A) My kid has diabetes. I realize that not ALL kids have diabetes, and he IS allowed to eat SOME candy, but what ends up happening is he goes into this "candy frenzy" (as do most other children) and gets all OCD about it--- and it becomes literally a matter of life or death.
B) The instance of child-hood diabetes is on the rise. (Source)
D) Americans in general are fat and we gorge ourselves on candy (do you KNOW how many bags of candy corn I've eaten?? A lot!) and then we get all depressed about our jeans being tight; but we continually still feed into the lie that we need more candy (money, alcohol, etc.) to make us feel good. In fact, anything that makes us feel good (including food) becomes an idol to us (and reinforces this to our children).
E) Eating too much candy makes kids crazy. (Source - my own house). It makes moms fat.... yet we are compelled to sneak it out of our kid's treat bags in large quantities year after year.
F) Americans need to get a grip and stop being naive about marketing tactics from those companies who are trying to make us eat more and spend more on things we don't need (like candy- which is bad for our health and our teeth) And when eaten in excess, as we generally do (okay, I know that moderation is fine and some people are great at it, but the majority are not), we are suckered into the gravity-pull of American consumerism and gluttony.
G) Halloween/Harvest parties - Let's just go to a halloween, harvest, or whatever party (even at our churches) and stuff our faces with all kinds of goodies and treats and send our kids (even teens) home with buckets of candy - so then our teenage daughter needs therapy because she has weight issues and hates herself because her jeans don't fit. Do we get this people? Why are we surprised when children struggle with self-image and eating disorders such as Bulemia? Okay, so don't flame me, I'm no expert, but my opinion is that society tells us to look one way and eat another way - that totally contradict one another.... and then we wonder why we have these problems.
H) For the $35 I will spend on buying candy for trick or treaters in my neighborhood (I live in a middle-class subdivision that sees a fair share of Halloween traffic) I could sponsor a child to receive food, clothing, healthcare, and education for a whole month! (And I'm not even talking about costumes, just the price of candy).
So, in short and in my honest opinion, Halloween reinforces gluttony in our children, gets them to buy in to the lie that "stuff" (like candy) can make you happy, and is some sort of "right" or "material reward". This only adds to the deception and problems within American society and culture where we feel that we are "owed" something or "deserve" something (which isn't necessary) in order to draw our self-worth.
Will we participate in Halloween this year? Hmm.... probably. Why? Because everyone else is doing it?
But it makes me think. And it makes me ask myself if allowing my children to participate in this event is only perpetuating a life of self-gratification, rather than living a life of serving others, as the Gospel of Jesus calls us to do.
On second thought, maybe we won't participate after all......
