ricky Martin – although arguably frightening – is not cool. None of this has anything to do with how society views women/men. It all comes down to how women/men view themselves and how they want others to view them. I guess that what I’m trying to say is this: Halloween isn’t slutty, rather it’s the girls that dress up as slutty nurses/officers/firemen/etc. that are indeed slutty.

I can’t believe I used the word “cool” as an adjective describing something other than the temperature. How has my vocabulary come to this?!?

Great, there goes my punctuation as well.

What a sad world.