This weekend I reluctantly took my daughter Halloween costume shopping.  I have to say I was a little worried about the scary stuff she would see.  She is easily frightened (as am I).  To my surprise, it wasn’t the scary stuff that proved objectionable.  It was all the slutty costumes for women.  Sexy secretaries.  Sultry nurses.  Tantalizing teachers.  Wait a minute..I see a pattern here.

Apparently, I’m not alone.  The young women we met with in Cincinnati brought up the subject completely unprovoked.  “Why is it that the only costume choices for women take stereotypical ‘female’ jobs and turn them slutty?” said one woman.  “I mean its fun to be sexy sometimes, but I don’t want that to be my only option.” “And why do the guys get more funny costumers than we do?,” asked another.

To be fair, there were some scary alternatives for women.  But even those had a sexy side to them—the voluptuous vampire, the candy corn witch.  And the attempts at humor were stereotypical in nature—the pregnant nun—for example. 

When did Halloween turn so sexy?  Whenever and why ever it happened, women are finding other alternatives—using their own creativity.  One woman we met in Charlotte talked about dressing up as a human tornado.  She was going to take a t-shirt and attach small animals, people, houses, cars by yarn and safety pins to it and then twist to watch them fly.  I’m sure she’ll get plenty of attention…and not for the wrong reason.  Smart woman!