Does Halloween have the same spirit as when you were a kid?

Question

Halloween seems to have changed so much from when I was a kid. Notice that there are no more Halloween specials on television anymore, and there are more and more Halloween Scene stores popping up everywhere.
Also, I have almost zero trick-or-treaters around my neighborhood. What's going on in your neighborhoods?

Answer 1

I hate how most of the teenagers and 20 somethings all use it as an excuse to dress like sluts.Halloween is about the fun and the scare not how much skin you show

Answer 2

Same here. I grew up in the 1980's and lived in a great neighborhood in MS. Our neighborhood was the kind you see on tv. Kids all over the place. We all knew each other and the streets were filled with kids on Halloween.
My best friends & I would carry pillow cases and they would be filled to well almost the top. Just enough for us to twist it and carry it over our shoulder. But it was FILLED UP HIGH of candy.

Now a-days though it's just not safe to let your kids run around on the street knocking on strangers doors.

My husband & I live in a nice neighborhood. It's maybe about 7yrs old or so. Yet we hardly know anyone here. The roads are safe and well lit at night but no way I'd let my kids run around alone. No one does.

Sadly things have just changed and I hate that. We are a homeschooling family and I won't let my kids outside alone with my husband or I out there. It just isn't safe.

We too hardly have any tricker treaters. We had NO ONE last year!! I think that may be since we were out too but even after we returned home (we trick or treat at the mall! Crazy isn't it?) we took the kids around the neighborhood some and still no one rang our bell.

Sad isn't it? We just need to think of new memories to create for our kids. But yes I agree it has lost its fun and magic.

Makes you feel old doesn't ?

Answer 3

Halloween is extremely controlled where I live (Ohio). There are time slots for different neighborhoods, and it's always before the sun goes down (really odd...). I wonder if it's because of all the Halloween scares back in the 1980's. Remember the razor blades and pins in the candy and apples? The kids that grew up with that all have kids of their own now. I've also noted a lot of very religious Christians making a big deal of it being Satan's night... and there seem to be more evangelical Christians than ever before. And y'know, kids just really don't go outside much anymore. Sigh.

Answer 4

I get it about the neighborhoods. In my area, the older houses (of which I have one) don't get as many trick-or-treaters because they are too far apart and the lighting is not as good as in the developments. Around here, people tend to dump off loads of kids in the housing developments of cookie-cutter suburban houses with tiny yards -- lots of trick-or-treating in a small area. It's about volume. My friends in these developments hate Halloween because they get hundreds and hundreds of trick-or-treaters so they don't bother with lots of decorating. I realize this is not always the case, but it's the constant refrain around here that "I'm spending so much on candy, why bother with decorations."

Kids coming to my neighborhood are rewarded for the effort. We've got neighbors who give away full sized candy bars, neighbors who decorate (my house is in the over-the-top decorating category) and it's just the right mood! But we get less than 100 kids every year. The ones who come seem to really enjoy it.

Halloween seems to have gotten some anti-fans who think it's the work of the devil, etc.. I guess it's just people who don't want to have anything to do with it that prompt the lack of TV specials. Disney Channel tends to make a movie every year and that's about all you get.Even my very conservative religious grandparents were always happy to let their kids enjoy Halloween. Nowadays this same demographic seem to think it's a day devoted to satan.

I'm going to keep celebrating big. It's the one day when kids can look forward to staying up late, eating candy until they are sick, and being something they don't normally get to be.

Answer 5

My neighborhood still has *some* kids trick-or-treating, but it's sort of dangerous since college kids get drunk and harass the children. My friends come to my house with their nephews and nieces, and little brothers and sisters, but they can only stay outside until like 6 or 7 tops, becuase after that the college kids come out and their a pain in the a**. Normally we go with them just in case.

To me Halloween has lost its allure just for this reason. People use it as an excuse to get drunk and be jacka**es all night. The pranks they pull on house makes me real angry! I also hate the costumes ugly witches, the disgusting masks, and especially the smell of the latex (or whatever the masks are made of) The smell of it makes me...

I don't what happened to halloween. The innocent children knocking or your door, the fun costumes, now it's just... I miss the old days.

Answer 6

i see a lot of Halloween specials on TV, but some of them are reruns from previous years and so. I live out of the main part of my town, but when Halloween comes, i go into town and see a lot of trick or treaters, and like the person above me said, some kids without costumes wanting candy. maybe this year will be different, who knows~

Answer 7

Well, as I am pagan and Halloween is a very important holiday to me, I'd have to say I have more of the spirit than I had as a kid.

I'm not sure what's going on in our neighborhood, but we're planning a party for our friends who have kids (which is most of them) as it's a bit too cold here to take very little kids trick or treating. (I live in Alaska)

Answer 8

Yeah, things have definately changed. In our town, we used to trick or treat all over town. Now almost everyone from this town and the surrounding towns trick or treat on this one street (it's like the classic suburban street, in the middle of town). People don't go to any other street or side street, it's kind of wierd. I try to boycott it, there's too many people and it doesn't seem fair to all the people who live on the street or the other streets, who want trick or treaters. I miss it too. I guess it's up to us to try to keep it "old school".

Answer 9

I don't know really, i guess it depends if you get into the spirit of it or not, if you sit down and do nothing its not going to have the same effect but you can always do grown-up stuff too, like watch scary movies with your friends, something we couldn't do when we were little, and you can always still dress up just to be silly.

Answer 10

No-The fun has been thrown away-Or scared away -kids are expected to be grown up when they are only 5 and the adults are acting more like kids for the childhood that has been taken from them. No it is not the same-