In your opinion, what's the age limit for Trick r Treating?
My sister is 23 and still dresses up and goes out knocking doors for candy… and I find it weird but I let her do her. It got me thinking, at what age do you think someone should stop Trick r Treating at? Just curious.
Halloween is all but dead in my area, Seattle Washington. Only pockets of neighborhoods put up decoration. If you are able to get to my front door I don’t care what you’re wearing or how you got there. You get a treat. Anyone elitist with this is literally helping to kill the spirit of Halloween. The holiday hardly exists, stop trying to kill it more.
Although no trick or treat involved, I feel the same about Christmas decorations in neighborhoods. When I moved to the states in my prep teen years, I remember the sheer amount of decorations everywhere and I was beautiful to see and experience. No if feels 1 out of 10 houses put up decorations. I’m not even a Christian and I enjoyed seeing them so I think of it as more cultural than religious
Okay, rant time. If you don’t like rants, skip this comment.
Listen motherfuckers, Halloween isn’t about candy. The fact that the candy has become the point is a fucking problem.
We’ve lost the social cohesion, the sense of community, and even the superstitions that made Halloween such a popular holiday.
And that fucking sucks.
Nobody really believes we’re scaring off bad spirits any more, but we could at least celebrate the weird, the scary, and just spend one night a year dressing up for fun.
Fuck the candy. The only reason we have to give out candy is because assholes fucked up being able to give out home made treats. Man, did any of y’all have the fucking awesomeness of getting candy coated apples, or home made fudge, or wax paper wrapped cookies? Or anything but the sugar bombs in a bag you buy? But no, some assholes had to fuck around and break the ability to trust the social contract of Halloween.
Shit, I’m the only asshole in my entire town baking and making things today. Why? Because I’m the only idiot willing to put up a sign on my door “home made treats available on request by adults”. Which means I’m the only house on the fucking street that has cars pulling up with kids in them, accompanied by adults. Parents don’t let kids walk the streets on Halloween any more because humans are fucking horrible and can’t be trusted not to mess with kids. So that means nobody even fucking bothers to hand out anything, they all go to fucking trunk and treat shit, which ends up being about the fucking candy instead of having fun because a bunch of people in parking lots isn’t a community.
Fuck. Fuck the assholes that ruined Halloween and turned it into a day for fucking candy.
I haven’t even had a trick or treater come to my door in probably like 6 years. The 2 or 3 years before that, I was getting no more than 3 visits per year. This is the first year I’ve just straight up not even bought candy. Halloween is gone. I thought that after covid got under control, maybe there’d be a resurgence since it’s an activity that kids can do together with their friends outside of home, meeting other kids and shit, and that was all very much taken for granted until people were stuck inside for two years. But nope. 24/7 news convinced parents that there are drugs and poison and razor blades in their treats, and the houses their kids visit will be inhabited by pedophiles and scary [insert dogwhistle]s, and some lunatic will either commit a mass shooting or drive over as many people as possible. No fun allowed.
We let the terrorists win. The domestic terrorists, specifically. We’re afraid of what might happen, and nobody is doing anything to quell those fears, so we just hand over a little more liberty and freedom for the sake of supposed safety and security. What a boring dystopia.
There’s actually a huge amount of trick or treaters here but the thing is they all go to like the very best neighborhoods that go all out and no one wants to go to mid tier neighborhood with only a few houses that are doing things anymore.
I love Halloween. Every other holiday I have to cook, clean, plan. So much work. Halloween? Creativity and candy and kids. Fun, without all the baggage. American Halloween I honestly love.
ETA: we get trick or treaters here, from little kids to teens. Not a suburb or a rich neighborhood. First one today pulled up in a truck and I was about to be judgy, hate the car house to house thing, dad got out, opened the door for his blind daughter who was in a wonder woman costume, helped her up our front steps so she could trick or treat. I love Halloween.
Then we need a PR campaign to motivate adults to break out of the spiral of fear they’ve fallen into.
Make Halloween a left or a right wing thing. Frame it in terms that celebrating Halloween follows and honors the values of each political tribe, and not celebrating it violates those core values.
I hate the idea that older kids shouldn't do it. Like I remember getting shit when I decided to be kid-like again at 15 after not having done it when I was 13 and 14.
Houses told me I was too old. And looking back now, as a parent of teens, and I wish they and their friends were just going out trick r treating. I will definitely encourage any kid I see. And at my age anyone under 26 is a kid, easily. I'd much rather kids do something communal and fun than just go out drinking. I'm sure that by the next Halloween when I was 16 I was probably doing something less good than asking for free candy.
If we want people to be communal, have fun, and be safe then we shouldn't give them shit when they do that. So I don't care if the old dude down the streets dons a skeleton costume and grabs a pillow case. If he has a costume, he gets candy. And anyone who tells me different will get called out for being a killjoy.
I love the tradition of trick or treating in the neighborhood. I hate that it is dying in some communities (instead going to malls, trunk or treat etc). I happily give candy to anyone who knocks on the door and I don’t care how old they are or if it’s “late”. It’s a fun time for everyone.
Anyone of any age can dress up and not have it be weird… but trick-'r-treating? Anything over 12 is just fucking weird to me. I’m instantly sus of any adult doing it (unless they have a kid with them).
When (not if — there’s a few every year) clearly adult women knock on the door asking for a treat, I tell them they have to turn a trick first. Gets rid of them pretty quickly.
If you are an adult, and clearly an adult, then it’s probably too old.
I’ll still give you candy if I answer the door, but that is probably where you might creep some people out, or they give creeper vibes and don’t trust answering the door.
That said, in my own experience, you are too old to trick or treat once you pass about 5’6" (~165 cm).
I remember finding out I was too old. After an event, some friends wanted to go trick or treating. I was in high school still, but just shy of 6 feet. Female friend the same age was just over 5’, and another female friend that was a few years older was about 4’9".
Anyways, they trick or treated fine, and I got stares, and clearly treated differently. Clearly trick or treating is not about age, but perceived age. (and effort. If you’re short and all covered up in your costume, no one will know or care… long as your voice isn’t boss baby)
I used to think there should be an age limit, I think i officially stopped trick or treating at like 13 or 14. I live Halloween though and always did so I dressed up and trotted around with my little siblings to help keep an eye and make sure they were safe and didn’t get too scared because we did have a few houses that often provided “tricks” with their treats.
Most of the adults tied to give me candy too even though I wasn’t carrying a bag, some flat out refused my attempt at just saying I was chaperoning and not trick or treating. Got told by a few that I dressed up and that’s the rules, I got candy without trying just because I wanted to have fun and spend time with my siblings.
I remember a few people giving my dad candy when he took me as a kid because he always dressed up with us. He even stayed back on the walk way as we walked up to the house and the old guy giving out candy yelled out “Hey Wolfman!” my dad looked up as he was dressed as a werewolf and got a reeses thrown to him with additional compliments on his costume.
All this to say is I don’t think I’d give any side eye to anyone coming to get some candy, sometimes adults need a little pick me up as well and it just used to be fun seeing all the different costumes and creative stuff people would come up with or randomly scaring a couple older kids just by opening the door with whatever creepy costume I had that year.
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