If ever there was a holiday that deserves to be commercialized, it's Halloween. We haven't taken it away from kids. We've just expanded it so that the kid in adults can enjoy it, too.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Holidays have been commercialized. It has become about material things. But the holidays are about sharing stories and being in each other's presence.
Halloween is an opportunity to be really creative.
The way we allow children to be advertised to is shocking. Eating is a learned behavior, and we've made these kids sitting ducks for all the bad messages about industrialized food. The fact that we allow that to go on is horrifying.
On Halloween, kids get to assume, for one night the outward forms of their innermost dread, and they're also allowed to take candy from strangers - the scariest thing of all.
That's why we're doing this, to defend our traditions a little. I don't have anything against it (Halloween), but it's not our tradition.
You have to remind kids to stay connected to the meaning of Christmas. Sometimes it takes a little bit of effort, but it's so worth it.
People value Halloween, like Valentine's Day, because they can tell themselves that it's not merely secularized but actually secular, which is to say, not Christian, Jewish, Hindu or Muslim.
It always depresses me when people moan about how commercial Christmas is. I love everything about it. The tradition of having this great big feast, slap bang in the middle of winter, is an essential thing to look forward to at the end of the year.
Having a birthday cake squashed into your face by young kids? Delicious. I always don a Santa suit at Christmas. Remaining childish is a tremendous state of innocence.
There is nothing funny about Halloween. This sarcastic festival reflects, rather, an infernal demand for revenge by children on the adult world.