“An Irish Reader Suggests A Halloween Costume: The "Phantom Of Systemic Racism"
Peter Brimelow writes: Halloween gives me the creeps. But Lydia and the girls love it.
James Fulford was my chief lieutenant for 25 years at VDARE.com. One of his key functions was to mark major festivities like Halloween, and also to compile a running list of VDARE coverage of them (all still available on our archive site thanks to our heroic volunteers). Scroll down to the bottom of his new article to see the list—I recommend Paul Kersey’s Diversity vs. Halloween—Can Your Neighborhood Pass The Trick-Or-Treat Test?, posted in 2011 but still alas relevant. And An Irish Reader Has A Suggestion For A Halloween Costume: The "Phantom Of Systemic Racism" (pictured above).
I urge everyone to subscribe to James’ substack, as he suggests politely below.
The Wars On Halloween Return
by James Fulford
Please Sign Up As A PAID Subscriber: Remember, I’m only on Substack because VDARE was forced to suspend operations by NYAG Letitia James’s lawfare, so if you’re a free subscriber, please upgrade to paid! The approach of Halloween means it’s the end of the month when I have to pay rent, and I have a dentist’s appointment coming up in November, so subscribe generously:
Last year at this time I posted The Many Wars On Halloween, explaining that while we talk about the War On Christmas (caused by hatred for Christianity like the similar War on Easter) the War On Thanksgiving is caused by hatred of America, although a couple of atheists will also complain that it’s God who is being given Thanks at Thanksgiving; but there are several kinds of hate for Halloween.
The Many Wars On Halloween
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October 30, 2025
One of the things that seems to be evergreen is racial rows: people dressing up as other races is apparently wrong, as is dressing up as something historically “racist” like a Confederate soldier or a Klansman.
In a recent incident, some youths on the east side of El Paso, TX apparently dressed up as Klansmen and allegedly yelled racial slurs.
This was reported on Instagram, and has led to the usual stupid meetings of community organizers to condemn (a) playing dress up, and (b) the actual Ku Klux Klan, which does not really exist in the 21st century.
Community members share their experience navigating anti-Blackness in a Hispanic-majority city – and how the troubling incident should be used as a history lesson.
by Priscilla Totiyapungprasert [this is a Siamese name], El Paso Matters, October 28, 2026
Note: this story refers to the Klan (which hasn’t existed in any meaningful form since the 1970s) in the present tense:
The Ku Klux Klan is a white supremacist terrorist organization whose violent mobs targeted Black Americans. In the Southwest, Mexican Americans were the second-most targeted group.
Of course in the border town of El Paso, only 4 percent of the citizens are black…and only 12 percent are non-Hispanic white. It’s almost certain that the kids who were playing Klansmen were either Mexican-Americans or actual Mexicans.
But the War On Racist Costumes isn’t the only War On Halloween.
In 2019 I noted that we had an extra, unusual case of “War on Halloween”—mass shootings at black Halloween parties. Call it
Gang War On Halloween
There was one shooting at a Halloween party in Greenville, TX. The victims were black, the shooter was Brandon Ray Gonzalez. This is not a suicidal mass shooting, or a terrorist mass shooting, it’s a criminal thing. This year there was a shooting at a Spirit Halloween pop-up shop in Detroit. Spirit Halloween provides the costumes at the top of the page:
Spirit Halloween shooting in Madison Place Shopping Complex hospitalizes two By Jack Nissen FOX 2 Detroit, October 30, 2026
The man in the red outfit at right is not actually in costume, as far as I know. I believe he just dresses like that all the time. If you, on the other hand, dressed up like that, you’d be in trouble:
The Halloween shooting above wounded two and killed no one, which is what we call a “Sailer’s Law” shooting. See below for a full analysis:
Sailer’s Law And Mass Shootings—Poor Black Marksmanship Is STILL Saving Lives
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October 27, 2025
Even so, if you are asked to attend a black Halloween party, apply John Derbyshire’s rules 10 (a) through 10 (d) from The Talk: Nonblack Version, and stay away. See also, from Steve Sailer in 2016, Chicago Criminals Not Really Into World Series, Evidently (17 Dead, 41 Wounded Over Halloween).
Evangelical Christians’ War On Paganism And Satanism
Christians are not wrong to think that Halloween is the occasion for a lot of paganism and Satanism. To the extent that there is paganism and Satanism in America, it takes off on Halloween.
I don’t think that’s a reason not to let your kids collect neighborhood candies, but it’s not as ridiculous as the MSM makes out in stories like The Evangelical War on Halloween, by Phil Zuckerman, Huffington Post, October 20, 2014.
Mexicans’ War On Halloween: It’s Now The Day Of The Dead, Gringos!
When reporter Daniel Hernandez wrote Day of the Dead: Your New American Holiday, FasterTimes.com, October 31, 2009, he talked about cities “Mexicanizing.” When we say that, it’s Hate! Hernandez wrote:
Day of the Dead is increasingly becoming a United States holiday, with people of all backgrounds in Mexicanizing U.S. cities adopting the parties and customs of Mesoamerica’s cousin to Halloween. Just check out the annual scene at Hollywood Forever cemetery in Los Angeles. There are political touchstones to the holiday as well; in El Paso they are observing Día de los Muertos with a vigil for migrants who have died attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border.
Right! But as I wrote at the time, in a sense there’s nothing new here—most people don’t seem to realize that the Day of the Dead is just All Saints Day and All Souls Day in a slightly different garb. Halloween, the Eve Of All Hallows, is part of the same festival.
Nothing wrong with that, although Americans can’t be blamed for finding the Mexican festival, with its candy skulls and Aztec associations, slightly more bizarre than the American Trick Or Treating, the Great Pumpkin and Treehouse of Horror.
Feminists’ War On Slutty Halloween
Steve Sailer has written about this, including a note on it in Feminists: Making Children Cry on Halloween Since 1969—the recent custom of dressing in skimpy costumes on Halloween can be traced to the gay community’s parties in the 70s in Greenwich Village.
(Sailer also wrote about the lesbian Dean of Harvard Business School banning dressing up in class to “head off the potential for sexy pirate costumes.”)
It’s problematical for girls, and some of them are reacting to that:
Why You Shouldn’t Dress Like a Sexy Bunny this Halloween, by Sharon Szmuc, CollegeMagazine.com, October 21, 2015
9 Reasons to Boycott Slutty Costumes This Halloween, by Lyndsay Rush, theeverygirl.com, October 2013
Of course, the illustration for articles like this usually looks like this:
Finally, there’s the Big One:
War On White People Dressed As Non-Whites
I covered this in an article called Is There A War On Halloween—Or Just A War On Regular Americans?
The basic principle is that it’s supposed to be wrong (”cultural appropriation”) for white Americans to dress as people of color, or in the costumes of foreign lands, or using any non-Christian religious symbol. (Dressing up like naughty nuns doesn’t count—they’re considered white Christians, so fair game.) Sensitivities and microaggressions abound.
For example, below is the famous 2014 Vanity Fair cover of Olympic athlete Bruce (”Call me Caitlyn”) Jenner dressed as a lady. (The picture was taken pre-surgery and may have required some airbrushing.) That’s fine, but if either a man or a woman wants to dress as Caitlyn Jenner, that’s awful. Hence this article from the new, Politically Correct Forbes: Caitlyn Jenner Costume Is Bestseller At Spirit Halloween Despite Outcry [By Clare O’Connor, October 30, 2015].
So here’s my suggestion for the poor white male American who wants to have a costume free of cultural appropriation, or the stigma of dressing like someone non-white:
Civil War On Halloween
I don’t mean starting a Civil War, I mean dressing like a Civil War soldier. Amazingly, they still sell Confederate uniforms to dress up in:
Or these, from Regalia Lodge on Amazon:
How could anybody hate that costume? The men who wore the Blue (also available as costume) reconciled with the men who wore the Gray within thirty years of the actual war:
THE ROAD TO REUNION: Reconstruction, Reconciliation, And The Pulitzer Prize Winner Who Failed To Hate The South
However, whether you’re partying with girls in skimpy costumes, sitting at home waiting for trick-or-treaters, or getting your reenactor’s uniform out of the closet to see who salutes, have a Happy Halloween!
Halloween Stories From The Archives Of VDARE.com
A Reader Has A Suggestion For A Halloween Costume Or Image: The ”Phantom Of Systemic Racism”
VDARE.com Halloween I: THE SACRED FURY And The Democracy Of The Dead
Harrowed on Halloween: Young Women With College Degrees WANT To Play Dress-Up
The Fulford File | Is There A War On Halloween—Or Just A War On Regular Americans?
Halloween Is Cancelled in Connecticut, Then Reinstated after Copious Complaints
Seattle School Ends Halloween to Please Students from Other Cultures
Diversity Vs. Halloween—Can Your Neighborhood Pass The Trick-Or-Treat Test?
War on Halloween: Schools In Canada (and Beyond) Crack Down On “Offensive” Costumes