All Hallow's Rant.

I just want to state right off the bat, that we as people should try to be sensitive to one another and respectful of people's beliefs.

That being said, "Orange-and-Black" day is a giant pile of lame.

Yes.  Orange and Black day.  That is what my childrens' school calls a Halloween celebration.  No costumes.  Just Orange and Black clothing.

L.A.M.E. Lame.

In what universe does it make sense that I am allowed and encouraged to dress in costume at my office job, yet my children are subjected to this?   I've heard a number of reasons behind this, the main one being:

• We don't want to leave out the kids who don't celebrate Halloween.
• We don't want kids to lose parts of their costumes before Halloween.

First,  I've generally been of the opinion that the way to promote diversity is to engage others in traditions, rather than shy away from them.  I generally get on this more around the holiday season, by maintaining that rather than trying to erase christmas from schools, schools should also teach about other celebrations such as Chanukah, Diwali, Kwanzaa etc, especially in more culturally diverse areas.  I don't think anyone should be forced to participate, but then we get the argument 'well, we don't want the kids who don't celebrate to feel like weirdo's or something

Secondly, kids are gonna get left out of stuff.  We as adults do children a huge disservice by constantly trying to level the playing field, because when they are in the real grown-up world, there is no level playing field.  We do more damage, in my opinion, by going 'well, Johnny doesn't celebrate halloween, so none of us can, so Johnny doesn't have hurt feelings.'  How alienated is Johnny going to feel when all the other little kids know he's the reason they can't wear their h'ween costumes to school?

The second one I got from my younger daughter's Kindergarten teacher a couple of years back.  Flabbergasted?  Yes i was.  That year was especially stupid, because Orange and Black day was strictly a Kindergarten thing.. the older grades were allowed to wear their costumes to school.   So parents with more than one kid at the school were stuck explaining to their 4 and 5 year olds that they couldn't wear costumes, but their brothers/sisters could.  Real nice.

My reaction (non-verbal, in-my-head reaction) to this teacher's reasoning that she didn't want to be responsible for making sure the kids didn't lose parts of their costumes was "Are you kidding me?  Why are you even a teacher?"  Seriously, what a friggin' cop-out.  Oh, while on the subject, when I brought banana muffins for their Orange and Black.. erm.. party, I was told 'sorry, healthy treats only."  Shit.  All that heroin I laced the muffins with going to waste.  Seriously?  Banana Muffins=Junk?  At least my co-workers liked them.

(I am in no way insinuating that any of my co-workers are smack addicts.  Just in case of any confusion)

The other thing that bugged me is that there probably are people out there who would get mad at the school if Little Precious lost part of their costume, when they should be A) mad at their kids for being irresponsible and losing stuff or B) mad at themselves for buying expensive costumes when they could easily make them, knowing full well that kids are irresponsible and lose stuff.

If my kids lose a part of their costume at school, I'm out maybe 2-3 bucks (because I refuse to buy costumes, and prefer to piece them together - I may buy components but on the whole, I costume pretty cheaply) and they have to make do with whatever we have lying around the house, and if they don't like it, they shouldn't have lost their costume.

Simple.  Teaching kids at a young age to respect their belongings and hold themselves accountable.

*sigh*

I guess I can take some solace that at least they're not pulling out the old played out "Oh Noes!  Devil worship!" arguments.  But Really? 

I'm thinking I'll dress them in their black and orange, and if they want, do some zombie makeup.

Civil disobedience, Kids.  That's where it's at.