Another October, another Halloween costume in the spotlight for being “inappropriate.” But this year, it’s not a “Sexy Harambe” suit that people are debating, it’s the popular Disney character Moana.
In a now-viral post on the website raceconscious.org, a white mom weighs options for her young daughter’s costume. She’s torn between Elsa from Frozen and Moana, but sees issues with both.
“Elsa is an imaginary or made-up character. Moana is based on real history and a real group of people…if we are going to dress up a real person, we have to make sure we are doing it in a way that is respectful. Otherwise, it is like we are making fun of someone else’s culture.”
Hearing me push back against her Moana choice, my daughter re-asserted her desire to dress up as Moana (for Halloween 2018!). I closed this initial “Moana” conversation by telling her: “We would have to do some research and figure out if there is a way to dress up as Moana that is respectful of her culture.”
Since her 2017 Halloween choice was, in fact, Elsa, I returned to this costume choice and shared: “There is one thing I don’t like about the character of Elsa. I feel like because Elsa is a White princess, and we see so many White princesses, her character sends the message that you have to be a certain way to be “beautiful” or to be a “princess”…that you have to have White skin, long, blonde hair, and blue eyes. And I don’t like that message. You are White, like Elsa—if you dressed up as a character like Moana, who has brown skin, you would never change your skin color. But I’m not sure I like the idea of you changing your hair color to dress up as Elsa—because I think Elsa’s character could also be a short, brown-haired character like you.”
“No,” my daughter refuted. “I want you to make be a long, blonde braid like Elsa’s.”
“We can do that,” I agreed. “When we are dressing up as a made-up character who is White, it is OK to change how your hair looks, but I just want you to know that if you wanted to, you could dress up as Elsa and not change your hair.”
Then Redbook backed up the argument, saying that there are plenty of princesses that white girls can dress up as.
“At this point, you might be saying something like: “But, I dressed up as Jasmine as a child, and I’m not a racist!”, or, “It’s just a Halloween costume, please chill the f*ck out.” But one of the best things about time is that it moves forward. You should too. You can (and should) strive to be better than you were 10, 20, or 30 years ago. If you missed the mark when you were younger, maybe think about using this Halloween as an opportunity to teach your kids about the importance of cultural sensitivity. If your child’s dream costume feels questionable, don’t just throw up your hands and hand over your credit card. You’re the parent here, and the onus of what your child wears falls on you. If your kid wears a racist costume … you’re kind of wearing it too.
I know. It’s a lot to handle.
If you ask me, there’s a big difference between dressing up as a character from a movie for Halloween and doing something like blackface. One is wearing a costume in admiration; the other is mocking a culture. A 5-year-old dressing up as Moana is not trying to be disrespectful — she’s emulating a fictional character she reveres.
Where do you stand in this debate? Sound off in the comments.
