Halloween: No Kids Allowed

​It used to be that the only adults you saw in costume on Halloween were teachers and people working at child-friendly restaurants.

Somewhere along the way, though, adults took over the celebration. Now, it now seems likely that in a generation or two, children will simply look on in envy as their parents head off to costume parties, leaving the youngsters home, munching on organic, vegan-friendly protein bars.

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The celebration of Halloween has a long history, and predates the birth of Christ. But it’s only in the past 100 years that it’s really moved toward the form we recognize today. Indeed, in the 1920s and 1930s, it became a community-centered holiday with parades and parties for everyone in town to share. By the 1950s, trick-or-treating had returned and Halloween had, as History.com explains, “evolved into a holiday directed mainly at the young.”

Typically when children became teens, they were pretty much done with trick-or-treating and found other diversions on the night focused on candy and treats. That often included mild vandalism — like egg or toilet paper throwing — but the overall sense of the holiday was that parents indulged younger children on Halloween, from costumes to treats delivered with a bemused smile.

The teen rule still holds for trick-or-treating to some extent, but in the past decade or so, adult Halloween parties have become far more prevalent. Now, more money is spent on adult costumes than children’s costumes — $1.5 billion versus $1.2 billion, according to the National Retail Federation. Astonishingly, both of those figures are dwarfed by the staggering $2.3 billion spent on Halloween candy in 2014. On average, Americans spend $27 per person on candy, $31 on a costume, and $25 on Halloween decorations.

Indeed, almost 70 percent of Americans say they celebrate Halloween, with 44 percent wearing a costume of some sort. More interestingly, only 32 percent of parents say they’ll take their children trick-or-treating.

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One assumes that the rest of the children are either heading out with an unsupervised group or with someone else’s parent. But there are also some challenges that face modern trick-or-treaters that weren’t a concern 30 or 40 years ago, including the realization of how unhealthy candy really is and the rise of inappropriately sexualized children’s costumes.

Halloween spending has almost doubled in the past ten years!

It’s hard to miss adults in costumes on the 31st of October, though, and if you ask them, a considerable percentage will say they’re heading to a party that evening dressed as witches (the most popular adult costume), pirates, vampires, cats or vixens. Liquor store owners understand, and for weeks beforehand they market alcoholic beverages as being perfect for a Halloween party. Indeed, Halloween spending has almost doubled in the past 10 years.

Why? Perhaps it’s because the Gen Xers refused to grow up and held on to youthful interests far more than any previous generation in history. They just couldn’t let go of the fun and wish-fulfillment of Halloween, and now have forced it to be more focused on adult play and activities than the young children who were the original focus of the community-based event.

And in 20 more years? Millennials won’t feel it’s safe for their children to trick or treat, won’t want them to eat unhealthy candy and treats, and will reject popular costumes as being sexist, racist or lacking compassion and empathy. Their children will be safely tucked into bed with the babysitter on duty, and the parents will merrily sneak out to their booze-infused adults-only parties, dressed in slinky, suggestive and revealing costumes of their own.

Trick or treat indeed.