# So Halloween is Halloween unless it's Sunday? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 15, 2004, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456 "2004-10-15T21:02:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Juniper200](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/df788c/32.png) [@Juniper200](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Juniper200)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2004, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/41 "2004-10-18T01:40:08Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Where I grew up, the night before Halloween was “Devil’s Night”, when everyone went out and vandalized the shit out of their neighborhoods. You know, TP, eggs, that sort of thing. And where I grew up, the night before Halloween was “Devil’s Night,” when everyone went out and burned their neighborhood to the ground. ---
**Author:** ![Mirror\_Image\_egamI\_rorriM](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e56c9b/32.png) [@Mirror\_Image\_egamI\_rorriM](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mirror_Image_egamI_rorriM)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2004, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/42 "2004-10-18T01:42:53Z")
I still want to know why **Eve** thinks people in KC have Halloween on the 29th. ---
**Author:** ![caligynephobia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7feea3/32.png) [@caligynephobia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/caligynephobia)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2004, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/43 "2004-10-18T01:49:11Z")
I remember a few years back, Independence Day fell on a Sunday. The city of San Angelo TX decided to hold 4th of July celebrations on Saturday. Kind of stupid I think, but made the natives happy. I’m gonna pretend to be cool for the kids this year and have candy for Saturday and Sunday trick-or-treaters. The kids don’t give a shit - its their parents that are raising the fuss. ---
**Author:** ![vanilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/f19dbf/32.png) [@vanilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vanilla)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2004, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/44 "2004-10-18T02:08:18Z")
> [@Juniper200](#): > > And where I grew up, the night before Halloween was “Devil’s Night,” when everyone went out and burned their neighborhood to the ground. I thought that was Detroit? ---
**Author:** ![Epimetheus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c4cdca/32.png) [@Epimetheus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Epimetheus)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2004, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/45 "2004-10-18T12:21:14Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > Hmm, in Kansas City they trick-or-treat on the 29th. Strange, I wasn’t aware of this… ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2004, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/46 "2004-10-18T16:17:41Z")
> [@bluethree](#): > > Also, I bet they make sure it doesn’t conflict with the local high school’s football games. Man, are they football crazy around there. Now, _that’s_ twisted. Same goes for what **Siege** said about the Steeler fans. Stop the world! There’s a game on! :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2004, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/47 "2004-10-18T16:27:15Z")
> [@astro](#): > > [This lady](http://mywebpages.comcast.net/cpeek001/m.mp3) certainly has something to say about this controversial topic. Please warn people when you are linking to a media file instead of a website. Of course, if you don’t care, then you don’t care. But I really can’t open media files at my workplace. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2004, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/48 "2004-10-18T16:28:36Z")
> [@vanilla](#): > > I thought that was Detroit? Would explain the decor. Yes, I lived there ten years. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2004, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/49 "2004-10-19T13:14:58Z")
One could validly not want ones child trick-or-treating on ones Sabbath because it’s a holy day of rest, if one also refrains from other legit activities. One could validly not want ones child TrT’n’ on Sunday night because it’s a school night (our town has had TrT night on Fri or Sat night for years). But for it to be OK any day except Sunday because it’s Devil-related- that’s just silly. ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2004, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/50 "2004-10-19T15:28:31Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > Many Protestants, interpreting Scripture to suit themselves, bring over the idea of keeping the Sabbath from the Ten Commandments, and drape it over the keeping of the Lord’s Day – though they too will not keep the Sabbath as an Orthodox Jew will tell you it should properly be kept. But they **will** often challenge X, Y, or Z as “Sabbath-breaking” – including the keeping of the Eve of All Saints in its traditional celebration, which is what provoked this current Pit thread and this excursus\* within it. > 😉 That is what always bothered me immensely too. The “holier than thou crowd” picks and chooses what they feel like following or ignoring, and then they have the nerve to demand that everyone else obey them, as if they are the sole conveyors of absolute truth. They need to just do their own “thing” and shut the hell up. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2004, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/51 "2004-10-19T23:25:16Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by **FriarTed** > _One could validly not want ones child TrT’n’ on Sunday night because it’s a school night (our town has had TrT night on Fri or Sat night for years)._ See, this reasoning is weird to me, too. How long does it take to trick-or-treat? My brother and I were always home by 7:30 and cleaned up and in bed no more than half an hour past our bedtime. We were allowed to eat only a few pieces of candy that night and had to save the rest for later. Part of the fun was going out on a school night, just like part of the fun was going out after dark. ---
**Author:** ![burundi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/3ec8ea/32.png) [@burundi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burundi)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2004, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/52 "2004-10-19T23:26:27Z")
Oops. That was me above, not **Left Hand**. ---
**Author:** ![Tamex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@Tamex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamex)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/53 "2004-10-20T10:07:44Z")
> [@Squink](#): > > Well, occasionally there are [blizzards on Halloween](http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&c2coff=1&as_qdr=all&q=blizzard+halloween+cancelled&btnG=Search), and _someone_ needs to tell the little tykes not to go out and freeze to death in a snowdrift. Living in a society where you can’t trust parents to take that responsibility, the city does it in order to avoid the expense of cleaning up heaps of little frozen corpses come springtime. :eek: I remember that blizzard (at least, I’m assuming it’s the same one). I was 15, and I thought I was too old to go trick-or-treating, but my sister convinced me to come along with her and her friend…"It’s starting to snow, and you know that moms aren’t going to take their little kids out in this weather. _Just think of the candy we’ll get!_ I dug around in the closet and threw on a red cape and devil horns over my winter clothing, grabbed a plastic bag, and we went to town. We had an absolute blast, and my sister was right about the haul. People were just emptying their bowls into our sacks, saying, “Take it, I don’t think anyone else is coming, and I don’t want this stuff around the house!” If our city had “cancelled” Halloween, how would we have known? Do they blow sirens or something? At the time, we thought it was just a regular, if a bit early, snowstorm, and had no idea that school would be cancelled the next day. I mean, this is Minnesota we’re talking about. I wonder if someone who was a little kid then might remember that “the city” cancelled Halloween, when, really, Mom was the one who kept the kids home. Every year, my mother-in-law asks me when our town has trick-or-treating, and every year, she’s surprised when I answer, “Uh…Halloween”. Apparently, in her area of Wisconsin, cities do schedule trick-or-treating…generally for Saturday afternoon at, say, 2 p.m. Rather odd. I thought that it was a “no-school-night” thing, but I wonder if they avoid Sunday Halloweens, too. I always thought, though, that those families that equated trick-or-treating with devil worship didn’t tend to celebrate Halloween in the first place, and went to church to pray for our heathen souls or something instead. ---
**Author:** ![Dragwyr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dragwyr/32/2855_2.png) [@Dragwyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dragwyr)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/54 "2004-10-20T18:22:14Z")
I also disagree with the “rescheduling” of Halloween Trick-Or-Treating, but mainly from a logistical and organizational view. Where I come from, there weren’t very many houses to go around to for trick-or-treating, so dad would drive us to the nearest neighborhood (Usually 10 minutes away) to go out. My point is that one town may have it on the actual holiday while the next town may not, so those who are commuting in won’t know whether or not it’s even going on. It would be a heck of a lot easier if people would just do trick-or-treating on Halloween (Like you are supposed to) rather than try to get EVERYONE in a community to change to another day. …and if you believe all that clap-trap about Halloween being “the devil’s night” or just don’t want to participate, THEN DON’T PARTICIPATE and leave the rest of us alone. Ok… I feel better now. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Claude\_Remains](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/898d66/32.png) [@Claude\_Remains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claude_Remains)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/55 "2004-10-20T19:08:49Z")
I don’t care one way or the other. Ant kids begging at my door will get an icecream sandwich dropped into his/her bag just like every other year. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/56 "2004-10-20T19:13:11Z")
> [@Una Persson](#): > > Trick or treating _in general_ seems to be on a sharp decline here, continuing a trend from the 1990’s, according to personal experience, family experience, and experience of co-workers and friends. The year before last we had 1 set of trick or treaters the whole night. Last year, an incredible “zero” kids showed up. I guess they get scared off visiting the lesbian witch house. Really? So all of your co-workers and friends are lesbian witches too? Haj ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/57 "2004-10-20T19:47:56Z")
> [@StarvingButStrong](#): > > For a lot of kids, this is the first time you’re allowed to be out after dark. Especially that narrow window between being old enough to go without a parent and being too old to go at all: it’s scary and neat and _significant_ that you’re out in the dark. > > Hrrrrph. Some people want to take all the fun out of childhood. I for one, would have been god_dammned_ if my parents had ever accompanied me while T&Ting. The first time I went I was 4 and under the valiant protection of my 5 1/2 year-old brother. The presence of parents is one of my major peeves about Holloween. Every time I hear a parent shout “Be sure to say thank you” from the end of the driveway while I’m handing out candy, I want to shout back, “Hey, shut up! You’re ruining Halloween!” ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/58 "2004-10-20T20:19:37Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > Really? So all of your co-workers and friends are lesbian witches too? > > Haj No, that would be The (Lilith) Faire Witch Project. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/59 "2004-10-20T20:24:41Z")
> [@sqweels](#): > > I for one, would have been god_dammned_ if my parents had ever accompanied me while T&Ting. The first time I went I was 4 and under the valiant protection of my 5 1/2 year-old brother. The presence of parents is one of my major peeves about Holloween. Every time I hear a parent shout “Be sure to say thank you” from the end of the driveway while I’m handing out candy, I want to shout back, “Hey, shut up! You’re ruining Halloween!” Sorry, but no way do my kids run the night unsupervised. Even way back in the dark ages when I was a kid, Mom walked from house to house with us. I’m sure it’s lots more fun your way, but now that I’m a parent, I’d say, “If you don’t think it’s fun, you don’t have to go.” 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![sqweels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@sqweels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sqweels)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2004, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456/60 "2004-10-20T21:20:04Z")
> [@bob fortuna](#): > > And kids begging at my door will get an icecream sandwich dropped into his/her > bag just like every other year. 😉 Oooh, speaking of dropping fun stuff in kids’ bags… Every year my dad would relate to us his recipe for chocolate-covered ice cubes, but sadly, we never followed through. One of my greatest Lifetime Achievements, tho, was on a rainy Halloween when I was about 10 and I slipped a huge nightcrawler into a little girl’s bag. The payoff came the next day on the school bus when her brother related her subsequent horrified shriek while my Secret Identity remained intact. More recently, when I ran out of candy one year, I started tossing in condoms. :eek: That was about all they were good for at the time. ☹ I’m so evil. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-halloween-is-halloween-unless-its-sunday/269456.md?page=4)