By Sidney Reilly
Bill Clinton, the patron saint of getting some, famously tried to sidestep being caught in a lie by chopping up the meaning of the word “is.” I think we all do the same when we promote the Halloween masquerade, which is that we’re dressing up for some reason that is linked to mischievousness, paganism, and an artisto-spiritual release.
Because at this point, we’re really just getting dressed up to get laid—and I don’t have a problem with that. It’s the disingenuousness I don’t care for.
I mean, I love sexy costumes. Who doesn’t? But cosplay and Halloween are not the same thing. The great tradition of Samhain, passed down from our pagan forefathers to John Carpenter and Glenn Danzig, included dressing up as a way to disguise oneself. The holiday that would become Halloween was not meant as a self-esteem builder or a drunken hookup facilitator. That’s what the cosplay of comic conventions and my bedroom are for.
If I want to be a sexy goth Buckaroo Banzai, like I was at my wedding, then I’m going to do it regardless of the date on the calendar. Halloween, in my learned and spooky opinion, is for cleverness in the goal of attaining disguise.
That is the ultimate problem with being sexy in costuming; it just doesn’t lend itself to credibility. When a woman dresses as a “sexy cat,” she just doesn’t tend to look like a cat. Unless she does a really good Nala from The Lion King, but let’s save that discussion for my therapist.
And while we’re on the subject of women’s un-liberation, why is sexy costumery the purview of the feminine only? A good Robocop costume on a fella should launch the boats of a thousand lusty hearts all the same as a comely lass dressed as Princess Jasmine (yikes, do I have a weird Disney thing…?).
Which is all to say, that when I say no to sexy costumes on Halloween, it is only because I’m saying yes to them every other day of the year. But that really depends on what your definition of “is” is.
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