This Halloween, maybe skip the Handmaid’s Tale costume
Decades of frat parties have perfected the offensive and in poor taste Halloween costume. Just look at the market for Halloween costumes this year, there are plenty new and confounding ways to look embarrassing.
For example, there are the Handmaid’s Tale costumes. Consider the absolutely excessive amount of products you can buy to bring your favorite dystopian TV show to life. As Jezebel points out, there are now koozies and doormats and capes and all sorts of accessories that you can purchase — on Amazon, possibly with two-day shipping — to bring your very own version of a world where women are treated like animals for breeding to your home!
Kylie Jenner even decided to throw herself an entire birthday party dedicated to the show. A rather morbid theme for a 22nd birthday.
But in the world of disturbing Halloween costumes, dystopia can be portrayed through more than just a red cape and white bonnet. On the lingerie website Yandy, known for it’s ridiculously sexy takes on copyrighted characters, there is the opportunity to dress up as “Happy Tree Painter.” This is actually a description of Bob Ross, who the costume is based on. But instead of your standard loose-fitting jeans and baggy blue shirt, this Bob Ross costume includes “stretch denim booty shorts with an adjustable belt, a plush squirrel, a paint pallet clutch, and an afro wig.” Unfortunately, a paint brush is not included.
On a website where you can buy an “Officer Sexy” or “Blasphemous Babe” costume, it shouldn’t be surprising that one of America’s most universally loved figures has been turned into a sexed-up sideshow purchasable for the price of $69.95.
We can just be thankful, at least, that Yandy is no longer selling the “Yandy Brave Red Maiden” costume — based off of the Handmaid’s Tale but featuring a tight red mini dress and the standard red cape. It was pulled from shelves last year after people on social media pointed out that you can do sexy, you can do reproductive dystopia, but you definitely can’t mix the two.
