Devils Night 2009: A Luke Danes Rant from a Bitter, Trans-Bitch
So I don't know if you all know this about me, but I don't really like Halloween. I actually find no enjoyment out of it. For one, my entire life has been an orchestrated "dress-up." Playing the "male" role most of my life, sculpting the right costume of "maledom." As my good friend Red Articulates in her video.
[yeah...its totally ok if you take a moment here...open another tab in your browser...and watch the video....i can wait]
SO yeah, dressing up doesn't have the same allure to me. But more importantly I find Halloween to be an excuse for people to dress up and act like complete fucking assholes, with no real ramifications or qualms. All under the guise of happy happy Halloween.
In past years many of my Halloween nights were like any other. I remember specifically my freshman year of college, i got out of my psychology of women class, bought a Blimpies sub and fell asleep to the second disk of Gilmore Girls. AND that was fine. I had no issues with not participating in the parade of douchiery.
But tonight, Devils night 2009, I came face to face with a plethora of emotions surrounding the coming holiday.
I was totally content in my studio apartment, with my copy of "My Year of Meats" by Ruth L. Ozeki, in blissful silence. I talked to my partner, my cousin called and told me about the her first Rocky Horror experience. The night was panning out to be productive and solitary (just as i wanted it).
But the night shifted when I when to have a smoke outside.
First, as i came out of the elevators of my apartment building i noticed two women dressed up for the night. I didn't really pay much attention to what they "were", but i overheard the security guard go: YEAH! that's what my girlfriend is going as. a geisha.
Under that guise of Happy Happy Halloween, white people can't help themselves but to (1) appropriate culture and (2) fetishize and sexualize the HELL out of them.
Let's take a moment to think about all the cultures that get appropriated as Halloween costumes: Native Americans, Hulu dances, geishas, Eskimos...Fuck, lets think about how messed up it is for someone to be a "Hobo" for Halloween. One, not so charming in an economic depression and two, what kind of denial must you have to be dressed as a "hobo" and then walk down Michigan Ave. passing actual homeless people, and not notice "hey, i'm being a douche"
In line with all this, as I'm standing having a smoke a bus full of drunk Chicago hockey fans pulled up. Each of them pouring through the bus doors, each outfitted in their jersey's with the cartooned, but (notice) happy face of a "blackhawk"
I just want to go up to each one of them and say: Hey! you know, maybe this year when you're sitting down with your family for thanksgiving dinner you can think about how we killed, raped, and pillaged the people that are cartooned on your T-shirt. have a nice fucking day jag-off.
But I digress. As these hockey fans were establishing themselves on the sidewalks-- shifting their bodies, adjusting themselves-- I noticed one older guy, take a plastic hockey mask (i'm assuming they were handed out at the game, because a number of the fans had them) put it over his face, see the "geisha" through the window into the lobby of my building, and LITERALLY HUMP THE FUCKING WINDOW!
[I'll let that sink in]
He fucking humped a window.
yeah.
As i was heading back inside, i saw the "geisha" and her friend. I walked up and explained that I found that horrifically disturbing, that I was sorry that it happened, and if the downtown area wasn't swarming with cops i would have decked the guy.
Her response: Oh, its fine. Thanks though.
So now, back in my quite apartment, i'm left to process all of these things. The appropriation. the sexual assault. how that assault is waved off. What links each of these occurrences? Entitlement. Under the guise of Halloween people fucking just feel entitled to do what ever they please. They have no guilt, and feel as if they should not own any guilt.
Confront someone dressed as a hypersexualized, cartooned version of an native American, their response (most likely) will be that it's just a costume. They can't grasp why dressing up like a native American, or a geisha, is in bad taste. There is no connection between their stereotype fueled costume and the ACTUAL culture they are meant to represent.
AND HOW CAN YOU BLAME THEM. For fuck sake, we still have national sports teams named after actual cultures of people. And i know i know maybe i'm just being PC, but as Atom and His Package so gracefully puts it in his song "If You Own The Washington Redskins You're a Cock"
"you'll go wa wa wa you're so PC
and i will say hey wait remind me again how it came to be
that being a stupid american is a desirable trait
wouldn't that be offensive if we cheered
"rah rah rah for the Carolina negroes with a beat box cheer and a big foam afro"
the Minnesota Vikings became the New York kikes with dollar bills on their helmets
cause thats what they're like ya know"
They don't equate their costumes with actual people. As the article "When Cultural Appropriation Goes to Far" on Feministing.com states, "it [is] very convenient for people that hadn't experienced life as a person of color and an immigrant in this country to participate in a culture by choice" It is very convenient for someone to just buy the $60 squaw costume (with the brown tights and a beaded vest) throw it on for one night of fun, and cast it off in the morning. All without having to think about the messy "details" about the actual discrimination faced by Native American women.
And for the guy who humped the window, it comes back to my issue with Halloween in the first place. It's an excuse for people to be assholes. The anonymous nature of hiding behind a costume (in this case a hockey mask) allowed him to act however he wanted. All in fun, all in the name of Halloween. 'Cause i got a 100 bucks that his explanation of his actions would be that he was just trying to scare them!
Yeah, well, good job, because you do. You do scare us. However, your costume isn't one bought in one of the Halloween stores that pop up in September. You as a white male have so much power and ability to act however you please, as if everyday was your Halloween. We are scared of you. We are scared of you when we walk at night, through the streets, we are afraid of you at the bars and in our homes. We are afraid of you every day. Your "scariness" bleeds past Halloween, into our everyday.
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