A Letter to Costume Companies

Dear Costume Craftsmen,

Halloween is right around the corner and as a college student I can say this holiday is greatly anticipated within college culture. Halloween isn’t limited to just one day for us students, but typically a full weekend event.

With this being said, multiple costumes are needed for those who want to dress up as something different for each night of these weekend festivities.

This is the time of year to go all out and be that movie character you’ve always admired or even that comic book super hero!

Although, when the time for costume hunting begins these ideas are easier said than done.

When shopping at local Halloween stores there are only some aspects of the original character costumes that make the cut.

For example, when searching for a Police officer costume one typically expects to find something like this,

                                                

Here we have a perfect representation of an actual police officer costume for women.

But unfortunately when shopping it is almost impossible to find a costume of this degree for young women to purchase.

 Instead the only police costumes that are readily available are typically ones that look a little more like this,                                

Halloween use to be about impressing people with how well you capture a character’s persona, but it now seems to have evolved into impressing people with how well a women can show off her body.

Don’t get me wrong, I do enjoy dressing up and feeling flirty and going out to have fun. But this has become a contest for young girls to see who can look sexier or who can grasp the most attention on social media.

These costumes set a bar for over sexualizing women by providing a surplus of racy costumes to buy and a lack of more generous costume options.

So please with your help we can bring the main costume focus back from who shows the most to who’s the best ghost.

Sincerely,

A women who doesn’t want to dress up in lingerie 

The Little Things Matter

            It is 2015 and there are many achievements to brag about, and then there are the failures that cannot be avoided; Inequality between men and women. Believe it or not, or should I say, admit it or not, women are inferior to men. Who is at fault of this? Or is anyone? Why does inequality still exist, and how can we begin to change it?

            There are ranged problems that began simple then transition to extremely serious; it is the little things that soon add up to a bigger issue right beyond our eyes. Women are constantly criticized and judged in multiple settings; whether at school, at work, walking down the street, or even on social media.

Name-calling, something that unfortunately occurs too often is what most woman face regularly. Again, the little things add up and when a woman faces such slander purely due to her sex, these small things start to weigh a person down. For example, a woman being called a “hoe” is depicted as nasty, dirty, and disgusting; she will be humiliated, embarrassed and could even fall into a state of deep depression. A man who is called a “hoe” perceives this comment as a joke and very lightly, brushes it off, and does little to no harm to his identity. The society, his group of friends and community will not change their perspective on this man; rather, it is considered humorous. A man may laugh it off and go hit on a girl right afterwards. He will not be criticized and may become popular from it.

        Something needs to be changed. There is too much of a difference between genders. Women should be given more respect as a human being, wouldn’t you agree? Women have continuously fought to be treated equally; it is time that they receive the same respect as men. Name calling is just a start of how we can approach discrimination towards women. For men, think of it this way, imagine sitting at home on the couch and enjoying a beer but suddenly you are rushed with your 15 year old daughter whose face is flushed and has endless tears. Imagine your daughter then telling you she is getting picked on by boys from school. She is being called a “hoe” for her apparel and self-expression. As a father you may grow angry, emotional and defensive. But how can this father be so angry if he once degraded women himself?

        Young men and grown men need to be more understanding that women have feelings. Name calling is hurtful and if it is done then why can it not have the same meaning when directed to a man compared to a women? Gender equality falls into various categories, but name calling is one used in society almost every day around schools, on television, and in our neighborhoods, it is shameful and sickening and only being directed towards women. Therefore, as a society together it is obvious that there needs to be a change.

Let’s end 2015 on a better note. Beginning with the name calling and leading into the bigger issues such as wage differences between men and women. It is not only women who need to stand up for their own rights but it is the men of society who need to help contribute to this change and commit to it. As mentioned, it is the little things that that matter, which can make a really big change.

          Imagine the bigger change that will come from name calling directed towards women. It will cause there to be a reflection with actions. Women will gain respect and no longer have to feel demolished. The other factor to consider is society and the people within it. If men stopped the name-calling, will they be viewed as less than? Will they then be inferior than? What are the consequences if the ‘normal’ today were to change between gender roles/equality? Remember, this is our every-day lives we are considering, what will happen if our normal could evolve into a more unified society between gender roles?     

A Call for LGBT+ Community and Allied Support

Like many individuals involved in the transgender community, I was thrilled when Caitlyn Jenner announced that her gender identity differed from that of her biological sex. There lies a great opportunity for transgender voices to be heard, for their problems to be noticed and addressed, for the violence to taper off and acceptance to be spread. Caitlyn Jenner is a huge figure in the public eye this year, and as such she has the chance to truly make a difference – not only in the United States, but across the globe.

And she’s trying, she really is.

It’s challenging for transgender people to be taken seriously in some spaces; transphobia is a serious problem not only in the cisgendered sphere of society, but also in parts of the LG+ community. There are individuals who, rather than viewing transgender people as also being individuals, see them as “deceptive” for presenting themselves as a gender other than their birth sex. There are also people who simply see transgender people as “special snowflakes” that are looking for attention. With these false perceptions in mind, Caitlyn Jenner’s attempts to bring transgender problems to light seem more substantial. She’s trying to help the community, but also trying to be taken seriously and listened to, which is a struggle trans people face regularly.  Caitlyn has brought to light dangerous facts such as those emphasized in:

This Bustle article

This Washington Post article

The thing is: there is no one way to be transgender. As individuals, transgender people are trying to speak out, and as individuals, allies of the community need to not only hear them, but to listen. Every experience is different, and yet most transgender people face serious dangers daily. That’s something that won’t change until people take them seriously rather than as a joke. Trans people are struggling, and they’re dying, and representatives of the community can only do so much on their own to fix what’s happening. So even though Caitlyn is trying to get transgender men and women the recognition and right to equality that they deserve, she needs the support of her community to do so. She needs more voices, not to praise her or to tear her down, but to show her what less well-off people are struggling with in the trans community. To show her HOW she can help, and how she can be one of the true advocates that the community needs.

Caitlyn Jenner, as hard as she is trying, recognizes that her experience as a transwoman is not universal. She is extremely privileged financially, which aided in her speedy and thorough transition – involving surgeries that are for some transgender people impossible to afford – and she is further privileged by her race. Other famous advocates for the transgender community, such as woman of color Laverne Cox, get less recognition than their white counterparts. My reason for mentioning this extreme difference in the experiences of Caitlyn Jenner and the experiences of other trans people is that there has been some backlash towards Caitlyn because she “doesn’t represent the trans struggle”. But there really is no true way to represent every aspect of the struggle, because every transgender person is an individual, with individual experiences.

So yes, Caitlyn has advantages and privileges that many transgender men and women do not possess. Yes, she has the opportunity to do something great in terms of working towards equality for transgender people. But she still needs support and advice from her community before she can help bring about any change.