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" As a mom (of both daughters and a son), the act of buying Halloween costumes gives me an eye twitch. I know I&amp;#039;m supposed to reject the notion that dressing in skanky clothes is &amp;quot;bad.&amp;quot; Women should feel free to wear what they want, where they want and to do so free from judgement. As far as adults are concerned, I&amp;#039;m on board with that. I don&amp;#039;t presume to give fashion advice to grown-ups who know themselves and how the world works.  But when it comes to middle and high school-aged girls? Not so much. Here are ten reasons why:  1. Parents have one job and that&amp;#039;s to keep your baby off the pole.  At least according to Chris Rock, who says: &amp;quot;My only job in life is to keep her off the pole. Keep my baby off the pole. I mean, they don&amp;#039;t grade fathers - but if your daughter is a stripper, you f*cked up.&amp;quot; And as parents, that&amp;#039;s our sacred duty. So sending a 15-year-old daughter out of the house dressed like a sexy cat feels a lot like you&amp;#039;ve failed her as a parent. Saying it&amp;#039;s fine to dress like a (sexy feline) stripper and go out with your friends on Halloween isn&amp;#039;t exactly sending a clear message to your daughter. 2. The costumes themselves are sexist.  If a dude wants to dress like a cop, he can buy a cheap nylon replica of a police uniform. If a young woman wants to dress like a cop, she can buy something with barely enough fabric to make a plus-sized bathing suit. Because that&amp;#039;s what girls want, right? Sexy professions ONLY. Oooh! I&amp;#039;m such an arresting officer!  3. So is this really about other people judging your kid (and YOU) for dressing too sexy? Not really. But it&amp;#039;s part of cultural landscape and should therefore be on my (and kid&amp;#039;s) radar. For example: FYI if you&amp;#039;re a teenage girl, you should never, ever wear a sexy cop outfit or some lady will give you the righteous sniff and not let you date her sons. We don&amp;#039;t care what that lady thinks. But let&amp;#039;s not dress up just to shock and awe, either. Because that&amp;#039;s silly and it will only make your life harder. 4. Who is this costume really for, anyway?  Now might be a good time to have another talk about the concepts of dressing for men, dressing for other women, and dressing for yourself. And teenagers, here&amp;#039;s a bit of wisdom from someone with decades more life experience: if there&amp;#039;s one male demographic that doesn&amp;#039;t need skanky outfits to pay attention to the opposite sex, it is the teenage male. Your male counterparts are pretty much interested \u2014 and very interested \u2014 in you no matter what. Adolescent males are hard-wired to notice girls, so why not make sure they notice you, instead of just your sexy cop costume?  5. If you&amp;#039;re going to go there, at least be original and have it mean something. You can be anything! What is more awesome than anything else in the whole world? Bacon, obviously. And... There are tons of young women who will choose to be sexy bacon.  6. Where are you going in your sexy bacon costume?  If you&amp;#039;re in middle or high school, it&amp;#039;s probably not trick or treating.  A recent study said that age 13 was the magic year when most kids stopped trick or treating. Some towns even ban kids older than 12 from going (to which I say BOO!). So if you&amp;#039;re heading out in your costume and you&amp;#039;re not trick or treating, odds are you&amp;#039;re going to a party where there will probably be drinking (72 percent of teens try alcohol before they finish high school) and there will certainly be boys. I think we can all agree this combination increases the risk for making choices that at best you might regret and at worst could be dangerous.  7. Let&amp;#039;s not start this whole idea that you can just go crazy for one night with no consequences.  There are always consequences. Sorry. There are no free passes, not even for Halloween. We all understand the urge to to take a break and just have fun, but your consequences will always be waiting for you in the morning. It might be a hangover, finding yourself in trouble, or seeing the whole thing documented on Instagram.  8. High school and middle school have enough embarrassing moments without wearing torn fishnets and platforms to a party.First of all, it takes a very particular personal style to pull off torn fishnets, Halloween or not. Second, if you&amp;#039;re wearing platforms to a party and you drink a couple of beers, you&amp;#039;re probably going to fall down.  9. Save it for later. As far as torn fishnets, platforms, and sexy bacon are concerned, you have your twenties AND BEYOND to work that shit out. By then, you&amp;#039;ll know which friends to go out with so you don&amp;#039;t end up with no way home after making out with some cute guy in a NORMAL, non-sexy bacon costume (because of your shared love of bacon). 10. What would Amy Poehler and Tina Fey say about that costume?  Forget me. Who am I? I&amp;#039;m just somebody&amp;#039;s mother. What would AP and TF say? EXACTLY. Tina Fey would probably say that as far as skanky halloween costumes go, teenage girls should be reminded that they&amp;#039;re better than that (Tina&amp;#039;s already on the record about strippers as saying: &amp;quot;I feel like we all need to be better than that&amp;quot;). And if you watch Amy Poehler&amp;#039;s awesome web show for girls &amp;quot;Ask Amy,&amp;quot; she&amp;#039;s all about just being you and taking your time to grow up. So if you won&amp;#039;t take my advice, take theirs, and rethink those risque Halloween costumes. Photo Credit: Getty Images "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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