It’s all fun and games till they start beheading babies
I liked Halloween as a boy because, even then, I was a cheapskate. I loved getting candy, and I loved even more getting it for free.
When I was about 11, my three siblings came down with the flu. Oddly, I didn’t. I went out trick-or-treating alone till about 10:30, way past my bedtime, while my sister and brothers languished at home praying to the porcelain god.
I took in quite a haul. Two full bags. Probably today’s equivalent of a couple hundred dollars’ worth of candy.
I was afraid that night. Not of goblins or ghosts. No, I was afraid that my sibs would steal some of my hard-earned free candy. I ate as much as I possibly could, and then some more, but there was still an overflowing bag of the sugary crap. To guard it from my ill siblings, I put it right next to my bed.
That night, the flu, the candy, and the fates, caught up with me. I turned on my side and projectile-puked right off the bed into – you already guessed it – the candy bag.
Of course, I wanted to wash it all off, save it, and eat it. After all, it didn’t have anything on it that wouldn’t get on it when it entered my stomach anyway. My mother saw things differently.
It took me half a lifetime to recognize the accidental profundity of this story. It’s worthy of Aesop, or maybe even Leviticus.
A good kid would have seen that particular Halloween as an opportunity to collect candy for his ill siblings. I was not a good kid. I instead saw it as an opportunity to make my sibs jealous. And I can’t deny that the thought crossed my mind to profit by selling it to them.
I was lucky to get off with punishment no worse than the flu.
Maybe the experience did teach me something, however. It left a bad taste in my mouth for Halloween, a bad taste that’s only gotten worse over time.
Halloween is now a celebration of death, disease, superstition, and evil.
I recognize that, at least initially, the celebration was in good fun. It was an excuse for a party, like “Hey, let’s put on ridiculous costumes and get drunk!”
OK, but since when do we need to put on ridiculous costumes in order to party and drink? Personally, I do my best drinking and partying in blue jeans. And black jeans. And overalls. And three-piece suits. And my birthday suit. And, well, you get the idea.
In the old days, Halloween meant dressing up as Ronald Reagan, or ET, or Princess Leia, or a Disney “witch,” or a 4’3″ sheet-draped ghost who said “boo.”
Now, it’s gotten ugly. “Freddy” appears at your front door with a plastic chain saw. He demands a caramel or four as a treat, else he’ll pull the trick of using that chainsaw on you. He’ll start by lopping off a hand, then a foot. Then he’ll carve out your liver.
Fun, huh?
In the old days there were only two genders. Kids and adults, too, sometimes dressed up as their opposite gender. A man would dress up as a woman, or vice versa. It was seen as a funny thing. Today, we consider it sick, but the sickest thing is that we have to celebrate the sickness of it.
Like, “Oh, that’s so cool that you’re a trans . . . wait, it’s just an act, right? Not that there would be anything wrong if it weren’t . . . “
Whisper to wife: “Maude, is that guy a transexual pervert, or is he a bigot who’s mocking transexual perverts – which is it? Whichever it is, celebrate him, but keep him away from the other kids.”
OK, that’s enough fun, frivolity, drinking, humor, and transgenderism. (Where’s a Venn diagram when you need one?)
This Halloween, Year of our Lord 2023, is different. This year, there’s 10/7.
Animals living in the stink hole they made for themselves invaded one of the most civilized nations on earth, a civilization founded by the survivors of a Holocaust that murdered six million of their wives, fathers, children and friends for nothing other than their religion.
The animals invaded that Jewish nation to shoot people in cold blood, to laugh as they raped daughters, to cheer as they burned elderly women alive, and to celebrate as they slit the throats of fathers in front of their children.
And then just for amusement, they beheaded babies in front of their mothers.
Such premeditated, grotesque, sadistic atrocities had not been seen in this world since the rape of Nanjing nearly a century ago.
The animals took hundreds of civilian hostages, and still hold them in underground tunnels. They took the hostages not as prisoners – they still plan to murder them – but for their own sick fun and to use them as bargaining chips.
These acts are not just allegations. The terrorists (oops, the media now disavows that pejorative word in favor of “militants”) admit it. Nay, they boast of it. They wore Go-Pro cameras to record it all, and posted the recordings on the internet.
For creatures the media deems something better than “terrorists,” they seem determined to terrify. “Animals” is too good a word for them. No animal does such things.
On American college campuses, silly and supercilious students say the Jews had it coming, apparently because the people doing the killing had slightly darker skin than the people being killed.
Think about that. Was six million not enough? How many more millions of Jews “have it coming”?
And why? Because they want to live successfully, in peace, in the land of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? Because they want to live in the place they’ve called home for the last three thousand years?
“Next year in Jerusalem” is not a slogan. It’s a prayer spoken through the millennia. One of the great achievements of modern society – a true social justice – is that for the last 75 years Jews have finally been free to have each “next year in Jerusalem.”
“Never again,” vowed the Jews and the world when the United Nations established Israel after the Holocaust. But here it is. Again. Genocidal sickos candidly advocate the extermination of the Jews.
I have no appetite for Halloween. Let the saloons find some other excuse to bring in throngs of drinkers (I prefer to drink at home, thank you). This year, I don’t want to celebrate death, suffering, ugliness, evil, the beheading of babies, and the genocide of the Jews.
I’m not a Jew. I’m a Christian. But Jews are the ancestors and foundation of my faith. They are the rock on which Christ built his church. (Muslims often fail to recognize that Jews are the ancestors and foundation of their faith as well.) This year and next and the one after that, and forever, I say “This year in Jerusalem.”
As for Halloween, go back to hell.
the Aspen beat 
Great reminder, Glen
Absolutely Correct! Some primitive societies view halloween as the time of the year when its easier for the gates of hell to be opened. The best outcome for the Gaza problem is to bomb and bulldozer it back to the Stone Age; a vast, featureless plain of barren sand and rock. The Palestinians voted for hamas as their leaders and will now suffer the consequences of that stupidity.
Great article Glen!
Like you, Glenn, I am a Christian and I recognize the ancestral roots of Christianity, revealed in the pages of the Bible that I have lately taken to reading with greater frequency and deeper interest. Although there are historical precedents for the evil we are witnessing today (yes, the Japanese committed equally horrifying atrocities in China, and did so an a numerically vastly greater scale), I am not sure there has been a time when such a confluence of events as is occurring today has ever existed before. There have always been sexual degenerates, but I do not recall them being lionized, encouraged and protected. And never before has surgical mutilation been readily available to implement their degeneracy. And as for the Jews, they have always been the subject of prejudice and even frank persecution. Pogrom, anyone? But they have remained as a discreet social/ethnic/religious group for nearly four thousand years in the face of all that. I can reasonably think of no other reason for this than it is part of God’s Plan of Salvation, His intention to restore what The Fall in Eden destroyed. When the people began plotting rebellion on the plains of Shinar under Nimrod, God dispersed them and confused their language, and moreover, gave dominion over each separate group over to the bene ha elohim who had earlier rebelled against His authority, retaining only one group as His people. (Genesis 11-12) It was that group of people, beginning with Abram/Abraham whom He used to produce Messiah Jesus, the God-man we Christians follow as Our Lord and Savior. Looking forward from our perspective, now two thousand years after Jesus’ birth, death and resurrection, we are approaching, and may now be in the times of “the fullness of the gentiles” as described in Scripture, when Jesus’ triumphant return might be anticipated shortly. The restoration of the Jews to the land of promise and the conflict it has occasioned is all part of the unfolding of history in accordance with Biblical prophecy.
We Catholics celebrate All Hallows’ Eve, with a Vigil Mass in the evening on October 31st, then on November 1st we celebrate All Saints Day with several Masses as it is a holy day of obligation for Catholics. What has happened here is that Satan hijacked “All Hallows’ Eve”, and turned it into “Halloween”, a day to celebrate himself. Catholics are taught that one has to be a good Jew before one came be a good Catholic. Jews have been persecuted for 5,784 years – and it is obviously ongoing to this day. Catholics have been persecuted for 2,023 years – and it is ongoing to this day. For example, a friend of mine was driving one day and received a call on his cell phone. The caller identified himself, and said I understand that you went to so-and-so boys’ school. My friend said yes. The caller then said well we are going to sue the school for all the abuse you endured at that school. My friend said that he was not abused at all. The caller said, “Oh that doesn’t matter we can still get you a lot of money. It is cheaper for the Catholic Church to pay to settled out of court than to go to trial.
It would have been unthought of for anyone older than elementary school to do trick or treat when I was a child in the dark ages 1950s.
It turned into something very weird when adults started using it a an excuse to behave (be?) kids. Even in our small town, we only went to houses in the neighborhood and our parents took us to the homes of elderly people they knew who looked forward to seeing children having fun. We went to a small Catholic school in very Catholic Louisiana. It was understood that this was sort of a Mardi Gras costume party for little ones. Agree, now it’s just perverted.
Yes, Michele K, when I was a child, only young children participated in Halloween. Fun costumes, candy, and older children did not go house to house. Adults didn’t participate at all except to accompany children. All of the expensive decorations and adult parties are new. I know of nominally Christian houses that decorate for Halloween but not for Christmas.
Meanwhile, along our southern border every day is “Trick or Treat”:
“Hi, little girl, which of 180 countries are YOU from? And is this man your father? Great costume — he doesn’t look like you at all! Well, if you’ll go over to that tent, Catholic Charities or some other NGO will have some candy for you. Have fun! We’ll see you and your father in court about seven years from now, OK? OK!”
I’m actually a Texan now, with a ranch and boots. Fortunately, we live in a far from the border, in a inhospitable area that is so remote that we don’t even have reliable phone service. As for the NGOs, I have particular contempt for so-called “Catholic Charities.” I collaborated with the Office of the Inspector General for Fraud and Abuse of government programs in my prior work in Austin. (The portal to Hell in Texas and we got out as soon as we could.) Catholic Charities not only facilitated the influx of invaders, they refused absolutely to assist investigation of the many, many utterly baseless claims for SSI Disability. You can bet that there’s a bounty for each liar they get a check for. I hope there’s Hell coming for these debased do-gooders.
Evil wears many costumes, doesn’t it?
More complicated, Hugo. When Arab countries have free elections for the first time, or for the first time in a long time, the result is that the majority of the people vote for the Islamist party. They do it not because they want an Islamist government but because they want to make a cultural statement.
Then they get a government they hate and it takes a very long time to dislodge it. I always refer back to Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points. As a statement of principle, they’re nice. A world policy, they’re a disaster because the further east and the further south you go, the application they have.
The concept of government and life embodied in the Fourteen Points is problematic even in Eastern Europe let alone the Middle East.
America is insufficiently aware of the hazards of spending our geopolitical capital, not to mention our actual treasure, trying to establish Western-style democracy in places where the people themselves are not suited to it and cannot sustain it. In the end, we may end with no capital, either geopolitical of financial, for our trouble
For another thing, one of the reasons why Hamas won the election is because Hamas successfully practiced good old fashioned American-style machine and ward politics. Hamas was the entity that passed out the goodies and came up with the emergency aid when there was a family that needed it. It works in Chicago. Why not in a heavily urbanized community like Gaza?
The difference is, how Chicago goes doesn’t always affect world politics that much. When Gaza ended up with a regime far more radical and reckless than the people wanted just because the people liked the goodies and social benefits and wanted to make a cultural statement, it did affect world politics. And still does.
The actual, present fact is that the Palistinians DID vote for Hamas as their governing party, however it was done. That fact is not in question. They will now reap the, “Benefit,” of their error.
casteanddestiny, I might begrudgingly concede some of your points about simply voting in those who are handing out the goodies, however NOW that the ‘simple Palestinians’ have SEEN the DEMONIC acts of their Hamas leaders, where are all the Palestinians/ Gazans forcefully speaking out against them??
No where that I’ve heard.
No, these demons in Gaza were a bunch of ghouls who were videoed CHEERING the fall of the twin towers on 9/11.
I’m sorry but these people are simply demons who must be destroyed. They are a cancer in humanity.
As a Christian family, we will still celebrate Halloween as we always have, a fun time to pretend, meet neighbors, give the little kids treats, and enjoy the tradition.
Evil and evil deeds have been around since Genesis, this latest horror by Hamas will not cause us to change our traditions. Also, as a Vietnam veteran, I have seen horrors, faced up to them, and refuse to let them change the way I live.