I’ve been researching my career options for hours at this point, flipping back and forth through numerous descriptions and outfits. I wish I had a few more options, but at this point I just need to pick something.
Personally I’m torn between “Firehouse Hottie” and “Hospital Honey Nurse,” though “Blast Off Sexy Astronaut” has a certain ring to it. But those fishnets have to be a fire hazard. In fact that entire outfit would probably go up in flames in about three seconds. Plus I doubt I would have many options for career advancement. Maybe I should go the military route instead. “Booty Camp Cutie” looks like it would prepare me well for a career in the field, though the platform boots may make some training exercises difficult. Maybe I can take them off when crawling through the mud. Alternatively, “Adult Major Bombshell” sounds like I would get a lot of leadership experience. Though I don’t know if I could handle being a bomb. That sounds like a lot of pressure.
Screw it, I’m joining the circus. They have a “Circus Sweetie Ringmaster” opening? Done.
I have a certain disdain for Halloween. It’s like a slap in the face.
After all that women have accomplished, American culture still sees us as valuable only for our sex appeal. Every costume is sexualized. I can’t just be a police officer, I have to be a “Stop Traffic Sexy Cop.” I can’t just be a basketball or baseball player, I have to be sexy too. Not sure how I’m supposed to score a basket or hit a home run in platform heels. I can’t just be a gnome, I must be a sexy gnome. Yes … that costume exists.
My frustration does not lie in the existence of sexy costumes themselves. Women should feel empowered in what they choose to put on their bodies, defining whatever “sexy” means to them, without the judgment of others. Rather, my frustration stems from the fact that commercial Halloween costumes offer no other option except for sexy. By contrast, the male versions of costumes, especially “career” costumes, strive to look as realistic as possible. Police officers look like police officers, doctors look like doctors, pilots look like pilots. You get the point. But the female equivalents marginalize women. Good luck finding any “career” costumes women could actually wear to do their jobs. Good luck finding female costumes for professions like doctor, judge, lawyer, pilot, and more. You’ll instead find sexy nurses, sexy criminals, and sexy flight attendants. That tells girls and women that their worth lies in their ability to look attractive in cheap polyester, not in the profession they have worked hard to attain.
When we sexualize every military costume option that women can buy, we are sending the signal that women don’t really belong in the military, especially when the male equivalents actually look like realistic uniforms. This degrading gendering devalues the struggle that women have faced to even enter the armed forces, and ignores the continued combat-exclusion rule for women, often justified by arguing that including women would make combat units less capable. By portraying women in the military as wearing fishnets and polyester lingerie, we fundamentally devalue the service women have devoted to their country.
Hyper-sexualized “career” costumes are just as damaging for what they don’t portray. Sexy maid costumes frequent nearly every commercial store, the vast majority of them modeled by white women. However, the reality of housekeeping work is that nearly 70 percent of housekeepers are people of color, and sexual abuse in the industry is disturbingly common. America’s housekeepers aren’t wearing frilly lace lingerie; they are working grueling hours with low pay. An equally problematic costume is the sexy prisoner, also nearly exclusively modeled by white women. Yes, the sexy prisoner is actually in the career costume section. In reality, black women are imprisoned at twice the rate of white women, and inmates who report sexual abuse have nearly a fifty percent chance of being written up. Not to mention that, by law, inmates cannot consent to sexual activity. Sexy inmate Halloween costumes fetishize a group of women–mostly women of color–who can never consent to sex. And sex without consent isn’t sex; it’s rape.
We shouldn’t tolerate commercialized Halloween assigning women sexy “career” outfits–outfits that look nothing like what someone in that career would actually wear–while simultaneously handing men realistic costumes. That sort of gender division upholds centuries of gender discrimination in the workplace, and arguments about women’s inferior ability to perform jobs based on their sex. Even more so, these gendered costumes perpetuate the objectification of women in what are considered subordinate roles, for the sole purpose of male pleasure. That objectification removes women’s agency over their bodies, career choices, and the roles that they play in society.
We should do better.
Throughout high school I bought into the commercialized Halloween industry’s insistence that anything I put on my body during Halloween had to be sexy. Any career I aspired to had to include an outfit revealing as much skin as possible. I wasn’t wearing those clothes to feel empowered; I was wearing them because I was told that attractive women wore costumes like that.
I’ve decided to make my own costumes. Last year I went as Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Unsurprisingly I couldn’t find any costume judicial robes for women. For men, there were plenty. I ended up cutting a black maternity dress down the center and wearing it like a cape. This year? I’m going as Amelia Earhart.
Dana Raphael is a Trinity junior. Her column runs on alternate Mondays.
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