Sit back, boys and ghouls, and I'll tell you a tale. A tale of terror. A tale of horror. A tale... of
privilege!
Every year, Halloween comes around and we get a plethora of different reactions. A lot of people love Halloween because of the darkness of it all, some love the costuming and pageantry of it all, and others just enjoy another excuse to party. But just like there's always someone looking for an excuse to party, there's always people looking for an excuse to get angry.
And some of it's justified. There are some pretty tasteless costumes out there that people should re-think, or even think about for the first time, before throwing them on and leaving the house. But anti-privilege crusaders, obsessed with finding the problematic in anything fun, will stop at nothing, and I mean
nothing, in their pursuit of... well, whatever passes for happiness for them:
Look, I understand that you have strong feelings about how problematic Halloween is. The internal struggle not to appropriate a Celtic holiday for an excuse to drink indie craft beers with your friends in the safest costumes possibly imaginable must be hard. But should you really be surprised that someone would have an objection to you defacing merchandise in the seller's place of business? Not everyone's going to see you as a noble defender of the downtrodden when a local business owner is facing a potentially serious loss in their profits because you wanted to make a statement. It's a shame your white privilege didn't protect you from repercussions.
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| Welcome to the reality of "You break it, you bought it." |
I have a couple of thoughts on this.
First off, if you were that serious about your activism, why were you not willing to be arrested? When I was still an activist, I was cuffed, put in a cop car, and detained. Fortunately, no charges were laid against me and I was released, but I went willingly. You seem genuinely shocked that, after defacing property that wasn't yours, that you'd be charged with a crime. You're very lucky the police gave you the option of paying it off.
Speaking of which, I have a few hundred bucks in my bank account right now. All of my bills are paid, and I don't have any major expenses planned coming up, but you have the privilege of having enough money to pay for $1500 worth of Halloween costumes. Which, by the by, count as sales, so congratulations on artificially inflating the market for "the shittiest costumes." Expect more "Sexy Policewoman" costumes on sale next year, partially due to
your efforts.
Gosh, they didn't let you go tax-exempt? What's your charity status? Did you file a 501(c)3 form for yourself? No? And you're upset that his reasoning was that he had to pay his taxes, too? He's a small business owner,
of course he has to pay his taxes; the people who run Halloween Spirit franchises aren't in the 1%.
I think I've just about had it with spoiled rich kids thinking they're the world's saviours by doing dumb little things like vandalizing private property they don't agree with. Back in my day
we went out and
protested. We didn't go into stores with a credit card at the ready and vandalize sweater vests in the hopes that... in fact, what the hell
were you hoping to accomplish here?
I mean, imagine what she could do if her strength of conviction matched her bankroll... but I imagine that would cut into her tweeting time.
So, another year's Halloween has come and gone. Given my lack of any cohesive social circle, and the decade or so I've spent working from home or in other situations not conducive to it, I can't remember the last time I celebrated the holiday. Maybe next year; this year I've been too tired and too busy to plan anything.
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