Mythago reports that some local Christians leave their porch light on to attrack trick-or-treaters – but only give away pamphlets imploring people to come to Christ (and come join their church).
It does poke a needle in a pet theory of mine, however. We took Syndey trick-or-treating in the mall this year (I’ll post pictures of Sydney in her costume in a couple of weeks, when I’m back home from Florida). The mall encourages this practice, and most of the mall stores have an employee in a costume and holding a bag of candy hanging out by the entraces, ready to fill up kid’s bags. Some of the places give away stickers instead of candy, which is a little on the lame side, but since Sydney actually loves stickers I’ll give those stores a pass.
What’s unforgivable is the Disney Store, which didn’t give away candy, and didn’t give away stickers. Instead, they gave away little printed ads telling us that Disney’s new movie, Chicken Little, will open soon.
Keep in mind, children wait on line for this, thinking that they’re going to get candy. Disney stole precious time from these 2-6 year olds that could have been spent waiting on line for some store that doesn’t Hate America and therefore gave out candy!
Plus, they dressed some poor 12-year-old in a princess costume to hand out the ads – I presume because they knew that an adult employee would have had to listen to complaints from angry parents, whereas no one was willing to yell at a 12 year old girl. So not only are the people who run the Disney Store lame, they’re cowards.
Anyway, at the time I argued that Disney could only get away with being so lame because they were in a mall, which screws up the entire trick-or-treat economy by eliminating the essential threat of egging. It’s classic moral hazard: If the infrastructure guarantees no punishment for it, why shouldn’t people use trick-or-treating as a ruse for advertising? But Mythago’s Christians apparently aren’t worried about being egged, either, so maybe I’m wrong. (Or maybe the Christians want to be egged, so they can feel martyred.)
In Mythago’s comments, by the way, is one of the best distinctions I’ve read all week: ” I would pee on these people in a non-sexual way.” Thank goodness it’s in a non-sexual way!
World O’ Crap featured an essay by some nuts or other stating that just responding to “Trick or treat” is involvement in a full-on Satanic ritual, and even giving tracts would not exonerate you in the eyes of God.
I’m not a fan of the more obnoxious Halloween traditions – our pumpkins were missing, presumed smashed as of eight on Halloween night; I wouldn’t have minded, since we historically are really bad at dumping the pumpkins before they mush, except that the candles went with them – but anyone who’s deceiving children by essentially promising candy and refusing to deliver deserves to spend the next week picking rain-sodden toilet paper from their trees. Incidentally, why hasn’t anyone developed a toilet paper that dissolves easily in rain for the purpose of TPing? We have every other possible silly product; why not that one? It could be printed with pumpkins and black cats and so forth, or be glow-in-the-dark, or whatever. It could be made out of that cornstarch stuff they make the dissolving packing material from.
Ledasmom, I can think of two different places you might find the toilet paper you are talking about. One would be at a Fleet and Farm or some other store that serves a rural area; the other would be at a store with camping supplies. What you’re looking for is toilet paper made for septic systems or for chemical toilets; it degrades much more readily than the regular kind. If you live in/near a rural area, you might find it in a regular grocery or department store, but given you’re unfamiliar with this kind of thing I’m guessing you’re not in such an area.
Handing out evangelical tracts to kids seems bogus to me. If the were accompanied by their parents and the homeowner gave out the tracts to the parents and candy to the kids, that’d be different. I believe I’d be rather annoyed if someone tried proseltyzing my kids.
Oh, yeah, you can go trick or treating with your kids. When I was a kid, one year Mom and Dad put costumes on too and we all went trick or treating. This was back in, oh, about 1960 or 1962. We got candy. Mom and Dad got cocktails (we went to houses where we knew the people, we didn’t just go down the street). After about the 5th or 6th house it became quite a jolly evening, and we scored a heck of a lot of candy.
A big “Feh!” to you. You took her to the mall, indeed. You, sir are responsible for the loss of community in the sadly reduced America of Today(tm). Halloween is a community building holiday. It’s a way to meet your neighbors. But nooooooooo, you had to go to the mall. It’s also a chance for kids to roam around in the dark & have fun while getting candy. Thankfully, our neighborhood had plenty of trickertreaters (never mind the scads o’ kiddies who skipped our house). Best costume? I’m glad that you asked. It was the teeny child in the ladybug costume.
When I was young and soft things… I always looked forward to the house that invited us in & sat us down for cider & handed out Jack Chick comics. Hmmmm, maybe I’ll do that next year.
A big “feh” to your feh, sir. If we were talking about a five or seven year old, I’d agree with you. But I can understand why the parents of children who aren’t even two years old would prefer a more controlled environment.
But what about your neighbors? You’re denying them the pleasure of your company and Squish’s costume. Don’t you care about your neigborhood’s quality of life?
Ron, I didn’t say I was looking for such a product; I’m only surprised that nobody is marketing Special Pranking TP, In Assorted Halloween Prints, so you can give the appearance of performing a practical joke without actually offending the victim at all.
“I believe I’d be rather annoyed if someone tried proseltyzing my kids.”
Then you need to monitor your kids in situations where they might get “proselytized.”
Many people who don’t like the “cultural proseltyzing” thorough the omnisleazic media of the sludge that passes for current “culture” in this country do try to shield their kids. These parents keep tabs on their kids’ company, whereabouts, television viewing, music, etc. Try it sometimes.
Freedom of speech slices goes both ways, not just YOUR way.
Dispassionate, I don’t see that as equivalent to essentially promising children free candy and giving them religion instead. Apart from its being the stupidest conditioning ever (Jesus: What You Get Instead Of Candy), it’s just plain obnoxious, on the same level as putting heaps of beautifully wrapped presents under the Christmas tree and allowing your kids to open them in the belief that they’re getting toys, while what they actually find is a slip of paper saying that their toy money has been donated to charity. Even when the impulse is good, as in this example, the presentation sucks.
We spent Halloween in San Francisco this year. We got to see a few children (always fun) but lots of great costumes on grown ups. Not a single kid came to my brother’s door, very disappointing. (Shame, we were giving out Lindt Chocolate.)
The Tract thing is sad for the before mentioned reasons. I see them left on urinals in rest stops, and sigh. The Faith is all about relationship, where is it in hit and run and deception? I do have to stop short on judgment though. A colleague was bottoming on Heroin, trying to pan handle at a rest stop for a fix, he found a tract with 1 John in a stall and was broken. He says that was the turning point in his sobriety. I still dislike the practice and find the baiting of children as disingenuous and counterproductive if sharing Love is the goal. (Flanders from the Simpson’s comes to mind when I hear this stuff. Well intended but a bit off target.)
Disney? What else would you expect? Blessings.
What do you want to bet that the people who prostlytize trick or treaters are the same people who leave religious tracts instead of a tip at restaurants?
I’m not Christian, but I thought the Bible was pretty clear on it being better to preach the Gospel through actions than through words. And I don’t think that being sneaky and un-generous is a great way to convince people of the rightness of your path. I don’t think most kids are going to think “gee, I wish I could be sneaky and un-generous just like those people!”
Then you need to monitor your kids in situations where they might get “proselytized.”
Our kids have been taught that if somebody gives them a religious tract, they should bring it to us right away. It’s not quite Stop, Don’t Touch, Tell An Adult, but it’s close.
As Ledasmom says, the asshattery is pretending to be giving out candy for Halloween and giving out religious tracts instead. It’s also rather stupid–did they really think the kids’ reaction was going to be anything other than “I got a piece of paper instead of candy?!” Yeah, way to make them have an initial positive attitude towards Jesus.
Oh, and I guess it goes without saying that this particular household also didn’t have anything to contribute to UNICEF.
(Jake, not everybody lives in a safe neighborhood with houses. It’s a little hard to trick-or-treat in an apartment complex, say.)
Instead of candy? Hasn’t it occurred to them that they’d do better if they gave out candy and Chick tracts at the same time?
Jake Squid- amen to anti-mall trick or treat. I can’t believe people do that! Why? You can take a baby or a toddler around the block in the dark- that’s how they get introduced to the neighbors! I was also really upset that they were talking about changing daylight savings to after Halloween, thereby making trick or treat happen in daylight. Boo to a boring daylight Halloween!! Boo to trick or treating indoors! Boo to “trunk or treating” and prosyletzing and not carving a jack-o-lantern!!
Actually, my town holds a “Pumpkin Walk” a few days before Halloween from 5-7, which is still light. It’s to bring people downtown, and it’s a lot of fun. It’s more like a big Halloween party and the stores give out candy and coupons, but no lame advertising w/o candy. Everyone stays and eats out afterwards, and you always see many people you know.
Ron- I’m going to try to start a cocktail-o-treat tradition w/ my neighbors. My friend/ neighbor said her neighborhood was like that when she was young too. Great idea (how come that’s not in the Good Housekeeping Halloween Issue?)
If it was just Sydney, that would have been one thing, but we also had Maddox with us (Matt and I switched off on holding Maddox while Barry ushered Sydney to the candy hander-outers). And it was much more comfortable for me (having just had surgery and all) to walk around in a warmer environment that I knew I could sit down in, as opposed to a wettish outdoor environment where I couldn’t. And I -wanted- to enjoy Sydney’s pleasure at her first Halloween that she would be comprehending (at least somewhat) what was going on. Needless to say it was priceless, and when Sydney and Maddox are old enough, we’ll be taking them out around neighborhood (perhaps not felony flats and all but…)
And yes, Disney was way freaking lame.
Point taken. But – although you had no way of knowing this – Jake has been to my house a bunch of times, so he knows perfectly well that I don’t live in an apartment. And my neighborhood is… well, safe enough, in my opinion.
But Jake also knows that I’m not the one deciding where Sydney spends her hallows eve – that’s up to her parents. :-) (And for the record, I don’t disagree with their decision to make this year a mall year.)
Rock, I hate to think of you with that leftover Lindt chocolate in your house (and don’t you mean “would have been giving out”, not “were giving out”? Technicality, I know), reminding you of your tragic lack of trick-or-treaters. I tell you what: I’ll take it off your hands, and I won’t even charge you for the service. I’m doing it out of the goodness of my heart, I am.
Ledasmom,
Is that like Leda and the Swan? (Well sort of?)
Yeah, it is “would have given out!” I grew up with an English Teacher for a mom, I should catch these things. (I think I am still rebelling.)
Now, the Halloween chocolate is in San Francisco still…. However I am back in LA; for my birthday my wife bought a lovely small box of “Helen Grace” dipped chocolates! (Bittersweet) They are the bomb. (How I love that woman of mine!) The fragrance is wonderful. One of them is simply a whole dried apricot dipped ¾ of the way in bittersweet, I cannot bring myself to eat it and have it be gone. The only way is to cut it in half and share it, it is better when someone else experiences these things with you. Hey if you can make it to LA I know where we can score some good stuff… but it aint cheap. Actually we only splurge for a treat or special occasion; it makes it where we never grow tired of it. (Feh! Tired of chocolate?) The Armenian shops in Glendale have some good stuff reasonably cheap. Calibeau (sp?) and Carma are good buys too.
I appreciate your kind offer to relieve me of our excess, I have never been a bogart… accept for chocolate. Blessings.
As someone that works in a retail store, I personally despise the the fact that people come to my mall to trick-or-treat. Just because the mall encourages the act does not mean that retailers should have to endure it. It is the biggest pain in the butt. First of all, the lines block access to my store, so people that want to shop find it very difficult to enter. Second, the malls used to provide candy, but have ended that practice, so now it is up to the stores themselves to do so. My company decided to do stickers instead, which of course is not really what the kids want. So, the other option is for the management team to purchase candy, which i refuse to do. I purchase candy for my boyfriend to give out at home, I am not going to dig into my well-earned money to buy candy to give to some snot-nosed little brats that 9 times out of 10 don’t even say thank you. Third, like most stores, we monitor things like conversion (the amount of purchases you have compared to the amount of people that enter the store) and this number, which is one of the things they use to rate us on our reviews, is incredibly, unbelievably low on Halloween, because even when we have someone stationed at our gate (which will bring me to number 4 in a moment,) people come into the store to ask for candy…even after being told that a sticker is all we are giving out, or worse, when we run out of stickers and post a note on our doorway sign that we are out. So, 4-although we operate on approximately 200 hours a week (which includes 3 full time and 1 part time manager, plus the rest of our staff) we have to bring in an extra person on whatever night Halloween is to do nothing basically but hand out stickers. And, because it is so difficult to enter the store because it is blocked my trick-or-treaters, and the majority of the people in the mall are not there to shop, we don’ make up for the extra hours with extra money made…no no no, we have to steal those hours from another day of the week, typically Saturday, which is the day we really need to use those hours. Okay, sorry, just needed to vent a little..and don’t get me started on how rude parents are that let their kids run around and make a mess, but don’t do or say anything about cleaning up…and these are the same people that wonder why their children don’t pick up their messes at home. As long as I’ve been in retail, I’ve been told that you should treat customers like guests in your home…but I don’t think anyone tells these people that in response they should act like guests in a home.