Have a Sexy Halloween: Lolita Costumes for Young Girls
Categories: Kids 5-7, Kids 8-11, Teens & tweens, Holidays, Extreme Childhood
Every year around this time, moms of young girls and teens go through a relatively new Halloween ritual: Steering our daughters away from the increasingly sexy costume choices in stores, catalogs and online costume Web sites.
This wasn't always the case. My mom's Halloween challenges involved last minute alterations, bad weather and predictable sugar-induced meltdowns. Of course, moms still wrestle with those Halloween fixtures, but the ghoulish holiday now involves negotiations and discussions our moms were mercifully spared.
When I was a kid, costumes fell into scary or sweet categories. Pop culture had a Halloween presence, but for girls in the seventies, it involved a Princess Leia long white dress and iconic braided hair buns. A few years later, Madonna's suggestive lace outfits were vying for girls' attention, but at least traditional costume themes were still in play. Nowadays, witches, pirates and vampire costumes for girls are no longer scary; in fact, most are down-right sleazy. If your pretween daughter is like mine, she's probably oblivious to the sexualized nature of the costumes she's circling in the annual catalogs, which means there's still a good chance you can successfully steer her toward a more appropriate (and inevitably, more expensive) option.
However, savvier tweens and teens are likely to be less agreeable. Why? Because too many are already steeped in our Lolita culture -- a culture that tells Disney pop stars, including the devoutly Christian, self-proclaimed virgin variety like Miley Cyrus, that the way to be taken seriously is to appear half clad in Vanity Fair or learn to use a stripper pole, an art once reserved for a certain type of woman. As a result, girls raised on "Hannah Montana" and "Gossip Girl" will find it hard to resist peer pressure to be sexy or the allure of sexual attention they are being told is the real source of their power.
So what's a mom to do? Tackle the Halloween costume dilemma in September and no later than the first week of October. It's much harder to negotiate or offer better alternatives when the shelves are bare and the only size 12 costume is a sexy fairy.
Diane E. Levin, co-author of "So Sexy, So Soon: The New Sexualized Childhood and What Parents Can Do About It" believes that the influence of television and the culture is so powerful in our children's lives that parents no longer have the luxury of simply giving our kids "the right answer." We also have to "help children make sense of pop culture" by entering into more serious, societal discussions with them.
Levin is right. However, if post discussion negotiations break down, I'm still the parent and it's my job to say "no" and protect my daughter from inadvertently signaling something she is far too young to comprehend. As a mom, I refuse to be an enabler for our culture's sick designs to sexualize childhood. Plus, if more of us refused to buy the products, they might just go away.
Related: Australian Girls Growing Up Fast, Raising Uncivilized Kids
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Greta 10-11-2009 @ 8:51PM
I was just in a Halloween costume shop this weekend and could not believe all the totally inappropriate costumes marketed for children, tweens and teens - sexy Minnie Mouse, sexy pirate, sexy bee (??), etc. I'm not even a typically conservative parent, but the photos on the packages of young girls with super short skirts and thigh-high stockings, striking a provocative pose, made me nauseous.
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Frances 10-11-2009 @ 9:38PM
I just am thankful that I live in New Hampshire, and the cold weather prevents us ever considering anything remotely risque! My husband and I can't stand the goulish part of Halloween... we didn't even stay home for it until we had our daughter. She is seven and this is the first year she was trying to negotiate for something bloody. We gave her about four choices (none goulish) and she settled on making a leggo costume with her dad. She seems excited and had fun working on it with him, which I think was more important that actually wearing it on Halloween!
My Husband and I had a huge "after bedtime" debate, though, about letting her choose her own costume. I had the same feeling that you had, Rachel, about being the parent and saying "No" if the choices seem inappropriate. My daughter is pretty agreeable, so she doesn't hear that word often, but it is something we are going to have to get used to saying the older she gets. My husband teases me about being "practically Amish", but I am a school teacher and I see the range of what families consider "acceptable" every day (attire, movies they let their 2nd graders watch, language used in front of kids... you name it!). I am constantly comforting him that we are not the most conservative parents in the state, and that she is not growing up deprived! I just will not let her walk around looking hoochie, at least until she has a job of her own and spends her own money on the clothes she wears! Even then, probably not!
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cherylmachin 10-12-2009 @ 11:42AM
My youngest daughter babysits little kids, as well as my oldest daughter sometimes and they even get upset at the costumes that are out nowadays for the little girls to wear, and they are 16 and 17 years old. My girls dress with pretty good fashion sense most of the time so they look nice most days, some days in just t-shirts and jeans. But they become just as upset as I do when they see mothers and fathers dressing little girls in provocative outfits or even allowing their daughters to look at costumes that would reveal anything that they shouldn't. There's just way too many freaks out there lerking, especially on nights like Halloween. Waiting for the parents not to be around. It's insane. I've even gone so far as to make little girls get away from thongs at stores. I don't care if the mothers were right there. That's insane to have 8 or 9 year olds buying thongs. WTF is wrong with parents these days? Those are little girls. Sorry..
LS 10-11-2009 @ 10:00PM
When I was growing up, one of the coolest parts of Halloween was MAKING my costume. I'd choose something fun (Snoopy), or weird (the Headless Horseman - complete with the horse, courtesy of my riding lessons), or traditional (a pumpkin), and my parents and I would set out to make it. Dad would mold the cardboard, Mom would sew the parts that needed sewing, and I would float between the two, helping where I could.
Fast forward *ahem* years, and I have a little boy of my own. First, thank GOD he's a boy... I don't have to worry about the sex thing. But second, he's still a kid, and wants a good costume. We're cash-strapped, so I'm hitting the pattern bins and breaking out the sewing machine.
The nice part about this - and the part that can help moms of girls - is that sewing, for all it's mystery, is a very straightforward thing to do, and it gives YOU the control over the costume. She wants to be a witch? You can make a WAY cooler witch costume than any of those in Toys R' Us... and way more personal. She wants to be a cheerleader? You can do that, too... all it takes is a little imagination, and some plan-ahead time. And you control the length of the skirt!
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Elizabeth 10-11-2009 @ 11:08PM
LS, I agree with you--I think the number of years I made my own costume definitely outweighs the number of years I had a store-bought one. It had nothing to do with the fact that the costumes were too sexy--it was that they didn't have the style I wanted. If I was going to be a wench, I didn't want those cheap, tacky looking corsets, I wanted a real one, so I got out my pattern and made one. Not to mention those one size fits all didn't fit me. That way I looked more appropriate. I also hit the thrift stores if I was looking for a more modern costume--Madonna or something. Come to think of it, I don't remember anyone who bought a costume when I was a kid--other than very little babies. Everyone either made them or used what they had around the house. Only kids whose parents were very rich or whose mothers weren't very creative had store bought costumes.
And I agree--if you think the costumes one the market are too sexy, make your own, or just buy accessories.
Melissa 10-12-2009 @ 12:45PM
My little girl is being Jasmine this year, and I was nervous about that, because she bears her belly and stuff. I am probably one of the most liberal parents around, but she's only 3 and a half, she is not bearing her belly! We went to the Disney store to buy the costume, and to my surprise, they had "revamped" it. It has these flowy side pieces and the it's a full shirt now, no belly showing! However, I was in a Halloween store near my work (I went in looking for something for myself lol), and they had the old style Jasmine costume, and it was for an older child (maybe 8 or 10 year olds?), which I still think is inappropriate, call me crazy! And all the other sexy looking costumes, I mean, really? They are kids, let them stay kids for a little while!
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MB 10-12-2009 @ 2:52PM
I'm a mom of boys and while I don't have to worry about them wanting a sexy costume. I do have to worry about the message those costumes send to my preteen and teen boys. I don't them getting the idea that girls are just sex objects. I'm trying to teach them to be gentlemen and these outfits and costumes do not help.
By the way, (to LS) making costumes is a great idea! We try to do that most years when he doesn't want to be something I just can get a handle on. Familyfun.com has some great costume ideas. Some are super easy to make and very cheap!
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CLM 10-12-2009 @ 4:07PM
Rachel, thank you for a post on a topic very relevant to parents and one with no side-bar political sniping. One thing that makes me grateful to have boys is the absolutely terrifying early sexualization of girls. My hats off to all of you parents with girls who are battling this disgusting trend.
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praginex 10-12-2009 @ 4:42PM
About making your own costume -- my younger son won first place in a school contest when we had wrapped commercial toweling around and around a la mummy over white leggings and turtleneck, then dabbed on some muddy lipstick (dried blood). Super cheap and the more it got loose and messy, the more authentic it looked!!
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Aimee 10-12-2009 @ 8:46PM
RACHEL!
I have to thank you for your comments today on The View! Thank you for standing up for unborn children, and making a comment that not many others who are pro-life, are willing to make. You made a true, statement, that I think shocked the rest of your co-hosts, when talking about Barack Obamas Nobel Prize win. I wanted to stand up and cheer for you! I disaggree with his win, because of his liberal views on abortion, among a few others. I applaud your ability to make that statement, when surrounded by so many who dissaggree, and might in fact try to rip you to shreds, over it! And I appreciate you giving women like me, a voice!
I know that Mr. Obama did not nominate himself, and I realize that the Nobel prize, is beginnning to mean less and less, as a result of nominations such as this!
THANK YOU! I have followed you for several years, but did not know you blogged. Count me in. I love what you have to say!
Thanks,
Aimee
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queenoqueens 10-13-2009 @ 11:57PM
So anyway....as we were saying....
The sexualization of young girls really is repugnant to the Nth degree. I saw a French Maid costume for 8 year olds subtitled "the upstairs maid" and was almost moved to violence. Just couldn't believe my eyes. I am a pretty liberal person, but not when it comes to this.
To think, I couldn't find a cowgirl costume for my 8 year old girl, but could find plenty of "cheerless cheerleaders" and other weird goth crap. I mean, yes, Halloween is all about scary stuff, but given the chance, I think lots of (younger) kids would want to be happy, uplifting characters. But we're not giving them that option in an easily available way.
So to all those makers of ridiculous, in appropriate costumes.....phooey on you.
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Sifrina 10-14-2009 @ 9:40PM
It really is sick. I have a son (who will be an astronaut for the 2nd year in a row as per our agreement when we bought this expensive costume which still fits!) but I feel for parents of daughters. I can't imagine trying to counteract that sexualized, empty-head/appearance-obsessed message our culture puts out day in and day out. The regular cheerleader costumes creep me out and it's not just Halloween. I know this may offend some here but is it just me or is there something a tad unsettling about "daddy/daughter" Valentines Day dances? I know many churches put this event on, and it's supposed to be sweet & family-oriented, but aren't they too little to be thinking about dressing up for a dance with a date (even w/daddy)? Dress up is great for play but the whole dance/"couple" thing??? Is this really age appropriate? Can't the whole family dress up for something more culturally enriching - say a children's concert, symphony, ballet, jazz concert, whatever???
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mommiedear 10-24-2009 @ 11:21AM
This is true I think society sensualizes the kids and wonders why they become prey to the phedeophiles wonder no more. pOn www.truuconfessions.com moms will clarify this .
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Dac 10-18-2009 @ 2:23PM
Rachel, I would like to thank you for your book "Stay Home, Stay Happy". It is an answer to my prayers.
I first saw you in Raymond Arroyo's World Over Live and have to say I am so very grateful for all that you do as a mother and as the voice for mothers like me raising a family to be counter-cultural. You are making such a great witness. God Bless you more and more!
I applaud your comments on the The View! It sure is very refreshing to see someone out there who is not afraid to talk about real issues, however displeasing it may be to people who are so used to hearing what they want to hear. I will be praying for you that you continue to be the voice for us - women & mothers, who are in sincere pursuit to positive change and living and promoting the true essence of family life as it was intended.
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