Halloween’s political correctness

One of this year’s best Halloween costume was a kid sporting a “Baby

Ben Simmons” outfit, replete with the pouting Sixers’ player wearing a diaper and throwing a tantrum. As they say, it’s funny ’cause it’s true.

In the real world, everyone got a good laugh. Sure, it lightly poked fun at Simmons — and deservedly so — but in the big picture, there was no harm, no foul. Yet in the politically correct world populated by the “I’m offended by everything” crowd, that costume would undoubtedly make the “what you’re not allowed to wear” list.

Maybe the extremists would deem it offensive to parents whose babies are now associated with an unpopular person dealing with the mental anguish of a pathetic playoff performance. Or maybe they’d say it offends incontinent adults who wear diapers. Or maybe they’d just call it racist — like almost everything else — because a non-black person was personifying a black basketball player.

If that sounds far-fetched, just look at how many costumes were deemed offensive this Halloween. Here’s a few:

Can’t wear the “sexy nurse outfit” because that would offend America’s frontline health care workers by objectifying them and reducing them to sex symbols. Opposition from the PC crowd had become so loud that entire news stories and commentary pieces — delving into more psychobabble than Freud ever mustered — were dedicated to why it was so “wrong.”

It’s out-of-bounds to don a

“blind ref” costume showing why they “miss the calls,” and there’s no putting your hands together for those sporting scars, burns, and prosthetic hooks and limbs (or no limbs at all). According to a Yahoo!Life article, disability rights activist Marie Dagenais-Lewis of the Diversability Leadership Collective (DLC) told the news organization that these costumes “really highlight the ableist society’s blatant disregard for disability” and “perpetuate the notion that disability should be feared.”

Sadly, Halloween loses more of its uniqueness every year, courtesy of the coddled generations who don’t understand the ramifications of their beloved Cancel Culture. It’s gotten so ridiculous that, in some places, trick-or-treating for some children is illegal. Don’t “snicker.” For the “crime” of celebrating Halloween, some Orwellian cities had/have ordinances on the books stipulating that anyone over a given age — as young as twelve — caught trick-or-treating faces fines and jail time. Further, any “legal” revelers knocking on doors after a certain time face similar penalties.

Where are we going when America’s hyper-sensitivity no longer allows us to laugh at ourselves? And worse, when we willfully allow the Thought Police to exercise control over every aspect of our lives? You can tell a lot about a society by its sense of humor. The strong ones have the ability to laugh, poke fun, and engage in self-deprecating humor, made possible by an innate confidence and the ability not to take itself too seriously. But we are losing such collective humor at an alarming rate.

Ironically, lost in the controversy of choosing Halloween costumes (or toys, movies, or sports team mascots) is the only thing that truly matters: intent, intent, intent — a concept the PC crowd simply can’t comprehend. This debate isn’t about defending blind referees and fake leg costumes, but advocating a tolerant society where we act like rational adults instead of pouty third graders.

Things change, and people evolve for the better — nowhere more so than in America. Much of what was offensive or taboo in the past — such as Halloween, which was banned by Christian religions — eventually loses its stigma, and in fact becomes embraced.

Let’s be honest. Is wearing a black store-bought Obama mask any different from darkening one’s skin as part of a homemade costume? Come on!

President Obama, LeBron James, Aretha Franklin, Jackie Robinson — all icons of American culture. Real life heroes, they captivate and inspire millions. The fact that people want to emulate them — and yes, that includes looking like them — is the ultimate gesture of goodwill. Slamming those who want to walk in a champion’s shoes for just a day makes no sense.

Honoring people by emulating them merits praise — not condemnation. It’s time to rip the masks off those masquerading as moral crusaders to expose them for their true colors: thought police. And what a treat that would be.