Poor Halloween!

[zoogs]

"We are victims," wail parents whose kids will have plenty of Halloween celebrating anyway.

[teachercd]

4 hours ago, The Dude said:

I'm going as Murtaugh from Lethal Weapon 5 for Halloween. 

 

Go suck an egg.

I am getting to old for this s#!t!

[Pedro Guerrero]

7 hours ago, zoogs said:

"We are victims," wail parents whose kids will have plenty of Halloween celebrating anyway.

 

“Get over it”, wail people that don’t have kids to parents who think Halloween parties are harmless fun and think the reasons their kids School don’t do them are silly.

[zoogs]

I’m not wailing. 

[B.B. Hemingway]

7 hours ago, zoogs said:

"We are victims," wail parents whose kids will have plenty of Halloween celebrating anyway.

 

1) The idea that you're being critical of somebody playing "victim" is hilarious.

 

2) Did any of the parents say that in the article? Not that I read.

 

I mean, I guess it's nice to see the school offer a Halloween party after school hours, even as unnecessarily inconvenient as it seems. I would have to have it explained to me how having a day of candy/fun for the kids is disrespecting any individual's differences.

 

I don't know how you can read that article and have any other reaction than:

 

 

 

 

We are sooooo worried about hurting someone's feelings in this country. It's almost comical at this point.

Edited October 23, 2017 by B.B. Hemingway

[zoogs]

From the response to this action by the school, we are clearly not worried enough.

[B.B. Hemingway]

2 minutes ago, zoogs said:

From the response to this action by the school, we are clearly not worried enough.

 

Why were they offended by the Halloween party? The posted article is the only thing I've seen on it. Was it specified anywhere else?

 

If it was a situation where some families couldn't afford costumes, I would certainly understand that. However, in lieu of cancelling the party I would have liked to seen the school's tax dollars at work and purchase costumes for those children (similar to what they do for under-privileged kids and school supplies).

[Landlord]

If you fall on the side of, "It's stupid that they're doing that, it's just harmless fun" instead of on the side of, "I guess for the kids who it's not inclusive of, it's nice not to have to deal with, and for the rest of the kids, they probably still have plenty of trick or treating and costume wearing and halloween fun regardless, so, no big deal", that's kind of weird to me.

 

For the record, I'm pretty unconcerned with the entire thing in general, and don't really care. But reality is that nobody is being oppressed through this decision, and some little kids are probably relieved, while the rest have plenty of alternative means of celebrating and having fun on a meaningless holiday if they want to. 

 

If you like Halloween and you grow up with a certain sort of tradition, I get how people getting rid of it can seem like an overreaction or unnecessary or whatever. But that's because you're starting from your pre-conception. The real question is why does a school need a Halloween parade in the first place? If there's no less or no more need to celebrate the holiday than there is to refrain from it, then just refrain from it in state/federal spaces.

 

Isn't it interesting that the political party who favors less government interference and control also seems to get a bit bent out of shape when the government stops endorsing their specific holidays? 

[B.B. Hemingway]

12 minutes ago, Landlord said:

If you fall on the side of, "It's stupid that they're doing that, it's just harmless fun" instead of on the side of, "I guess for the kids who it's not inclusive of, it's nice not to have to deal with, and for the rest of the kids, they probably still have plenty of trick or treating and costume wearing and halloween fun regardless, so, no big deal", that's kind of weird to me.

 

For the record, I'm pretty unconcerned with the entire thing in general, and don't really care. But reality is that nobody is being oppressed through this decision, and some little kids are probably relieved, while the rest have plenty of alternative means of celebrating and having fun on a meaningless holiday if they want to. 

 

If you like Halloween and you grow up with a certain sort of tradition, I get how people getting rid of it can seem like an overreaction or unnecessary or whatever. But that's because you're starting from your pre-conception. The real question is why does a school need a Halloween parade in the first place? If there's no less or no more need to celebrate the holiday than there is to refrain from it, then just refrain from it in state/federal spaces.

 

Isn't it interesting that the political party who favors less government interference and control also seems to get a bit bent out of shape when the government stops endorsing their specific holidays? 

 

How do you know that the school hosted Halloween celebration isn't the only opportunity some poor kids will have to celebrate. Maybe it's something the local underprivileged kids look forward to all year..... I imagine there's a lot more disappointment then relief in the student body. If there are kids who don't want to participate they can just sit it out. You could argue they'd catch hell from other students if they found out that he/she was the kid responsible for not having a party.

 

What would be the issue with the party in the first place? What would the reasoning be behind it?

 

Like you, I don't really have much concern either way.

Edited October 23, 2017 by B.B. Hemingway

[Landlord]

26 minutes ago, B.B. Hemingway said:

 

 If there are kids who don't want to participate they can just sit it out. 

 

What would be the issue with the party in the first place? What would the reasoning be behind it?

 

 

Like I said, all of these questions seem to only come from the place of, "this is what we've done in the past so why stop doing it?" If schools celebrating Halloween had never been something that was normal in our culture, nobody would be asking these questions. So, equally as valid of questions are what the point of having Halloween in schools is supposed to be in the first place.

 

"If there are kids who want to participate in halloween, they can just do it in their neighborhoods/at their churches/with their friend groups" is the same rationale as what you said, just from the other side of the equation. I always tend to lean towards the side that doesn't promote or celebrate specific holidays in public, government funded places. Just doesn't seem to be any need for it imo.

 

(Also I don't really know any details of this school and their specific context, I'm mostly speaking about the whole thing hypothetically"

[B.B. Hemingway]

If there was intimations of religion involved I'd agree with you. But there's not, and by most (if not all accounts) it's pretty harmless. So, we'll just disagree on this one . I'm going to bed!

[zoogs]

Quote

For the record, I'm pretty unconcerned with the entire thing in general, and don't really care.

 

Right. This isn't something that begs much of a response at all, much less the outrage sought from certain corners. That's not every parent who disagrees with the decision, to be clear. Though there's probably something to be said for not making a big deal out of an event where some kids will have the latest and greatest costumes and other families will struggle to afford to get their kids the same. Maybe that's all they're going for?

 

Quote

Why were they offended by the Halloween party?

 

It's not clear that anyone was offended by the Halloween party. It's the other party -- the ones with clearly aired grievances -- whose sensibilities I was speaking to.

Edited October 23, 2017 by zoogs

[Landlord]

3 hours ago, B.B. Hemingway said:

If there was intimations of religion involved I'd agree with you. But there's not, and by most (if not all accounts) it's pretty harmless. So, we'll just disagree on this one . I'm going to bed!

 

 

I mean, I'm good friends with some people who don't support or celebrate or endorse Halloween in any way because of their religious convictions. Those sorts of people do certainly exist around the country, if in small numbers. 

[The Dude]

Everyone celebrates Halloween. 

[JJ Husker]

I don't see anybody wailing or claiming victimhood so please dispense with that nonsense.  There's a few, myself included, that just happen to think it's harmless fun and that it's a bit ridiculous to do away with school parties to appease a vocal extreme minority.

 

FWIW, the very few I've known who opposed these parties tended towards the extreme Christian types who were concerned about the devil/satanic side of Halloween. IMO, it probably wasn't good enough to just opt their kid out, they probably wanted to help "save" everyone else too.  Our grade school always did have a policy against bloody gory type costumes.