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Are Kids' Costumes Too Gruesome?
Associated Press/AP Online via Yellowbrix
October 28, 2009
Halloween has morphed into a gore fest that has kids as young as 6 unleashing their inner monsters in ultra-violent costumes – blood-smeared chain saws and spiked killing gloves sold separately.
Options include Leatherface from “Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” Jason (“Friday the 13th”), Freddy (“A Nightmare on Elm Street”) and Michael (“Halloween”). Costume sizes can run so small that many wearers might be too young to have seen the slasher movies under film industry guidelines.
Fanged creatures feasting on brain stems. Possessed babies chomping on arms. Not all parents think it’s OK for the holiday second only to Christmas in the minds of many kids to be more a celebration of the most deranged characters pop culture has to offer.
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“Bloody, sadistic, nightmare-inducing Halloween costumes are indeed being made and marketed for kids, and no one seems to care,” said Joel Schwartzberg, a parenting writer and Montclair, N.J., dad of a 10-year-old boy and twin 7-year-old girls.
Schwartzberg is fighting back at tooscarycostumes.com, which he hopes will raise awareness about how Halloween has strayed from “sickly sweet to just plain sick.” No puritan, he said he loves a good horror flick and has even written some himself, but what’s the point of all the realistic gore – for the very young, anyway?
Katiemichelle
21 days ago
42 comments
I would be less hesitant to give out treats to kids if they didn't come knocking at my door with a knife or axe in their hand, even if it's plastic. I don't think that the actual scary outfits are bad. The weapons are what bug me.
killerwasp
22 days ago
116 comments
Lemon2Orange: What actions would you consider against the teens and adults who don't feel like dressing up as firemen as they walk the same streets as your children? Of course, if they DO dress as firemen I am sure it will probably be scantily dressed! I've seen scarier looking people on a regular sunny day than on Halloween!
Zaaz7y
22 days ago
26 comments
Proof that ethics and economics are rarely considered together. If a product sells, it will be sold. Thus the resposibility lies with the consumer to shape the market by their choice of demand, effecting the supply. In terms of art, this has been the downfall of many a brilliant artist who's creations where not in vogue at the time. Still, this appears to be a parental ethics issue, not an economic one.
CurtMaryAnn
24 days ago
96 comments
Halloween, like Valentine's Day, is a holiday kids can understand. You can start asking any child after Sept. 1 what they're going to be on Halloween. They will give you an excited description. Tonight, there will be plenty of princesses, firemen, and fuzzy bunnies knocking at our door . Let's hope we see only a few slashers. Can we give less candy to the more gruesome?
Lemon2Orange
24 days ago
6 comments
I think first of all what people need to realize is that even though the kid, or the parents don't care if their child is dressed up as a movie character they've never seen before, it does effect other children. unless Freddy Keuger JR. is walking along a deserted street other people are going to see him, and yes there will be other kids scared by him. I hope I know what I'm tlking about since it wasn't too long ago when I stopped trick or treating with my parents because there were far too many gory zombies walking around.
tomwhisper
24 days ago
48 comments
"it's Only a costume." Yes I do agree, but age appropriate comes to mind and that dreaded artistic accountability. You don't go to a five year old or a 12 year old and teach them about the wonders of psycho killers or latest horrific human events because you might think they might find it entertaining, and it's not about education. From age 0 to 14 you are teaching your kids about right and wrong and good judgment, which these costumes don't show one bit of good sense. I know I am a parent. But if you think these costumes are entertaining would you take your 10 year old through the `concentration camps of the holocaust and just for the added effect recreate all the Nazi horrors because it is entertaining? Again we complain and are appalled by the violence of the youth and their lack of respect of life. "It's just costume." just doesn't cut the mustard. It is called being responsible. Not shielding the kid from the world both good and bad, but doing it constructively, and not glorifying human gore and man's unique ability to create blood and mayhem into a masterful art. Common sense should rule here and general understanding what is right and what is just plain wrong.
Tom Whisper~ (The Devil is only a whisper away...)
randompix
25 days ago
136 comments
its only a costume well done to
tomwhisper
25 days ago
48 comments
I read through some of the commentary, and the fact that we have made our own homemade concoctions of horror triviality, but now it is mass media, and by the way I am far from conservative, but the fact these costumes, rather the character borders on human madness somehow sets my nerves on edge that we would think of entertaining the thought of allowing a 5 to 12 year old go out in these that glorifies human atrocities. Alfred Hitchcock who with a bottle of hersey's syrup and a shower scene in Psycho made every American woman terrified of her own shower, saw the Blob exploding into a flowing lake of lava of blood spill across the big screen, was quoted to say, "Blood has just now lost it's effect." A man who made you your skin crawl with a thought, your imagination, accented with a single drop of blood.
Just some food for thought....
Tom Whisper~ (The Devil is only a whisper away...)
tomwhisper
25 days ago
48 comments
desensitization mean anything. I find it ironic that we are appalled by the violence of the youth, and teen age angst and the variety behaviors that we as a society deem unacceptable. Take the handguns from the street so there is less shootings and young people dieing and yet we will by our children video games where they steal cars, shoot cops and create as many causalities and make it a big game and I'm sorry these costumes are a little bit over the top for a five year old or a 12 year old for that matter. Would you let your kids watch these movies. At 16 maybe and that's questionable. I don't even allow my five year old boy watch Coraline or Mirror mask because of the dark imagery. Too young is too young. Dress the kid up like a vampire, a mummy, a pirate, or a werewolf, not a bloody corpse of a thing that overloads the senses and takes things out of context and things that are beyond a child sensibilities when morality and good judgment of right and wrong are still in the process.
Tom Whisper~ (The Devil is only a whisper away....)
Mindy_Kern
25 days ago
34 comments
I think it's great. And as artists we should be encouraging expression. So what if the kid looks just like the scary creature, big deal. If it doesn't scare the child wearing it than what's the problem? I've been doing horror makeup for my friends and siblings for many years. We even got morticians wax, and noone thinks its "scary" it's always a ton of fun for everyone.It brings joy to children when they look like the character they are trying to portray! So, if you are so conservative that you can't let kids enjoy Halloween, than there is no help for you. And to the "concerned parents" get over yourselves. It's almost 2010...things are changing fast, and if you can't keep up, shut up and deal with it.
MarionJade
25 days ago
18 comments
Wow... this is aweful! I don't live in America, so Halloween isn't big here, but we do throw a party for the fun of dressing up and I won't even allow kids there incase my shoddy decorations made of recycled boxes and such are too scary.... I can't believe people let their little ones wear things like this :( This is a sad, sad day for all!
PatsyC
25 days ago
1814 comments
Whatever happened to using the imagination, this costumes are dumb. Hopefully young children are not watching this movies.
ThePenciler
25 days ago
2 comments
General rule: If the costume is based off a psychotic character or individual then the kid's too young for it. Better to scare the kid with yourself dressed in that type of costume than dress him in that type of costume and mess up his psyche.
I like #4 though. It's macabre, but it's fun. That's the line I would draw. I would dress in similar costumes as a kid myself. It's that Addams Family type of humor. Macabre, but fun.
But it's Halloween. Being scared by cheap tricks and traps is the core of what genuine Halloween is. I'm not talking about what the traditional roots of Halloween are. I'm talking about what it is as a family event.
JaneLeonard
26 days ago
144 comments
not gruesome enough? hey, i've seen modern slasher flicks. if i had kids, there's no way i'd let them watch those movies, even if they -did- know they were just movies.
so why let them wear costumes from the movies? no thanks.
mariposaa
26 days ago
126 comments
Halloween is a traditional holiday, it used to be called Day of the Dead. I think costumes could be more original, if anything.