{"id":1316200,"date":"2019-10-29T00:36:00","date_gmt":"2019-10-29T06:36:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/polman-column-halloween-costumes-free-expression-vs-offense\/"},"modified":"2019-10-29T00:36:00","modified_gmt":"2019-10-29T06:36:00","slug":"polman-column-halloween-costumes-free-expression-vs-offense","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/polman-column-halloween-costumes-free-expression-vs-offense\/","title":{"rendered":"Polman column: Halloween costumes: Free expression vs. offense"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Everything is offensive now \u2014 even Halloween.<\/p>\n

In Sandy Springs, Ga., a fellow\u2019s humorous display featured a pumpkin man mooning the street.<\/p>\n

\u201cHis pants are halfway down, showing his backside which is made up of pumpkins,\u201d reports CBS12.com.<\/p>\n

Neighbors complained to their homeowner\u2019s association that the display was offensive, so the fellow altered it.<\/p>\n

Which is regrettable.<\/p>\n

Halloween is \u2014 or used to be, anyhow \u2014 a time for stressed-out adults to blow off a little steam and have a little fun.<\/p>\n

Long a staple of childhood, Halloween in the past few decades increasingly has been celebrated by adults \u2014 for good reason.<\/p>\n

Eleven years ago, when Halloween\u2019s popularity among adults was rapidly growing, Robert Thompson, Newhouse Director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University, explained why.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the one day where almost anything goes,\u201d Thompson told me in 2008. \u201cAdults can be a wise guy or do something outrageous they\u2019d never do normally.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thompson said adults generally picked costumes that mocked or satirized popular culture. In my opinion, nothing is healthier for a well-functioning society than the ability to freely and heartily mock things we find silly.<\/p>\n

Such free expression is under attack in some quarters.<\/p>\n

Several publications are pointing out costumes to avoid because they may offend someone.<\/p>\n

Good Housekeeping suggests avoiding Holocaust-victim costumes \u2014 though for the life of me, I don\u2019t know why anyone would want to sport a costume like that.<\/p>\n

But last year, Good Housekeeping says, \u201cseveral retailers came under fire for selling an \u2018Anne Frank\u2019 costume for little girls.\u201d<\/p>\n

I scratch my head at the stupidity of my fellow human beings who came up with an Anne Frank costume \u2014 but the idiotic retailers who stocked them quickly pulled them off their shelves.<\/p>\n

Hitler and Nazi costumes are out. A Marie Claire story mentions the hullabaloo in 2005 over Prince Harry going to a party dressed as a Nazi.<\/p>\n

But wasn\u2019t the point of that costume to mock and berate the followers of the evil mastermind who plunged the world into a horrendous war and created the Holocaust? Wasn\u2019t that costume meant to remind us that we must never forget the evil that some humans are capable of, and that we must be ever-vigilant in preventing it from ever happening again?<\/p>\n

Any costume displaying blackface is out this year, which is obvious to everyone \u2014 except the fools, no doubt, who aspire to political office.<\/p>\n

Costumes that play off animal cruelty, eating disorders and mentally illness are out, too \u2014 though again, aside from some idiotic retailers, I can\u2019t think of anyone foolish enough to target such subjects.<\/p>\n

Zombie costumes are out \u2014 if one dresses up as a zombie version of a recently deceased celebrity. Why? Because, says Good Housekeeping, \u201ca dead \u2014 or undead, a.k.a. zombie \u2014 version brings to mind the phrase \u2018too soon.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Look: On one hand, it\u2019s good for adults to be mindful enough to avoid offending others with their Halloween costumes.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, it\u2019s dangerous to limit free expression in a free and open society.<\/p>\n

Satire may not always be pleasant \u2014 a bold satirist always risks crossing the line \u2014 but it plays an important role.<\/p>\n

The free expression of ideas \u2014 the freedom of anyone in our society to mock politics and popular culture as they see fit \u2014 is the lifeblood of a well-functioning republic.<\/p>\n

May the pumpkin man\u2019s mooning commence!<\/p>\n

Send comments to Tom at Tom@TomPurcell.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Everything is offensive now \u2014 even Halloween. In Sandy Springs, Ga., a fellow\u2019s humorous display featured a pumpkin man mooning the street. \u201cHis pants are halfway down, showing his backside which is made up of pumpkins,\u201d reports CBS12.com. Neighbors complained to their homeowner\u2019s association that the display was offensive, so the fellow altered it. Which […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1316200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-local-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-09-06 15:40:13","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1316200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1316200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1316200\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1316200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1316200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1316200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}