Editorial: For Halloween, I’m Me
Halloween is a day for transformation and exploration.
With crowds of students flooding King Street West in costumes and cheap wigs, the annual dilemma of whether to attend lecture as a student or as inflatable Garfield is back. Of course, the choice is yours, but here at The Medium, we believe that Halloween is the perfect time to explore your identity without feeling otherized—because after all, if a man can dress up in an adult diaper and be “Boss Baby,” you have our permission to explore a new look.
Halloween emphasizes horror, identity, and transformation, making it a great holiday to explore who you want to be and who you feel you are. Halloween is a chance to embody the looks of someone else for one night (or one weekend). It is an opportunity to explore an alternate identity—or even just a small part of it—and see if it makes you feel more confident, comfortable, and happy with who you are.
But with this invitation to explore your identity, we urge you to be sensitive to the identities of others. Just because Justin Trudeau did it, doesn’t mean you should.
With the free trial to a new self that Halloween licenses us with, it gives us the opportunity to see what we like. What we want for ourselves. It lets us peek into what a new makeup look, or an updated wardrobe, or a cool accent would look like in a positive light.
Many of us look forward to Halloween for months, because it’s the one holiday that gives us a chance to act or look different than what we are used to, and what others are used to seeing us as. And usually, the greater the transformation, the more positive the response.
The Medium encourages you to take that step more often. To transform and change when you feel necessary. To be the new you, unapologetically.
