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Who’s Afraid of Clowns?
Exploring coulrophobia, a word I didn’t know yesterday
Do you know what’s scarier than a bear hyped up on nose candy? The fact they made a movie about it. Oh, and apparently clowns. And, I would posit, sandwiches without peanut butter and tuna in them.
But of all things, why are people afraid of clowns?
According to possibly the nichest website I’ve ever come across, History of Circus, clowns have been around for a very long time. The first recorded ones were in 2400 BC in the fifth dynasty of Egypt.
They then evolved in ancient Greece where they cropped off all their hair and wore fancy padded clothes. Roman clowns apparently donned pointed hats and constantly made fun of themselves.
Even the indigenous tribes of North America had a form of clowns, which were called contraries, or reverse warriors, and used to amuse people by doing everything contrary to the norm. As in, they’d walk on their hands, ride horses backward, and presumably give diseases to scary white men.
But eventually, we got to the modern clown — assuming it’s not me — with its deep history rooted in the circus. Developed during theatre and Varieté shows (clown speak for variety show) of the 1800 and 1900s, we all know and love the bouncy, white-faced, red-nosed, only slightly-creepy comedians in makeup we call clowns.
The first mainstream one was a jovial fellow by the name of Joseph Grimaldi, who was likely the guy who popularised the white and red makeup which is still the standard even today.
Who could be afraid of that guy?
Well, according to a bit of lazy research, almost all children, and about ~40% of adult Americans (or 7.5%. ) are coulrophobics. One of those studies says Americans are more afraid of clowns than gun rights infringement. That doesn’t really fit into this article but I thought I should mention it.
