Let your children play, rendezvous with foolish fun and delve into the depths of delicious treats on Halloween.
Whether it's religious beliefs, or just plain paranoia, there are some parents who won't allow their children to roam the streets without adult supervision on the annual pagan holiday. For very young children it's abundantly necessary for constant supervision whether it's quote unquote Devils night or not. Most children 11-years and older are very capable or roaming the cool dark suburban streets with their peers in quest for fondant treats on the last night of October.
When I was a youngster, trick or treating with my peers in the 70's, the horror stories filled our ears; razor blades in apples, drugs and rat poison harbored in some of the candy. According to a Huffington Post article "Manufacturing Fear: Halloween Laws for Sex Offenders, written by Emily Horowitz on the Oct. 21, (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/emilyhorowitz/manufacturing-fear-hallow_b_4135793.html) these things are unsubstantiated gossip.
Sociologists, such as Joel Best claim urban myths such as razor blades in apples, first appeared in the early 1970s, and then spread via word-of-mouth. Best has never found a death or injury of a child on Halloween related to candy based on his decades of research.
Horowitz's article makes an excellent point about children potentially receiving poison candy on Hallween. Her article states that the Center for Disease Control warns children to only eat pre-wrapped candy and to avoid all homemade treats. This is excellent advice, not only because some demented individuals would make something that is harmful to children, but if it is homemade, the people who made it may have cold or flu symptoms, thus unintentionally getting people sick.
As far as parents worrying about their children knocking on the doors of possible sex offenders and the worst things happening to their children, they should ease up on the worrying. Statics, real ones show that there no evidence of increased child sex abuse on Halloween. In fact in all cases of sex abuse against children, more than 92 percent of those crimes are committed by their parents or acquaintances.
Increased fear and anxiety and remove the fun and excitement from Halloween. The night should be a time to meet neighbors and connect with community Horowitz wrote in her article and I agree.
People are basically decent, though we read about the exceptions everyday Neil Peart wrote in 1987 for the Rush song "Prime Mover."
