Sunday, October 31, 2004

Suffer the Little Children (Do)

Is nothing sacred?

I suppose that's a silly question to pose in the season of All Hallow's Eve, but I remember when the Halloween costumes selection at Wal-Mart for children included Superman, a robot (made of cardboard and tin foil of course), a ghost (you got it- a sheet with holes cut in it), and a hobo (dark makeup and a stick with socks wrapped in cloth). Now our friends with an unabashedly left-of-center sense of humor have forged tongue-in-cheek with a level of impropriety that causes one to wince. I suppose they think it's not only enough to celebrate costumes depicting some of the worst memories of these troubled times, but also to use children to do so.

I'm not saying that I don't think the Diebold voting machine costume is clever, if not in a groaningly over-used fashion, but the "Nancy Reagan", "Western Hostage in Iraq", "Littlest Prisoner at Abu Ghraib", "Lyndie England", and "'Shoe Bomber' Richard Reid" get-ups are not so much "2004's Scariest Halloween Costumes" as they are 2004's most inappropriate ones.
http://www.thestranger.com/2004-10-28/special.html.

I shudder to think what's in store next year if current deviant costume trends continue.