Men will don breasts, fake Afros and sombreros next weekend. Women will fancy themselves with moccasins and feathers. Some concerned students will take out their video cameras this Halloween and give voice to a silent culprit: victimization in the form of costumes.
Together, the Multicultural Student Coalition and the Campus Women’s Center will continue this week what they started last year and try to make students more cautious and respectful during the costume-selection process.
“There has been a tendency on this campus every Halloween for students to dress up as students of color,” said Peter Moran of the MCSC. “That can be offensive.”
Last year Moran kicked off what is expected to be an annual event on campus. He and others in the MCSC videotaped the Halloween celebrations on State Street and confronted people about the choices of costumes they made.
Tonight, the groups will showcase that video and kick off a week of activism fighting against what they see as a less-obvious sort of racism and sexism.
The student-filmed documentary “Halloween: Behind the Costumes,” will be showcased as part of the Campus Women’s Center’s biweekly Monday Movie Program. Following the screening will be a panel discussion about the issue and what can be done to curb it in the future.
According to a Campus Women’s Center press release, the week’s scheduled events are aimed at improving campus climate for everyone on the UW-Madison campus.
“This program is vital to the rhetoric on campus climate that surrounds the UW campus and the rest of the nation during this time of uncertainty and fear,” the statement said. “By discussing campus climate in relation to offensive Halloween costumes, we hope to make students think twice about the offensive nature of some costumes and broaden this topic to campus climate in general.”
Aside from Monday’s showcase and panel discussion, the groups have organized a gathering around costume venders on Thursday to make sure customers are aware of the issue.
“We’re just trying to get the word out to the whole campus just to be cognitive of what you dress up as,” Moran said.
Last year, he said, the list of offensive costumes was enormous. From “hula girls” to “drunken Mexicans,” Moran said, many students found it hard to enjoy the celebrations.
“Everyone likes to put feathers in their hair, jump up and down and act stupid,” Moran said. “That could make new students feel like they don’t want to go to this school anymore.”
Moran said both minority and majority students share his concern.
“Students of color are very supportive of this event,” he said. “And we’re finding more and more students of majority are in support of it, too.”
The groups will be filming the celebrations again this Halloween and expect the problems will persist.
“I’m just waiting to see how many Osama bin Ladens there are this year,” Moran said. “For people from that part of the country, I can see how that would really piss them off.”
