Martha Stewart lost Halloween

In these times, and we all do it, everything is talked about in terms of winning or losing – culturally, beyond sporting events, it applies to more than just awards and music charts; red carpets are won and lost, major and minor events, the concert industry, from the actual touring artist to who they invite as special guests, to even the fans of whatever city where an artist is performing and what the setlist happens to be.

Halloween has been a contest for decades, it happens at the civilian level and also in the celebrity ecosystem and all of it is merging together anyway, considering that social media is a breeding ground now for people to become celebrities. Every year there is a debate about who “won” Halloween, as in who had the best costume, of course, and every year there is often more consensus about who “lost”. This year, I think most of us agree that the loser is Martha Stewart.

Martha Stewart’s Halloween costume.

She has since deleted the post. pic.twitter.com/cGDfAh8mVb

— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) November 1, 2026

Martha’s Halloween costume was “person experiencing homelessness” – and her costume now is Wealthy Asshole Who Has Now Had to Apologise Twice. Her first apology made it worse: something something I was trying to bring awareness to the affordability crisis. Her second apology was posted last night, on the Notes app. A throwback!

But it gets worse…

Because Martha has two Instagram accounts. The Halloween mess was posted on her personal account, @marthastewart48. The brand content happens @marthastewart and just this morning, like freshhhhh off the controversy, they thought it would be a good time to talk about trends in home design. 

So to recap, Martha Stewart mocks homelessness for Halloween. Then claims she’s an advocate for unhoused people. Then says sorry for the insensitive costume. And then, a few hours later, wants you to know that this winter, the “restorative minimalism” vibe is so chic this winter.

As someone said in the comments, “WHERE IS YOUR PR TEAM”.

One explanation is that they hate her. I mean, someone had to take that photo of her on the porch with her expensive jeans torn up. The other explanation is that she hangs out with and employs people who also lack empathy and therefore thought her Halloween costume would be totally OK, and funny. Maybe it’s a combination of all of the above. And another example/reminder that extremely wealthy people live in a bubble of obliviousness, lacking diversity in their communities, becoming increasingly ignorant to the circumstances, challenges, and pain of others less fortunate. Which means Martha will pop up and be propped up in time for Thanksgiving, I’m sure, to judge people for how they set their Thanksgiving table. Calling her the Halloween loser, then, is all we really have.