Slenderman: the creepy, child-snatching boogieman who was born out of Internet imagination, is once again in the headlines. But only because he might soon be knocking on your door, or coming to your party.
Slenderman has made the synaptic jump from obscurity to mainstream, thanks to Halloween costumes. And that’s a problem.
It’s a good bet that many of you had never heard of Slenderman until you heard about the two young girls in Wisconsin who stabbed a 12-year-old friend 19 times, saying they wanted to “please” the fictional character. The girl did survive, but some say that’s not enough to dismiss this: Slenderman costumes selling at those temporary Spirit Halloween stores. They say it’s in bad taste, especially since the trial is still going on.
The store’s corporate owners had this to say to HLN: “We carried the costume before the incident, and we don’t think the costume in any way condones the actions of violence.”
Keep in mind, the costume isn’t glorifying the girls. It’s a fictional Internet monster. And there are plenty of other monstrous characters out there: everything from Jason to Freddy Krueger, vampires to zombies… and keeping it 100? You might throw NFL players into that mix these days.
Every year somebody somewhere makes the news for having a wildly inappropriate costume. So what’s it going to be this year? Since the outfits are already on sale, Rance hit the streets to find out: what’s the worst costume you could wear this year?
