In the iconic teen comedy “Mean Girls,” the spirit of Halloween is personified by young women dressing in provocative undergarments  that become costumes with  the addition of animal ears.

 It’s hard to pinpoint the exact year when Halloween converted from its child-friendly candy fest to a Playboy Bunny impersonation contest. Every year, it seems costumes get sexier, more revealing and more accessible to younger generations. It’s disconcerting when Halloween stores carry hypersexualized  costumes in children’s sizes.

However, what children and teenagers wear is up to parents and guardians to moderate. Adult women, on the other hand, are free to choose anything from a sexy firefighter to a sexy superhero.

Though it is a generalization to say that all women don some form of lingerie on Halloween, it is safe to say that a vast majority show more leg than creativity with their costumes. The problem here is not that women are scantily dressed up for Halloween; women have every right to wear anything they want, whenever they want. The problem is that there is a growing societal expectation for women to be sexy on Halloween and in general.

When a man is trying to figure out his Halloween costume, he can choose something “cool” like Batman or something scary like a zombie. A woman in the same situation can also be Batman or a zombie, but when she goes shopping for a costume,  she’ll have little luck finding anything that doesn’t come with a tiny skirt and a pair of fishnet tights.

Moreover, it is acceptable for a man to wear a blood-splattered T-shirt and a latex mask as a Halloween costume, but for a woman, it’s much more acceptable to wear a blood-splattered corset and a latex skirt.

It is this gender expectation that turns a holiday that was once about scary movie marathons and pumpkin carving contests into a night of objectification.

The idea that women are “supposed to be sexy” on Halloween is a reflection of our American culture, which has been increasingly obsessed with sexualizing everything, from music to clothing. Sex has found its way into almost every aspect of our lives, thus shaping the way that we act and what we accept as a society.

We live in a progressive time that allows women to have the freedom to break away from traditional female roles,    yet we are still anchored in the ideals of an outdated age.  Halloween costumes are a symbol of the sexism that lingers within the collective minds of America and the internalization of gender stereotypes.

As a society, we need to resist this growing trend toward hypersexualized female expectations.  By giving into such pressures, we are not only setting ourselves back by several decades, we are setting an example for young women and girls everywhere, an example that will only be reinforced with time.