I have a friend N who hates and is spooked by clowns. She and her husband held a bbq once and other friend A came over. A had found a string art painting of clowns at a thrift store that afternoon. While everyone was outside, he hung it in her hallway. She didn’t see it until the next day. Seventies bad clown art combined with post party cleanup? The games began.
A hated unicorns and cutesy crap like that. We made a purple glitter unicorn flag about six feet by four and hung it from his front porch while he was at work one night. And littered his front yard with circus peanuts painted with rainbows. Which was our version of unicorn poop.
I find clowns annoying from a distance. Up close, something about the real person behind the heavy makeup is kind of creepy.
Mostly a big “meh”. I never got why they existed. Esp. the mime part. But I also don’t generally find them creepy or scary (with the occasional exception).
One thing that does bother me is seeing them up close. Take Rusty Nails, one of the inspirations for Krusty the Clown. Seen in person the makeup was just a mess. Flaky, greasy, etc. Creates a zombie/dying skin look. Almost makes you want to puke.
We went to a circus when I was a child and the clowns were funny, including having a crowd of them coming out of a small car. We also saw a rodeo, and those clowns were great.
They don’t do clowns much here in Asia, so I haven’t had to think about them much. I know some people really dislike them, but I thought they were fine.
I never thought they were creepy as a kid, but, as an adult, I seem to be more sensitive to the “uncanny valley” effect, and so some clowns are now creepy. Not Ronald McDonald, or the new clowns that do low makeup, but some of the more traditional ones can be, especially if they also act a bit “off.” And deliberately creepy clowns definitely work on me.
Fortunately, you gave us multiple options. So I went with “creepy,” “neutral,” “liked them as a kid,” “circus” and “rodeo” (as I like them better at a distance), “depends on the individual,” and “depends on something else”–the makeup style.
