Gone are the days of “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” Halloween innocence….now there are new rules. Will Bill Maher weigh in?

Maybe I have been Captain Oblivious, but does government regulate Halloween now?

First I saw this article on Main Line Media News’ website about Halloween in Radnor Township (and I quote):

Malvern Borough is even more restrictive as per their Facebook page:

I know lots of places where it isn’t so safe to trick or treat they do things like trunk or treats, or Halloween at centralized location but we aren’t talking inner city, we are talking Malvern Borough and Radnor Township.

There are actually two articles about this which are interesting:

Huffington Post: What You Need to Know About 6-Foot Trick-or-Treaters

and

Washington Post: On Parenting Yes, that might be my teen at your door on Halloween

So yes, as teens get older they generally stop trick or treating, but this whole local government decreeing hours of operation and age restrictions just sits oddly with me. I get and appreciate the common sense tips about escorting small children, flashlights, reflective clothing, and checking candy but when were Halloween Ordinances passed?

So these townships are all dictating 6 pm to 8 pm only. The funny thing is all the parents I know with really little kids start around 4:30 pm and are basically finished by 6 pm.

Now I know that sometimes giant trick or treating teens can be not the best thing. When my sister and I were growing up one year a bunch of teenagers tried to mug my mother at the door. You see my mother had this silver bowl she put the candy in. They tried to steal the bowl. And it was the north side of Haverford in Lower Merion Township on the Main Line – not the inner city. We chalked that up to just punks.

When we were elementary school and kindergarten age young we lived in Society Hill. The costumes that year were from Creative Playthings I think. That was when we would also collect money for UNICEF in little cardboard boxes. We got jumped and mugged for the UNICEF boxes carrying minuscule amounts of change. And we were little kids being escorted by adults too.

I also know that parents will take kids to neighborhoods other than their own if there is no real trick or treating where they live, but known to be better in the neighborhood next to theirs. I also know that will freak out a lot of people if they see too many strange costumed and non-costumed faces, and not just their neighborhood folks. You are, after all opening your door, unless you just leave an honor bowl of candy set out. I think back in the day we trick or treated until 9th or 10th grade.

So I get Halloween can be problematic, and we live in less innocent times and all. But I have to ask : are we so far gone that local governments have to legislate a traditional holiday?

Thanks for stopping by.