American online shop HalloweenCostumes.com has been lambasted on social media for selling an Anne Frank outfit as a Halloween costume, with the catch phrase “we can always learn from history”. In the United Kingdom, the costume is being sold as a “World War II refugee”, which also seems awkward, but less questionable.

The clincher is that the costume, featuring a blue trenchcoat, dark green beret and a brown satchel, has a plain brown price tag pinned on the coat’s lapel, alluding to Jews and possibly others being deported. If you make the coat beige and wear white socks with a blue beret, they you’ll look like one of the girls of the French resistance (not the communist one!) from the British series ‘Allo ‘Allo!, whose catch phrase is “Listen very carefully, I shall say this only once”.

The American website pulled the Anne Frank costume, saying it should have been sold as a school play costume rather than a Halloween one.

(Link: ad.nl, still from ‘Allo ‘Allo!)