Where I don't really understand Halloween
Nov. 1st, 2011 03:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
I didn't want to spoil anyone's fun yesterday with grumpy entries, but I do not understand Halloween. Mostly likely because I grew up in USSR where we never had this holiday. It fact, round about this time of year USSR used to have one of their biggest holidays of the year, "The October revolution day", celebrating the anniversary of the revolution in 1917. This was one of the biggest holidays, but not one of the favourite ones. Usually the fun consisted of big parades and demonstrations (in mostly freezing weather you get in Russia at this season) and lots of Lenin films shown on TV. The favourite time of the year it was not, at least not mine.
Tangentially, when the similarity between the date of "The October revolution day" and "All Hallows' Eve" was discovered in 90s, this produced much speculation and conspiracy theories about the "demonic" nature of the October Revolution of 1917. Seriously. :D
The other aspect of Halloween-underappreciation for me is the fact that I don't see why my kid or I should get dressed as a skeleton or a zombie or any other evil thing. I am quite literal and for me evil things are .. well.. evil. As I understand, in the USA people get dressed in all manner of fun costumes and this sounds like something that can potentially be fun. But here in the UK the costumes we get seem to be witch/ghoul/zombie/pumpkin. I have no desire to dress as any of those.
Also I don't think it is at all that safe for kids to be wondering dark streets alone, demanding sweets from strangers. Usually the little ones are accompanied by an adult, but I have seen several groups of 9-10-11-12 year olds wondering the streets unattended. Yes, I am paranoid, but I still don't think this is safe at all.
And the last thing, although may be this is the main thing, is that I do not like ANY of commercial holidays. I have a sneaky suspicion that they all are invented by "evil multinational corporations" that want to sell more of cheap sweets, cheap zombie masks and other stuff that we don't really need.
Just for fun: the old card with the battleship Aurora literally translates: "Glory to the Great October!"

Tangentially, when the similarity between the date of "The October revolution day" and "All Hallows' Eve" was discovered in 90s, this produced much speculation and conspiracy theories about the "demonic" nature of the October Revolution of 1917. Seriously. :D
The other aspect of Halloween-underappreciation for me is the fact that I don't see why my kid or I should get dressed as a skeleton or a zombie or any other evil thing. I am quite literal and for me evil things are .. well.. evil. As I understand, in the USA people get dressed in all manner of fun costumes and this sounds like something that can potentially be fun. But here in the UK the costumes we get seem to be witch/ghoul/zombie/pumpkin. I have no desire to dress as any of those.
Also I don't think it is at all that safe for kids to be wondering dark streets alone, demanding sweets from strangers. Usually the little ones are accompanied by an adult, but I have seen several groups of 9-10-11-12 year olds wondering the streets unattended. Yes, I am paranoid, but I still don't think this is safe at all.
And the last thing, although may be this is the main thing, is that I do not like ANY of commercial holidays. I have a sneaky suspicion that they all are invented by "evil multinational corporations" that want to sell more of cheap sweets, cheap zombie masks and other stuff that we don't really need.
Just for fun: the old card with the battleship Aurora literally translates: "Glory to the Great October!"

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Date: 2011-11-01 03:57 pm (UTC)This is exactly how I feel about christmas, easter and thanksgiving. I also agree with what Halloween has become- it is commercial. I prefer the essence of Samhain.
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2011-11-01 04:18 pm (UTC)I went out for Halloween growing up and I always enjoyed coming up with some costume and getting candy. When I was at university Halloween was more sexy/clever costumes and going out to parties which actually was fun lol. This year I just handed out candy, its cute to see all the little kids dressed up and the older ones can be pretty funny with their costumes. My sister was a witch this year, but I don't see Halloween costumes as anything other than fun so it doesn't really bother me if someone dresses up as something "evil".
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 04:25 pm (UTC)Guess I don't get the appeal either.
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 04:32 pm (UTC)I'm mainly bemused by how it became a sexy holiday where adults want to play at being naughty nurses/teachers/etc. How did that happen?
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:49 pm (UTC)Lol, I wouldn't mind the sexy parties neither - I guess this is a "natural" progression?
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Date: 2011-11-01 04:35 pm (UTC)Sadly, it is very commercial. Big business for the costume people as well as candy/decorations. I don't remember it being quite this big a deal when I was kid.
The really sad thing is the state of Halloween costumes for little girls. Believe me witches/zombies/etc. are far better than the suggestive costumes that are being peddled to girls. One "costume" that totally shocked me was "the little black dress". Now that is scary.
(edited to fix bad wording)
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:52 pm (UTC)The state of the little girls' clothing in general is one of my favourite rants. :D But may be another time.
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:02 pm (UTC)This, for sure. Valentine's Day is the one that makes me really grumpy.
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:53 pm (UTC)I have grown very fond of Guy Fawkes day somehow.
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:06 pm (UTC)Halloween is totally american tbh. It's cute and all but it's something we mostly see in the tv shows imo I guess. They tried to put it in here but tbh it doesn't really work at all ^^. Probably because we have already Mardi-Gras/Carnaval when it comes to costumes.
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:55 pm (UTC)We used to have costume parties during New Year celebrations, I love a good costume party.
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:08 pm (UTC)As for the ghosts, zombies, etc: I was a witch every year as a kid. Every single year. There's something really powerful in taking things that scare you (vampires, zombies, the dark) and defiantly going out to have fun with it--and getting loads of candy as a reward! Halloween would be the one night I wasn't afraid to roam the streets in the dark--and, in fact, was encouraged to. It was pretty cool.
And that is why I love Halloween, by LNA, age *mumblemumble* :P
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 05:46 pm (UTC)I don't really think Americans have embraced the costume party as a whole, so this is our one outlet for that. I've never seen a non-Halloween costume/fancy dress party.
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Date: 2011-11-01 06:03 pm (UTC)I think the holiday just hasn't "grown into" the UK culture yet. Also we have Guy Fawkes night really really close to halloween.
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 06:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2011-11-01 05:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 06:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 06:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 07:16 pm (UTC)Idk. It's a cultural thing here. It's not kids knocking on doors and demanding candy. If people don't want trick-or-treaters, they generally just leave the porch light off. But people LIKE giving out candy. My grandma loves seeing kids in their costumes, but she lives in a gated community where they don't really get trick-or-treaters, so she goes over to my aunts house so she can see the kids in their costumes and hand out candy. It's a lot of fun, and since it's cultural, everyone knows what's up and what to expect, you know? In my experience, most parents either walk their kids to the door or follow them at a distance (waiting at the end of the drive way) so the kids feel a bit more independent. A lot of times, if a family lives in a bad neighborhood, they're drive somewhere else to trick-or-treat, so it really is generally pretty safe as long as the kids know basic safety rules like being careful when crossing streets and not going into a strangers home.
Over here, people get dressed up as all sorts of things. My cousin was the tin man from The Wizard of Oz this year. I was a cat. People dress up as all sorts of things. In fact the majority of things people dress up as are NOT scary. A lot of them are funny and based around contemporary pop culture like Snooki from Jersey Sore or Lady Gaga.
I'm sure that the reason Halloween is so popular now has a lot to do with candy companies pushing it on us, but meh. I don't care. It's still fun.
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Date: 2011-11-03 02:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 07:36 pm (UTC)So yes, I went trick-or-treating until I was about 15 when I got too old for it. Then I worked at a Halloween store in Manhattan when I was 19 and that totally ruined the holiday for me. Seeing all those crazed girls choosing the most ridicilous sexy costume for 2 months in a row really put me off to the whole thing. This year was another year when I didn't do anything for Halloween and it felt fantastic. Not caring about commericial holidays is really liberating.
But there is one commercial holiday that I still adore - Thanksgiving! The chance to eat my mom's delicious turkey with sweet potatoes in a family setting and feel that "fall, harvest" atmosphere for the last time before winter completely takes over is something special for me.
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Date: 2011-11-03 02:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 08:08 pm (UTC)When I was a kid we went out for treats on Saint Nicholas day. It was usually combined with saying a poem or singing a song. So it kind of irritates me that today's kids are going out for treats on Halloween as well now.
I don't like the commercial thing about holidays either. Forcing people to spend their money because someone says you have to because it's a holiday... there are other ways to make a holiday special.
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Date: 2011-11-03 02:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 08:18 pm (UTC)I really don't like Halloween in the US sense. It is too commercial and too ... well ... American. I rather prefer the original Samhain which is the beginning of the Celtic New Year.
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Date: 2011-11-03 02:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 08:54 pm (UTC)Now as a uni student it's all about going to fun parties with cheap booze and possibility to win money or prizes or more alcohol for whatever costume you managed to come up with.
It's also a good night to hook up :PAnd there's still candy! It's not really free but it's super cheap and in bulks everywhere!Idk maybe it's a very American/Canadian thing but I love Halloween and all my friends do too. It's just a lot of fun for us esp. because as kids we got to dress up to get free candy and schools always had a lot of Halloween-themed activities planned (like the Halloween door contest where the best decorated door of said classroom got a pizza lunch!) and now it falls at the tail end of midterms week for us uni students so we get to dress up and go crazy after a stressful two weeks or so. Plus in my city we had a lot of fun Halloween themed stuff like the Zombie Walk and today there's this pumpkin thing in the park. It's honestly a really fun holiday for a lot us, imo :)
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Date: 2011-11-03 03:15 pm (UTC)For the UK, I feel this is something that still feels alien too. It shows the extent of the USA influence to the world, but I rather the individual countries stayed with their own traditions.
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Date: 2011-11-01 09:41 pm (UTC)It's quite commercial at this point but still, a fun tradition that involves the kids not just dressing up but decorating the branches, too. It's all quite good fun, IMO.
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Date: 2011-11-03 03:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 09:59 pm (UTC)I think it's such a unique holiday with fascinating lore and fun traditions. Cheesy horror movies, candy corn, carved glowing pumpkins omg I can't get enough. In Switzerland/France, Halloween was mostly grown-up costume parties in the expat community but in the US, it is SPLENDIFEROUS for all ages and people here go all out.
And idk, I love holidays, including the more commercial ones. But then having grown up as an international kid, I have a patchwork cultural identity and not many holidays, except the purely religious, feel like someone else's party to me. At home, we do everything from the Jour de la Bastille to the Old Russian New Year - it's to whatever holidays any of us has an emotional tie and if we buy related food/decorations, it's all part of a good time. It's all my perspective, of course.
p.s. I haven't seen many kids without parents or in age-inappropriate costumes here; the zombies and ghouls are saved for the teenagers.
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Date: 2011-11-03 03:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 10:04 pm (UTC)It annoys me, because November 1st is a public holiday in France: we celebrate All Saints' Day (Toussaint) and the tradition is to bring flowers on the graves of family members and loved ones. It's a quiet tradition and seeing a commercial attempt at superimposing a foreign festivity on the eve of Toussaint out of sheer greed makes me angry. I'm glad that it seems to be failing here.
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Date: 2011-11-03 03:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-01 10:19 pm (UTC)And yeah, you get "scary" costumes here, but there are more media and/or sterotypes/"character type" (alien rocker, cowboy, ballerina, fairy, magician, etc)/historical figure costumes than scary ones.
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Date: 2011-11-03 03:24 pm (UTC)But in the UK this holiday seems like another USA import!
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Date: 2011-11-01 11:02 pm (UTC)Re: Valentines' Day. I love it. It's always a good excuse to hire a babysitter and go out for a romantic dinner. It's also the anniversary of when Mr. Mousie and I got together so it's pretty special. It's commercial, sure, but in a capitalist society every holiday is. It doesn't detract from the nice meaning one can bring into it. Mother's Day was invented explicitly to sell more cards but I know my Mom still loves getting a card and present on that day.
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Date: 2011-11-03 03:29 pm (UTC)I love the gifts on Valentine's day and Mother's day. LOVE THEM. But there is always a bit of a feeling of "I am selling up my principles for gifts" with both of these holidays for me, I don't feel "the spirit".
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Date: 2011-11-01 11:05 pm (UTC)In my neighborhood the parents walk around with their children in large groups and watch them as they go up to the doors to get candy. Of course the older kids get the late shift and cruise around on their own.
Their are people around here who think Halloween is evil or something, I don't know - *shrug* - and so their doorsteps are not lighted and welcoming and they close up their blinds and act like they are not home. Sounds like fear and superstition to me.
Halloween is completely optional. You don't have to dress up and if you do you can dress up however you would like. I used to dress up like a Hippy when I was a kid. One time, when I was a lot younger, I went to a party dressed as Madonna. People get really creative with their costumes. :)
My least favorite holiday is Christmas. Honestly, I could do without it. It comes to soon after my favorite holiday, which is Thanksgiving. I love Thanksgiving because you just cook a bunch of food and have family and friends over and hang out and talk and watch football and everyone falls asleep. It's great. :)
EDIT: After reading other comments and some of your responses it sounds like Halloween is very different over there than it is here. Sounds really bleak the way you describe it..."wandering cold dark streets". People here decorate their yards and keep their porch lights on and it's big groups of kids and families walking around or driving. Parents from low income neighborhoods bring their kids to the nicer neighborhoods to trick or treat. It sounds like they are trying to force an American holiday and cultural tradition on people that don't really understand it, all for profits sake. Like others have said most of the costumes people wear here are funny or sexy or pop culture. Like super heroes, fairies, bananas, hotdogs, pirates, cats, just silly stuff.
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Date: 2011-11-03 03:42 pm (UTC)After 2-3 years I discovered that if I switch the lights off on the side of the house that looks towards the street I don't get as many calls, so this is what I usually do. I feel resentful, though, because: "Why do I have to switch the lights off and scramble in darkness? Is this not MY house?".
But overall, no, we don't get too many Halloween displays over here. And the costumes are ALL "evil", I have never seen any other costumes for sale.
Hopefully , in a fe years the tradition will change. The most Halloween fun I have seen is as usual had by students - they usually wonder the streets of Leeds in all sorts of funny costumes, having big Halloween parties.
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Date: 2011-11-01 11:22 pm (UTC)That said, you know what I don't get? Why we have to import holidays that are essentially like other local holidays. For example, Carnevale. Sure, carnevale and Halloween have different origins, but still, the end result is the same for both: adults and kids alike, in costumes, partying, playing pranks, etc. The funny thing is? Halloween is almost more popular than Carnevale now.
I guess the more holidays the better? IDEK.
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Date: 2011-11-03 03:46 pm (UTC)When is Carnevale celebrated? I have never heard of it, although it sound like a good fun. I know here Caribbean communities celebrate their Carnival, but it is usually is celebrated in the specific communities (the same with the Chinese new Year) . I don't have problems with any of the local communities holidays as these help them to maintain their cultural identity.
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Date: 2011-11-02 01:34 am (UTC)That changed after WWII and for, as you would suspect, very commercial reasons the emphasis changed to the whole notion of making it a kids thing and going out trick or treating --- thus needing to spend money on candy, costumes, etc. All those folks that are nostalgic about it grew up in the post-war period.
As to the point about sending kids out alone on Halloween to trick or treat. Well, they aren't alone. They are in groups. We used to travel in pretty large "packs" when we were preteens and that age still does it today and in fact -- while the propaganda would make this seem unsafe "nowadays" -- it is quite safe. Crime rates in the US peaked in the early 90s and are now back down close to what they were in the 1970s.
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Date: 2011-11-03 03:48 pm (UTC)I think it is as safe as you allow it to be - when kids (usually teens) are allowed to wonder far off, I see a problem.This doesn't really happen with the small kids, mostly with teenagers as they don't have supervising adults and some of the kids can be separated from the group.