One Antonia Blumberg, writing at The Huffington Post, which often veers off into the weeds of political correctness, tackles that burning question of late October: Is it “culturally insensitive” to wear a Hallowe’en witch costume?
But the HuffPo’s cultural sensitivity is barely skin deep — they are also featuring an article on “Witch Is the New Black: How to Dress Like Your Favorite Sorceress.”
At least Blumberg interviews Selena Fox of Circle Sanctuary, who sees no problem:
“As someone who has been politically active for many years, I see that there’s some power in taking images and repurposing them,” said Fox. “Some in our community have chosen to have some fun with witch costumes.”
Pagan doctoral candidate Sam Webster adds,
“It highly depends on who’s doing it,” Webster told HuffPost. “If it’s a pagan or a witch, they’re usually doing it with a bunch of self-referential irony.”
Which makes sense; and what also makes sense is to adopt an attitude of “who cares?” Don’t be like the stupid school administrators mentioned in the article who banned Hallowe’en celebrations in the school “partly out of respect for practitioners of Wicca who might find the symbols offensive.” Yeah, right. They care so much about us. That language is just bureaucratic butt-covering: “Let’s avoid controversy by banning something else.”
The more Hallowe’en celebrations and the more pointy hats, the better, as far as I can see. Only what do the guys wear? Sorry, I can’t do Sabrina or Stevie Nicks.
What do the guys wear? Black dresses and pointy hats. A blonde wig, too, in the case of Sabrina…
I know that I could bait someone into saying that. 🙂
We do an annual Witches’ Lunch Out on Samhain. Anyone with a pointy hat is invited to join us.
I dunno. I think you could pull off the Stevie Nicks skirt and boots.