I'm sure it's very difficult to talk to your child about Halloween. "Sometimes, when a person and fun really love each other, the person, uh, dresses up…It's a kind of fantasy? Do you know what a fantasy is?" I mean, awkward! But you don't want your child to learn about Halloween on the streets, do you? Or, even worse, from television! No. Halloween is something that kids should learn about in an exceedingly, suffocatingly safe environment. Like their school.
From The NY Times:
Guns, daggers and other toy weapons have long been excisedfrom costumes at many school celebrations on Halloween. But in some classrooms across the country, the interpretation of what is too scary — or offensive, gross or saddening — is now also leading to an abundance of caution and some prohibitions.
In a school district in Illinois, students are being encouraged to dress up as historical characters or delicious food items rather than vampires or zombies. In Texas, a school has issued suggestions for “positive costumes” for the annual Halloween dance.
Well, I'm glad someone finally said it! Halloween should be about spreading positivity, not about who has the scariest costume or fun or whatever. That's why this year, I'm just putting my imaginary children (Hope, Hayleigh, and little Agamemnon) in MoveOn.org, Amnesty International, and Greenpeace t-shirts and telling everyone their costume is, "Human Doing." It's about time someone thought of the children.
At Riverside Drive, a Los Angeles public school in the San Fernando Valley, the Halloween parade is being defanged right down to its jagged fingertips.
A memo about costume appropriateness sent home recently by Riverside Drive’s principal made the following points: