Halloween is an incredibly fun time of the year.

For a day (or a week, or a month), you can delve into as much candy as you want; decorate everything you own with eerie fake cobwebs, ghosts, bats, witches and everything else spooky; and come up with the best costume that your imagination can afford.

The element of fantasy in Halloween that people indulge in is an absolute pretence.

You can immerse yourself into an identity that could never exist otherwise – whether it be a unicorn, superhero or something else entirely.

There is an undeniable appeal to dressing up as something that you could never present yourself as in real life, in clothes that you could never wear outside of the holiday.

However, as with everything else, fantasies have limits, and so do the costumes that you wear.

Cultural appropriation is an issue that comes up every Halloween. Every year, I see costumes being sold that carry bastardized images of people of color.

One of the most prevalent examples is that of blackface, which has historical roots in minstrel shows that dehumanized African-Americans.

These shows also perpetuated toxic stereotypes about African-Americans that have presisted to the present day – which is exactly what specific costumes that carry the image of people of color do.

Marginalized identities are not to be worn temporarily and cast off just as quick – people of color do not have that privilege.

The stereotypes, violence and history associated with these identities do not follow the person who wears the costume – people of color can never take that off.

According to Nadia Dawisha’s article on the topic in the Huffington Post, “a white person who dresses up as a (Black/African American man) … can go to a ‘ghetto’ party and wear his hoodie up in an effort to look more ‘hood’ without fearing that he will get killed like Trayvon Martin.”

With such threats facing people of color in this country today, to wear costumes that make light of this reality is nothing short of a demonstration of ignorance and racist bigotry.

For marginalized groups of people who have encountered systematic genocide and rape at the hands of colonial powers, these costumes are a privileged mockery of their history, identity and suffering.

When we are more invested in the market of wearing a fantasy of people of color for a holiday rather than learning their actual history, this speaks volumes on our current stance on cultural and ethnic sensitivities.

As an example of this, ‘Sexy Native American Costume’ brings up more than 3 million results on Google. ‘Native American Genocide’ fetches a third the number of results.

So, why do we have a market for and interest in these costumes in the first place?

“Our society equates Whiteness with normalcy, and therefore everyone outside of that category is foreign, weird, or joke-worthy – perfect for a costume,” according to Everyday Feminism.

Is that the attitude that you want to advertise with your costume choice?

According to Her Campus, here are the statements that, if they apply to the costume you are considering, qualify it for cultural appropriation:

“I have to come up with an excuse for wearing it when people ask who I am; I embody a stereotype; I am accompanying it with a fake accent; it contains a piece of another culture that holds significance (i.e. spiritual importance) and I have no connection to it or extensive knowledge of it; it is called a ‘sexy blank’ and that blank is a race, culture or ethnic identity.”

Having a ‘safe Halloween’ embodies much more than making sure you don’t get stampeded on Greek Row – we need to actively invest in protecting the integrity of the many identities and cultures that make up our campus.

Halloween is an incredibly fun time of the year.

For a day (or a week, or a month), you can delve into as much candy as you want; decorate everything you own with eerie fake cobwebs, ghosts, bats, witches and everything else spooky; and come up with the best costume that your imagination can afford.

The element of fantasy in Halloween that people indulge in is an absolute presence.

You can immerse yourself into an identity that could never exist otherwise – whether it be a unicorn, superhero or something else entirely.

There is an undeniable appeal to dressing up as something that you could never present yourself as in real life, in clothes that you could never wear outside of the holiday.

However, as with everything else, fantasies have limits, and so do the costumes that you wear.

Cultural appropriation is an issue that comes up every Halloween. Every year, I see costumes being sold that carry bastardized images of people of color.

One of the most prevalent examples is that of blackface, which has historical roots in minstrel shows that dehumanized African-Americans.

These shows also perpetuated toxic stereotypes about African-Americans that have followed to the present day – which is exactly what specific costumes that carry the image of people of color do.

Marginalized identities are not to be worn temporarily and cast off just as quick – people of color do not have that privilege.

The stereotypes, violence and history associated with these identities do not follow the person who wears the costume – people of color can never take that off.

According to Nadia Dawisha’s article on the topic in the Huffington Post, “a white person who dresses up as a (Black/African American man) … can go to a “ghetto” party and wear his hoodie up in an effort to look more ‘hood’ without fearing that he will get killed like Trayvon Martin.”

With such threats facing people of color in this country today, to wear costumes that make light of this reality is nothing short of a demonstration of ignorance and racist bigotry.

For marginalized groups of people who have encountered systematic genocide and rape at the hands of colonial powers, these costumes are a privileged mockery of their history, identity and suffering.

When we are more invested in the market of wearing a fantasy of people of color for a holiday rather than learning their actual history, this speaks volumes on our current stance on cultural and ethnic sensitivities.

As an example of this, “Sexy Native American Costume” brings up more than 3 million results on Google. “Native American Genocide” fetches a third the number of results.

So, why do we have a market for and interest in these costumes in the first place?

“Our society equates Whiteness with normalcy, and therefore everyone outside of that category is foreign, weird, or joke-worthy – perfect for a costume,” according to Everyday Feminism.

Is that the attitude that you want to advertise with your costume choice?

According to Her Campus, here are the statements that, if they apply to the costume you are considering, qualify it for cultural appropriation:

“I have to come up with an excuse for wearing it when people ask who I am; I embody a stereotype; I am accompanying it with a fake accent; It contains a piece of another culture that holds significance (i.e. spiritual importance) and I have no connection to it or extensive knowledge of it; It is called a ‘Sexy blank’ and that blank is a race, culture or ethnic identity.”

Having a ‘safe Halloween’ embodies much more than making sure you don’t get stampeded on Greek Row – we need to actively invest in protecting the integrity of the many identities and cultures that make up our campus.

Sophia Stephens is a senior english literature and comparative ethnic studies major from wenatchee. She can be contacted at 335-2290 or by [email protected]. The opinions expressed in this column are not necessarily those of the staff of The Daily Evergreen or those of the Office of Student Media.