Halloween Costumes – They Aren’t Just For Children!
When the leaves begin to turn color and fall from the trees children used to start thinking about that most exciting holiday, Halloween. You got to dress up as a cat or Batman or a princess and on top of that you could go outside on the cool or cold autumn evening and who knows what was waiting for you? Free candy, spooky looking houses and perhaps some other kids who were up to no good. No matter this was a holiday meant for children, forget Christmas, at least for one night.
Adults had parties I suppose but I never noticed as I was too focused on the treats of that evening, just waiting for it to get dark and rushing off to get my pillow case full of all the candy I could eat and then some. Parents were supposed to be at home giving out candy and not going out to some silly party where they dressed up and looked odd, didn’t they know Halloween was for kids?
Fast forward to today and the truth is Halloween is not just for children! Costumes were once the domain of kids but inevitably that changed for a variety of reasons. Candy is still a big part of Halloween but many complain that the kids just don’t come around anymore. One reason is certainly that families are a lot smaller than they were a generation or two ago. Another is the permanent change brought about by sensational stories about poisoned candy and kidnappings of young children.
Cheapest Christmas costumes are for adults now and when you think about it Halloween has always been a pretty mature subject. The origin of Halloween is pretty scary even for adults. Halloween traces back to the Celtics who inhabited present day Ireland. November 1st was their New Years Day separating summer from winter and they believed that the line between life and death was blurred on the 31st of October and the time that the dead returned to Earth. Without going into a historical analysis suffice it to say that there was nothing child like and innocent about the origins of this Holiday. Different cultures had different traditions but many celebrate the day of the dead or all saints day to honor the dead, again no fairy tale characters here.
Early on the celebrations many sanctioned by the Catholic church involved dressing up as saints, angels and devils which were the precursors of the tradition of wearing costumes. The tradition evolved and many cultures do not celebrate Halloween. Perhaps it is only fitting that the U.S. has managed to celebrate this solemn time by wearing costumes of Star Wars characters, Presidents, alive and dead and of course the Texas Chainsaw Massacre character and Jason the undead. Adults now celebrate the holiday with little tricking or treating but parties, gatherings with music, alcohol and food and many suggest “simply another reason to have a party.” Many if not most people have no idea what they are celebrating and why should they care. Unlike Christmas, Easter and the Fourth of July the meaning of Halloween is blurred and unfocused and likely to stay that way. Halloween, a holiday that used to celebrate the dead now celebrates life and in some cases debauchery.
Adults now have a wide range of choices of what to wear for Halloween. It seems that women more than men enjoy dressing up for the occasion. Why are women more inclined than men to dress up in silly, cute and suggestive costumes? Simplistically perhaps because women have been conditioned to be spectacles or object of desire more than men. Perhaps because in a male dominated society women have been conditioned by men to dress for the pleasure of men? These questions won’t be answered here, but the truth is the variety of costumes for women dwarfs those for men by a ration of at least ten to one. What ever the reason women can dress up in the classic costumes such as the cheerleader, French maid and nurse. These are costumes that have evolved from occupations that women hold to this day although the costumes are generally not appropriate for wearing to work at the hospital. Men’s costumes generally stick to the pirate, barbarian and other such manly figures.
Fortunately women’s Cheapest Christmas costumes now include a greater selection of plus size costumes in many, but not all of the characters available to missy sizes. Here as elsewhere in the fashion industry a controversy exists as to supply and demand and it is difficult to say who is to blame. Any woman who wears plus size will attest that the selection for plus size costumes is but a fraction of those offered to missy size girls. Manufacturers argue that plus size women simply don’t but these costumes while many women argue that the selection is poor and the styles are limited. Regardless of the outcome of that controversy selection of plus size costumes is increasing slowly but surely. Woman of all sizes can and do wear the suggestive costumes but plus size women have been slower to embrace the trend for whatever reason.