Have you ever dressed up for Halloween or college party in a racially sensitive costume?

[Anonymous]

I think the term you are looking for is not “racially sensitive,” but “racist.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the term you are looking for is not “racially sensitive,” but “racist.”

+1

[Anonymous]

I’m 53. Let’s count my transgressions starting with homemade Halloween costumes:

- a bum : dirty face and mismatched clothes
- gypsy costume
- went in drag in my brother’s Cub Scout uniform and tucked my long hair up in the cap
- bathrobe, hair in rollers, robe, slippers, brown makeup like a facial mask = housewife

Then I wore a full on “ cowgirl” outfit with a fringe vest and skirt with “Indian” silhouette patches to school just because. This was 1974.

I attended numerous late 80s fraternity and sorority theme parties to include Pimp and Whore. I dressed as a pregnant nun, pregnant cheerleader and pregnant bride.

[Anonymous]

I was a gypsy when i was a kid in the 70s. I think I was maybe 6 and it was because the costume was free. I also was a genie when I was 8, no brown face but I did have s turban (again, free, because there was a silk turban trend for old ladies in the 60s or something?). My mom would basically let us dress as anything that we could find in the rag bin or make, provided it wasn’t too flammable.

I remember people hosting pimps and hos parties in the 90s and most rational people thought they were incredibly offensive. I think the school made a statement that it should stop.

[Anonymous]

In college we had a “fascist dictator” costume party. SO stupid, but I still crack up thinking about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can anyone name a Halloween costume that is not offensive to some group somewhere? ? (I can’t).

Huh? I was a cat several years running. Also a princess, a baby, an angel, a flapper, and Robin Hood.

I have not worn a racist costume since kindergarten, when the school made us dress like "Indians" for Thanksgiving, in vests we made out of brown paper bags. I was pissed because mine had to have a paper papoose instead of a bow and arrow.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can anyone name a Halloween costume that is not offensive to some group somewhere? ? (I can’t).

Huh? I was a cat several years running. Also a princess, a baby, an angel, a flapper, and Robin Hood.

I have not worn a racist costume since kindergarten, when the school made us dress like "Indians" for Thanksgiving, in vests we made out of brown paper bags. I was pissed because mine had to have a paper papoose instead of a bow and arrow.

Hopefully now you are pissed for other reasons. Like it was racist and they forced children to wear racist depictions. A friend fought with her DS’s school over this and won. They made it voluntary and only one kid did it. The next year was also voluntary and no one did it. So they dropped it.

[Anonymous]

When I met my now ILs way back in the 90s, they had a decades long tradition to dress up as Indians and Pilgrims for Thanksgiving dinner and would alternate costumes and hosting with their family friends. One year I wore a construction paper headband and feather headdress, just like we used to make in grade school in the 70s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can anyone name a Halloween costume that is not offensive to some group somewhere? ? (I can’t).

I got a cardboard box and made a die/dice out of it one year. Another year, I was a baby. Another year, I was a hippie (tie die, groovy sunglasses, long hair parted in the middle) but my parents were actual hippies so I don't think it was offensive. Another year, I was a palm tree. There are infinite possibilities to non-offensive costumes.

Yes - but you ultimately mocked the values your parents stood and fought for, and in so doing, you diminished their accomplishments. That alone is offensive enough that you should feel shame for your actions.

Hippies had accomplishments? You obviously weren't around in the early 70s.

[Anonymous]

No I've never pretended to be another race. I've worn various ethnic costumes for 'culture day' depending on what country or culture we were learning about and families from that culture/country would let us borrow clothes/teach us info and customs. Have never darkened skin, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When I met my now ILs way back in the 90s, they had a decades long tradition to dress up as Indians and Pilgrims for Thanksgiving dinner and would alternate costumes and hosting with their family friends. One year I wore a construction paper headband and feather headdress, just like we used to make in grade school in the 70s.

They still do this at my kids episcopal school.

[Anonymous]

Went as Incredible Hulk once with Green paint and Green powder in hair. I now know Green Lives Matter and I am sorry I upset any green people

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I dressed as a gypsy for Halloween when I was about 8. I'm 40 now and came across the picture a year or two ago in a photo album. I'm not worried it will come back to haunt me or anything--I've got no plans to run for office--but it did make me reflect on how unthinking even my white, Jewish, liberal family was 30 years ago.

I could have written every word of this. But I’m in my late-40s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can anyone name a Halloween costume that is not offensive to some group somewhere? ? (I can’t).

I got a cardboard box and made a die/dice out of it one year. Another year, I was a baby. Another year, I was a hippie (tie die, groovy sunglasses, long hair parted in the middle) but my parents were actual hippies so I don't think it was offensive. Another year, I was a palm tree. There are infinite possibilities to non-offensive costumes.

Yes - but you ultimately mocked the values your parents stood and fought for, and in so doing, you diminished their accomplishments. That alone is offensive enough that you should feel shame for your actions.

Hippies had accomplishments? You obviously weren't around in the early 70s.

Smoking grass and gettin laid.

[Anonymous]

I was Louis Armstrong once. I actually did idolize him and I also played the trumpet. I didn’t have blackface but I remember puffing my lips out to look like his (where you put your bottom lip down and then your tongue becomes the top lip). I didn’t mean offense, but yeah I get it now