Posted on 10/31/2005 10:00:24 AM PST by laney
In Europe, steady encroachment of a "bad American habit" breeds a holiday backlash.
VIENNA, Austria -- It's almost Halloween, and all those ghosts, goblins, tricks and treats are giving Hans Kohler the creeps.
So the mayor of Rankweil, a town near the Swiss border, has launched a one-man campaign disparaging Halloween as a "bad American habit" and urging families to skip it this year.
"It's an American custom that's got nothing to do with our culture," Kohler wrote in letters sent out to households. By midweek, the mayors of eight neighboring villages had thrown their support behind the boycott. So had local police, annoyed with the annual Oct. 31 uptick in vandalism and mischief.
Although Halloween has become increasingly popular across Europe -- complete with carved pumpkins, witches on broomsticks, makeshift houses of horror and costumed children rushing door-to-door for candy -- it has begun to breed a backlash.
Critics see it as the epitome of crass, U.S.-style commercialism. Clerics and conservatives contend it clashes with the spirit of traditional Nov. 1 All Saints' Day remembrances.
And it's got purists, struggling to retain a sense of uniqueness in Europe's ever-enlarging melting pot, grimacing like Jack o' Lanterns.
Halloween "undermines our cultural identity," complained the Rev. Giordano Frosini, a Roman Catholic theologian who serves as vicar-general in the Diocese of Pistoia near Florence, Italy.
Frosini denounced the holiday as a "manifestation of neo-paganism" and an expression of American cultural supremacy. "Pumpkins show their emptiness," he said.
To be sure, Halloween is big business in Europe.
Germans spend nearly $170 million, on Halloween costumes, sweets, decorations and parties.
The holiday has become increasingly popular in Romania, home to the Dracula myth, where nightclubs throw parties with bat and vampire themes.
In Britain, where Halloween celebrations rival those in the United States, it's the most lucrative day of the year for costume and party retailers.
"Without Halloween, I don't think we could exist, to be honest," said Pendra Maisuria, owner of Escapade, a London costume shop that rakes in 30 percent of its annual sales in the run-up to Oct. 31.
But not everyone takes such a carefree approach toward the surge in trick-or-treating -- "giving something sweet or getting something sour," as it's called in German.
In Austria, where many families get a government child allowance, "parents who abuse it to buy Halloween plunder for their kids should be forced to pay back the aid," grumbled Othmar Berbig, an Austrian who backs the small but strident Halloween boycott movement.
In Sweden, even as Halloween's popularity has increased, so have views of the holiday as an "unnecessary, bad American custom," said Bodil Nildin-Wall, an expert at the Language and Folklore Institute in Uppsala.
Italy's Papaboys, a group of pope devotees who include some of the young Catholics who cheer wildly at Vatican events, have urged Christians not to take part in what they consider "a party in honor of Satan and hell," and plan to stage prayer vigils nationwide on the night of Oct. 31.
Don't take it all so seriously, counters Gerald Faschingeder, who leads a Roman Catholic youth alliance in Austria. He sees nothing particularly evil about glow-in-the-dark skeletons, plastic fangs, fake blood, rubber tarantulas or latex scars.
"It's a chance for girls and boys to disguise themselves and have some fun away from loud and demanding adults," Faschingeder said. "For one evening, at least, kids can feel more powerful than grown-ups."
Looks like he chose "Trick"...
American tradition? Since when? Who invented it? Certainly not Americans.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1512688/posts?page=1
Hallowe'en has become very popular as a masquerade party in Paris, for adults mainly.
The people you see in costumes are all adults, although it is creeping down to the children.
And it is not "An American bad habit". The Austrian has this all wrong. It is an ancient Celtic holiday, when bowls of food and treats were left out, supposedly for the spirits of the dead (but really for the passersby). It did not completely lapse in all Celtic lands, was carried to America, where it re-emerged as a big fun holiday. So now it is being reimported back to Europe.
And what is wrong with this?
It is fun.
German politicians are always such sourpusses.
I always get a laugh when Europeans complain about our "crass" culture ... and then copy it.
Yeah or Halloween (All Hallows Eve) ... Europeans really need to study their own history a little closer.
Halloween culture can be traced back to the Druids, a Celtic culture in Ireland, Britain and Northern Europe. Roots lay in the feast of Samhain, which was annually on October 31st to honor the dead.
I'm guessing 'his honer' will get a meeting from the M&M Mafia, the Kraft Kartel and the Hershey Hezballah about disrespectin' the tradition
Actually it was better 100 years ago w/bonfires and all. Kids actually being treated like they might actually grow up and so on rather than being cloistered and (over-)protected by delusional paranoid parents, where you can't even eat half your candy cuz "it mite be poisoned or have a pin". If anything likely Americans in the last 50 years have dumbed it down to harmless masquerades.
Non, monsieur, the "Frogs" are not distressed about Hallowe'en.
It is an excuse for a party.
French never complain about an excuse for a party. And also, it was already a national holiday, so why not spice it with more fun? The public masquerade is reborn with the flowering of Hallowe'en.
The fellows complaining about Hallowe'en in this article are Austrian. As in German. As in not French.
- Ribbit.
"German politicians are always such sourpusses."
Well.....see post #4. Most Christmas things are German; they're nuts about Christmas.
Ever hear of Oktoberfest?
The Euro-Marxists just need to do a twist on Halloween--instead of having the little kids beg for candy, they could have the kids go around and hand out candy to the street bums.
You know, I just wish we would call off diplomatic relations with all these creeps.
At least his dad's family - D'Signy or so.
You're a traitor if you're no longer in the French border.
Which actually is why any Frenchman who moves here and changes citizenship is OK w/me. ;-)
Actually I won a Halloween Contest when I was like 4? walking around a Bonfire as a Beatnik! HAHA..
That use to be the funest day for Kids, you started getting dressed up about 3:00 in the afternoon and all the kids from the surrounding areas were all out with there pillowcases getting as much treats as possible..
Those were the days that are now long gone...:(
Halloween was my dad's birthday. When we were kids, we couldn't wait to finish his birthday dinner and cake and go out trick-or-treating. I'm sure that's the best present we could have given him all those years, he and mom having the chance to be alone in the house without the five of us rowdy kids!
Europeans can be so incredibly dumb, can't they?
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