Univ. of Florida to students: If someone's Halloween costume upsets you, counselors are ready

As a community, we aspire to demonstrate integrity, respect, and compassion that strives to maintain an affirming campus climate for all members of our community. If you are troubled by an incident that does occur, please know that there are many resources available. Please take advantage of the 7 day a week presence of the U Matter, We Care program at the University of Florida by emailing umatter@ufl.edu. Additionally, there is a 24/7 counselor in the Counseling and Wellness Center available to speak by phone at 352-392-1575. Lastly, the Bias Education and Response Team at the University of Florida is able to respond to any reported incidents of bias, to educate those that were involved, and to provide support by connecting those that were impacted to the appropriate services and resources. You may submit a bias incident report here.Thank you for being mindful of these values, and have a fun and safe Halloween

So, Colin Kaepernick, good or bad? Are you exalting a hero of social justice or lampooning a tragic victim of bias? And if you dispense with the helmet and go with the fro, does that make it worse? Donald Trump? Better if you exaggerate the orange so as to further diminish his dignity? Or would that have to be reported as an "incident of bias" against Oompa Loompas? Hillary would be hard to pull off unless you've naturally got the cankles, but it might be funny if you carried around six or seven BlackBerrys and you had a friend dressed as Huma Abedin. Then you could get two male friends to go as Bill Clinton and Carlos Danger and that could make for quite a night of fun and adventure.

Counselors! Help!

Counselors! Help! I suppose Superman, Batman and Spiderman are out of the question because you're promoting Ableism, what with their special powers and all. (Although Batman mainly has cool gadgets, doesn't he? Well. They can't afford those in the 'hood you insensitive clod.) There's talk that Captain America and Wonder Woman might be gay, so they're OK, right? Unless . . . you'd be upsetting the more easily excitable among the LGBTQIAPK-affirmative community. Err on the side of sensitivity, Gators! I suppose creepy clowns are out of the question. Cheerleaders promote lookism. Pirates promote unfettered capitalism on the high seas (and the abuse of birds!). And Frankenstein? Don't think we didn't notice that uncalled-for dig at John Kerry. The last time I dressed up for Halloween was 2008 when I took my son out, and I dressed as John McCain. In retrospect, I prefer costumes that don't get captured. My very first costume as a child was the Cookie Monster. Now that's very upsetting to those who prefer Ho-Hos. And let's not be attacking the dignity of "sex workers" here . . .