The University’s signature Halloween event is Trick-or-Treating on the Lawn. The trick-or-treating tradition opens the Lawn rooms to the local community. Families from a variety of backgrounds throng together on the grass. Social divisions are, for the event’s duration, suspended.
In other instances, however, Halloween reinforces social divisions instead of easing them. On college campuses, the holiday frequently provokes disputes about costumes that play to ethnic stereotypes. Some frequent offenders include sombrero-wearing “Mexicans,” cowboys and “Indians”, or “ghetto” costumes.
This year, a few universities have warned students against wearing costumes that could offend their peers. The University of Minnesota’s Office of Student Affairs sent a letter to students urging them to take care in selecting Halloween costumes. The letter did not imply any threat of disciplinary action. It merely asked students to consider whether their costumes perpetuated racial or gender stereotypes.
The University of Colorado at Boulder took a bolder approach. The school put up posters that juxtaposed members of racial or ethnic groups alongside costumes that portrayed their cultures in an insensitive way. The posters read: “You wear the costume for one night. I wear the stigma for life.”
Many amusing Halloween costumes are provocative, and it is difficult to determine where provocation ends and offense begins. Aren’t these kids just having fun? Colorado’s strategy struck FOX News, for one, as being tone-deaf or insensitive in its own way. Administrators frowning on risqué costumes amounted to “politically-correct college busybodies,” in the words of an article published last week.
A ban on a particular costume would unequivocally damage a student’s right to free expression. For a school to disapprove of a costume is another matter. It may be that a school can create unnecessary taboos by discouraging certain costumes. But it seems as if a taboo against, say, appropriating exaggerated American Indian attire for the sake of fun is not such a bad thing. A student can choose to wear a costume that plays to racial stereotypes. Similarly, a student can choose to make racially insensitive remarks. But the best colleges strive to prepare students to function in a pluralistic society, in which they will work and interact with people who are different from them. So censuring racist costumes is consistent with a college’s aim of preparing students for an increasingly globalized and multicultural world.
And while some might object that discouraging certain costumes takes the fun out of Halloween, you could just as easily say that a racially charged costume would take the fun out of the holiday for a student who identifies with the group being stereotyped.
Disputes about objectionable Halloween costumes are not wholly distant from the University’s history. An episode in our recent past is worth remembering.
In 2002, Kappa Alpha Order and Zeta Psi fraternities were investigated by the Inter-Fraternity Council after photographs surfaced from a Halloween party that the two organizations hosted. The pictures showed students in blackface. The incident drew a storm of public debate in The Cavalier Daily and a University-wide condemnation from then-President John Casteen. The IFC found the fraternities not guilty of disorderly conduct on the grounds that the costumes were constitutionally protected free speech.
Free speech considerations are vital. But in choosing costumes, students should still seek to respect their peers. Racial stereotypes make for hurtful costumes and run the risk of perpetuating damaging ideas about minority groups. And such costumes rarely make for an amusing or imaginative Halloween. Students should exercise caution before selecting Halloween attire that promotes stereotypes that we, as college students, should be working to dispel and challenge.
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