What has happened to Halloween? When I was a kid, Halloween was my favorite holiday - hands down. I couldn't wait to dress up like Batman or Dracula (same cape), and run the streets of Eau Claire after dark, getting free candy from every house in sight. I also enjoyed the "Halloween build-up." People decorating their houses, Halloween parties and friend's houses, and making Halloween decorations at school. That's right - school. Back in The Day, kids still celebrated Halloween at school. We made decorations during the month of October, which were displayed at school, and got to dress up on Halloween day. Not anymore, baby. Halloween now seems to be going in one of two directions. They are:Direction A: Somebody realized that Halloween was actually based on some druid festival and has religious connotations and was offended. Others put two and two together (in their mind) and figured out that Halloween was "The Day of The Dead" or "The Devil's Day." Halloween celebrations were eventually cancelled in the schools because of the risk of offending someone. Halloween is now being avoided all together or renamed. In my oldest son's school, they celebrate "Harvest Festival." I know that when I was a kid, I was not excited about dressing up like Dracula and getting mounds of free candy, I was most excited about "The Harvest." By the way, virtually all holidays have been cancelled at my oldest son's school, including Valentines Day. This is now called "Friendship Day" because of the ever-controversial history of St. Valentine. Granted, some schools may be trying to hold on to the tradition, but are forcing kids to dress up in non-controversial costumes like kitty's or pumpkins. No more dressing up like the Sasquatch and scaring half the school. This is not good.
Direction B: Halloween "stores" are going a little overboard. Now, as I mentioned, I used to enjoy dressing up like Dracula. I was Dracula like 7 times. I also remember being a werewolf. These are scary creatures. I did not feel the need, however, to carry a severed-head along with my candy bag. I recently took The Kids to one of those temporary Halloween stores to find some costumes. My daughter wants to be a ballerina, my middle son is going to be a 1920's gangster, and my oldest wants to be Dick Enrico ("why buy new when slightly used will do"). In order to get to the accessories, we had to pass by a mannequin of a zombie-woman holding a bloody butcher knife and a severed head. Then, we had to pass by a display of a bound-and-gagged man being eaten by rats. Nice. My daughter loved that one. Then, I noticed a doll of that girl from The Exorcist (the most frightening movie of all-time). I'm not even going to talk about that. Finally, before locating the ballerina accessories, we gazed upon a pirate-skeleton holding a knife and (you guessed it) a severed head. What the hell is going on?? Can't somebody just be a ghost or a skeleton without having a bloody severed head? By the way, the employees at the Halloween store were scarier than any of the merchandise.
I guess I will file this under the "getting older" category. Once again, I find myself pining for "The Good Old Days" of Halloween when a kid could just put on a simple costume and have some fun. Once again, today we have the extremes. Either cancel the Holiday or carry severed heads. I'm probably over-reacting. Wouldn't be the first time.
What do you think? Happy Halloween.
Jeff
17 comments:
"cancelled in the schools because of the risk of offending someone"...ask yourself this: which political party supports this type of nonsense. then ask yourself if it is good...if it is, and it suits your value system, keep voting that way. if not, get them out. start paying attention to the people who control these school boards. I am tired of the vocal minority highjacking innocent things like halloween and valentines day...talk about beyond sad.
the problem that you have when you erase your past is that you stand for nothing. how are you supposed to know where you are going when you don't remember where you have been?
tony8489 and anonymous - good points. However, when it comes to so-called "banning" of activities, both ends of the political spectrum have been guilty.
The far left is more likely to "ban" an activity because it could possibly offend someone. However, the far right is more likely to try and ban an activity on "moral grounds." In the case of Halloween, activites get banned by the left because there might be a religious (or "too scary") angle that someone in the school might not agree with. The far right, however, might ban the same Halloween activity because it is seen as "the work of the devil."
Oddly enough, the far right and far left can attain the same outcome for very different reasons.
jeff, I agree with you to a point. the far left runs the democratic party. do you understand what howard dean stands for? the far right does not run the republican party. In fact present day republicans look more and more like democrats, especially with how they spend our money. back to the halloween issue: put 20 democrats and 20 republicans in a room, ask them to vote on whether or not halloween should be allowed at their child's school, even at the risk of "offending someone". I bet 18 democrats vote to "not offend someone", while the republicans vote for halloween. It is more important for a democrat to stand for nothing. that is why they are hollow to the core.
I would have to disagree with Anonymous above. The folks who are active in the Republican party are so far out of mainstream political thought that the GOP is in danger of becoming a marginal, geographically based (deep south) niche party. Look at the Polls, large majorities of people are against main republican tenents such as the War on Irag/Iran, Stem Cell Research, Global Warming, Health Care. The list goes on. There's a reason why GWB's approval ratings are at 25 percent. He doesn't reflect mainstream American views.
Jeff if you want your kids to celebrate Halloween, Christmas, etc. Check out a Catholic school. Our kids celebrate and do school work based on all of these holidays. My 7th grader went to a school sponsored Halloween dance just this last Friday. (Note to Anonymous - this is in SW Minneapolis a bastion of liberals, I am guessing that the families at our school are 75% Democratic voting oh and one other thing... it was a Republican family that raised a snit because the Science teacher wanted to show An Inconvenient Truth)
an inconvenient truth? the same movie that a british court prohibited the school system from showing because it was so factually incorrect? yeah, that one. you know the world is coming to an end when our children have to watch that trash and it is financed by the taxpayer.
according to the latest harris poll, job approval for democrats is at 24%. looks like your party is under performing the president you hate so much. so much for "reflecting mainstream american views"
I love how conservatives point out the 40 factual errors in An Inconvenient Truth. Forty errors out of literally 100's presented. Too bad they don't hold themselves to such high standards. Also this was a private school and was part of a science curriculum that was looking at ALL issues surrounding global warming including global weather cycles. Why stick your head in the sand?
The 24 percent for the democratic leadership is because they haven't done anything about the War in Iraq. If they grew cojones and actually did something about the war those numbers would skyrocket. A better poll is who americans think can do a better job on issues such as the economy, health care, the environment etc. D's lead by large amount on all issues.
Yes, approval ratings for congress are dismal currently. I think more reflecting on the fact that they are a bunch of pansies who don't seem to understand that they are there in part to provide a check and balance on the executive branch. Also, approval ratings for congress as a whole are always relatively low, and can't be judged directly against polls of a single person.
In regards to Halloween, we've lived in St. Louis Park since July, and send our kids to the public schools. Last weekend we and the kids got to take part in this fun evening activity. Basically, a citywide Halloween party managed by the school with help from much of the school population. Yes, we still call it Halloween, and St. Louis Park is about as liberal as a suburb can be. (Heck, Al Franken is from here.) Didn't hear of any Halloween protests there. Heck, if you click on that link, you can even see a picture of a kid at the party with some kind of Super Space Death-Ray gun, or something cool like that. The liberals must have been taking the night off to listen to folk music and hold a candle-light vigil somewhere, to let that one slip by.
There probably won't be much official school celebration of Christmas in the schools, however, since SLP has a very large Jewish population, but Halloween seems to be surviving the dirty liberal onslaught OK.
Halloween was originally and Irish and Scottish Gaelic event called Samhain, which Means "November" in Gaelic. Is was an end of the harvest feast and was the Celtic new year celebration.
I'm going to observe the 31st as it was designed to be observed. Getting pissed.
Tito J
That reminds me, I was looking for a good painting of St. Sebastian full of arrows last night and ran accross this:
http://store.cpcbooks.com/productDetail.aspx?ProductId=623
I am Catholic and I enjoy this very much.
Tito J
sorry free, I am not going to roll the dice on our economy based on 40 errors. there are so many things wrong with "an inconvenient al gore" that it is borderline mythical. this clown will be relegated to late night cable show oddity next to freak show jimmy carter in the not too distant future. nobel prize, indeed.
My God, I don't expect us to make environmental policy based on an Al Gore slide show, but I would hope it would at least have us talk about global warming, it's impact on the earth and economy, and what meaningful strategies we can do to overcome it. As for wrecking the economy, I am sure business will be at the table when policies are being developed (in fact they already are and in many cases much further in front of this issue than governmental "leaders"). I have no doubt Detroit will be developing, financing, marketing, and selling my grandchildren a greenhouse gas free automobile sometime in the future.
What I don't get is the conservatives continued covering up their ears and eyes screaming Al Gore Al Gore Al Gore once the subject of gloabal warming comes up. Look around you, industry, science, religous, other countries are talking about it and pledging to do something about it. That won't change if Al Gore gets hit by SUV tomorrow. Take your head out of the sand and join the conversations.
And if you really want controversy, how about people who hand out Almond Joys for Halloween? Or toothpaste??
Hey look, I want the people who hand out Great Northern Porter.
I love almond joys. I hated the toothpaste, and carrying the orange box for those communists that run the UN.
Don't get me wrong. I'd still eat the Almond Joys, but I much preferred the Reeses Peanut Butter Cups, Snickers, Milky Ways, etc.
Giving out toothpaste was a good way to get your tree toilet papered.
And yes, Tito, Great Northern Porter is always a good "treat" on Halloween.
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