The development of the Halloween Sadist has grown largely over the past few years as people’s fears about Halloween continue to grow. As stated by Horiuchi and Best, “Halloween sadism is thought to involve random, vicious, unprovoked attacks against small children” (488). I knew the prevalence of the fear of the Halloween Sadist was growing; however, I didn’t witness its true effect until this Halloween. A friend of mine works at a daycare and was shocked when she discovered the plans of many of the children at the daycare center. Instead of trick-or-treating, as most kids did when I was a child, many of the children were having small Halloween parties at their house because their parents didn’t want them out at night. The causes and effects of this fear can be attributed to societal changes as well as the influence of the media.
The past years have brought about stories of children finding razor blades in their apples or poison in their candy on Halloween night. These stories have inflicted fear in many parents around the world, largely due to the media’s portrayal of these stories. Although the few incidents that have occurred were done by family members of these children, the media portrays these stories as strangers attacking young children for no apparent reason. Due to the media’s portrayal of this, societal views have greatly changed. People are now becoming more paranoid of others around them and feel as though they can no longer trust their neighbors; this has resulted in a decrease of community feeling amongst neighbors. Due to the fact that “holiday celebrations reflect the larger culture,” Halloween traditions have been negatively affected by this growing societal paranoia (Best & Horiuchi). Parents now fear to allow their children to trick-or-treat, times for trick-or-treating have continued to be moved back so that children will only be out in the daylight, and, in the case of the children at the daycare, some parents are keeping their children inside at all times on Halloween. This paranoia not only negatively affects children’s Halloween traditions, but it can lead to larger social consequences.
If members of this society continue to fear those around them, communities in general will become obsolete. The trend to become “neighborly” with those around us has already began to decrease; if this continues, people will fail to know those around them, thus resulting in an even greater paranoia. This cyclical pattern of avoidance and the resulting paranoia will only bring members of today’s society further apart. In order to avoid this, members of a community must not solely depend on the media’s portrayal of occurrences in today’s world, but rather depend on each other and rebuild this lost sense of community.
