To be honest, I kinda had a problem with this article. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for expressing your sexuality and representing who you are, but I don't feel that wearing scandalous or revealing costumes really does that. The author, Dan Savage, openly admits in the article that he his a homosexual male. He than continues to bring up how parades wearing little to no clothes, and holidays such as Halloween are what allow the gay community to express their sexuality as well as heterosexuals. I disagree with this, or I guess am a little confused. I feel like sexuality is more than what you wear, how you talk, or how you dress. Just because a man isn't straight doesn't mean he becomes the stereotypical high-fashioned, flamboyant persona everyone labels gay men to be. In one line of the article when he refers to how Halloween used to belong to the gay community, he mentions how that used to be the one time of year that they could be themselves and "wear feathers." But to me, this is a little demeaning to the gay community. I feel, at least, that being gay and sexuality in general is way more complex than an outfit. I am just confused I guess as to how Dan Savage sums up sexuality by dropping your clothes, I feel that sexuality is much more personal than an outfit you wear, or a holiday choosing to celebrate your sexuality.
However, the one thing I did like about this article was the begging. Here, Savage discusses how as the years progress women's Halloween costumes shed less clothing and expose more skin. Which I suppose is fine and accepted in our society today, however, a good point is made when he addresses how the same desire to flaunt skin and expose body parts does not pertain to males, who instead are all covered up.
Jess
I was confused by this article too, which is why I didn't write about it haha. I didn't even know where to begin. I agree that sexuality should be expressed and everyone should represent who they are, but you're right that doesn't mean just how you dress and act on Halloween. I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, but I just don't think I agree with him either.
ReplyDeleteI had a lot of problems with this article, but I knew it was going to be bad as soon as I saw it was written by Dan Savage. There is a huge problem in the queer community that pertains heavily to the sexism in our larger culture and I think Savage shows us it in this article. Gay men, especially white gay men, have this idea that they can touch and comment on a women's body because they are not attracted to women and there for are not threatening. Savage thinks that because women are showing more skin it's because they are more free to do so when this is not the case. (Not to say its bad to show skin if that's how you like to dress.) I think the skimpy out fits on Halloween come down to women dressing for men. I have seen girls on the weekends wearing nothing in the middle of winter to go to parties, yet at the queer parties I attend most people are dressed for the weather. At queer parties girls don't dress to get with a boy they dress how they want and I see a lot less skimpy out fits. The people who do want to show skin show skin of course, but there is a much more even distribution of those dressing like this. Savage is wrong, girls dress skimpy on Halloween not because they want to but because they have been told by society that that is how they should look for men.
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