By: Juztin Bello, Copy Editor
- The debate fly
As the breakout star of the VP Debate, this meme-turned-costume is kind of filthy, relevant to current events, and at the exPence of a shitty politician — perfectly encapsulating 2020. While you could just dress up like Michael Pencil with a fly in his hair, that would be uninventive and very telling of your morals. I mean, just think about it: why would you dress up like an insignificant, weak, dirty, spineless maggot, when you could dress up as a fly?
2. Carole Baskin’s dead husband
Remember that phase of quarantine when Tiger King was a thing during 2020’s five-year-long March? Who could forget the m̶u̶r̶d̶e̶r̶ tiger Queen herself, miss Carole Baskin, and the mystery behind her ex-husband Don Lewis’ “disappearance?” Now, as someone who seldom trusts a white woman in a flower crown, I know that this giant-pussy-lovin’ activist definitely murdered her ex-husband. So why not pay homage to Mr. Tiger-grub himself and go as him for Halloween! All the cool cats and kittens will love your pop-culture phantom fit so much you’ll be Baskin in the attention you crave — except, unlike Carole, you won’t have to kill a man to get it.
3. A Notes app apology
“Hey guys, I never thought I’d be doing this, but I just want to be completely transparent with you all . . .” blah blah blah. If you’ve seen a celebrity post this type of discourse on social media, then you’ve unfortunately witnessed the most empty attempt of owning up to mistakes out there. Dressing up like a Notes app apology is easy, given that these apologies themselves are basically just glorified disguises manipulative people use to hide their ignorance and lack of social awareness. You could literally just stick a piece of paper on you that says “I’m sorry I guess,” since that’s about as much effort people put into these apologies.
4. The diversity character for a Netflix original
As a year that has seen the rise of performative activism and virtue signalling, a perfect 2020 costume would be a character thrown into a Netflix TV show/movie that solely exists to hit a diversity quota. This costume is pretty easy if you’re already a minority; you just have to go somewhere with a bunch of privileged-looking people, stand in the background, and not say anything. And middle-class, able-bodied, cisgender, heterosexual white person reading this, I know what you’re thinking — but no, this costume is not for you.
5. Trump’s tax debt
While the obvious choice would be dressing as Trump himself, this writer feels that, much like Trump’s “tan”, this costume seems a little overdone. The next best thing would be something that Trump himself finds horrifying, gets people talking, and is completely unexpectedly expected: that’s right, why not go as the taxes Trump failed to pay? You think the rich find monsters and try-hard pun costumes terrifying? No, of course not! Instead, confront them with accountability and the reality that they aren’t above the working class. That’ll get them screaming.
6. An impostor
This Halloween, take this opportunity to dress up like one of those sus, cylindrical little bitches and find out which of your neighbours is the impostor. Is it your stiff, old neighbour who glares at you and your dog on your walks to make sure neither of you shit on his lawn? Is it the meathead down the road who drives 70 down your residential street and yelled at your friend for puking in front of their house before the Uber came? Or is it actually just you, who continues to uphold the image that you’re perfectly collected and unaffected by the numerous tasks you’ve yet to do that will probably kill you if you attempt completing all of them?
7. C a k e (???)
2020 has been a year of questioning, and one of the biggest questions on everyone’s mind has to do with one thing: cake. In spite of numerous 2020 atrocities, the questioning of whether things are actually cake tops this year’s list for “Why and how is this a thing?” Why not play into this confusion? Put some crumbs in your pocket and leave them in your path to really play up your cakiness. Or, if you want to play the “laying it on thick” game, you could cover your naked body in icing; that’ll really have your friends questioning whether or not you’re actually cake. But then again . . . how do you know you’re not made of cake? . . .
8. A shit ton of moths
Mothpocalypse really swarmed BC this year. Arriving during the height of the forest fire smoke, their timing was almost as good as SFU’s tuition increase during a pandemic — the biggest difference, of course, being that the moths didn’t make any excuses for their sudden appearance. And while one might oppose dressing up like the butterfly’s ugly twin, in truth, moths depict exactly what everyone is trying to do this year: searching for the goddamn light.
9. Elon Musk’s child, X AE A-XII
I’ll be honest, Elon Musk absolutely terrifies me. And knowing that this man has offspring is possibly the next scariest thing. When word came out about Elon’s child with a literal formula for a name, people were rightfully amused. But rest assured, we shant be laughing for long, for once this all-powerful being becomes old enough to take over Elon’s empire, we’re all doomed. This child has access to all of the secrets of the universe and the inheritance to do whatever he wants with said information. Now is the time we must begin paying respect to our future ruler by honouring him through costume and hailing his name. No being, human or extraterrestrial, shall surpass the future energy conservation king. A L L H A I L X AE A-XII.
10. 2020 itself
Naturally, the only thing that could round out this list would be dressing up like the entirety of the shitshow that is 2020. There are plenty of ways you can replicate this year’s landmark disasters: dressing up like a tree and setting yourself on fire, wearing a hazmat suit that’s also on fire, or literally just setting yourself on fire with no costume because, let’s be real, that’s actually how 2020 feels. I could humour the idea of dressing up as a (white) cop who hasn’t faced consequences for his actions, someone who refuses to wear a mask in the middle of a pandemic, a Republican, or something on a similar, utterly thoughtless wavelength, but something tells me the only people who would wear these “costumes” wouldn’t really be dressing up at all.
