Eyesore | October 2026 <i>(Halloween Commentary)</i><

Every year the displays get more extravagant, as if they are tracking the national zeitgeist exactly, fright upon fright. You also have to wonder how much cash money is going into these displays of morbid anxiety, in many cases a hefty percentage of the annual household income plus who-knows how many hours of labor. . . to put out the message “Be scared, be very scared.”

Halloween traditionally brings a dissolution of the boundary between the real world and whatever you suppose lies beyond it: the abode of dead souls, restless spirits, sinister ancestors, demons, circles of hell, eternal damnation, Netflix. Is it strangely and ironically possible that daily life has become so comfortable that some cultural mechanism is required to prompt an artificial reminder that hazard, horror, and death even still exist in this world? Well, maybe that’s a stretch, with mass murders here, there, and everywhere week after week. And so many still struggle to put baloney sandwiches on the table and pay the light bill, they must live in a nonstop cortisol fog. The headshrinkers might have a clue.

One thing for sure: the average American neighborhood is hideous enough without all the life-size inflatable mummies, blood-beasts, werewolves, wookies, witches, rotted corpses, dancing skeletons, botched science projects, and severed heads cluttering up the dooryards. Imagine everyone putting that money and energy into cleaning up the property, pressure-washing the layers of auto-emissions out of the soffits, truing-up the saggy porches, painting the front door. Then, maybe get yourself a pumpkin, carve a smile on it and pop a candle inside so the kids will understand the message, “Candy here!”

Or maybe the whole population has decided subconsciously that the country is going to hell and if we take enough drugs, the journey there will, at least, be amusing.

For you connoisseurs: Halloween on John Street, by JHK, oil on canvas. 24 x 24. $1500

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This fairly recent trend of decorating for Halloween, with some starting in mid-September, seems too much. But it shouldn't be surprising, I suppose. Halloween for me in the early '60's was 1 night of T&T with no yard decorations. That was left for the elementary school Halloween party which the parents did a magnificent job of planning. American culture has really been declining. Used to be the fall (harvest) fairs were widespread and heavily attended. But the agricultural side of the fair, its original point of being, seems to be diminishing as the nation becomes more suburbanized. And with the fragmentation of American church denominations and decline in weekly Sunday attendance, it seems folks' attention is easily diverted to Halloween celebrations of a more macabre nature. Afterall our national holiday of Thanksgiving started as a form of harvest festival. I suppose the hard-core Christmas decorators do it up for 6 weeks from Advent (early DEC) through Epiphany (12 days after Christmas).

Thanks for posting. Kunstler makes very good points. When I was a kid, halloween meant dressing up as a pirate, dutch girl, or other simple costumes, and collecting some candy from neighbors.

The kind of horror shows he describes are revolting.

Halloween was originally All Hallow’s Eve, let me do a quick search:

All Hallows’ Eve is the evening before All Saints’ Day (November 1), serving as the vigil and spiritual preparation for the Christian feast honoring all saints. The term derives from the Old English word hālig (meaning holy or sanctified) and even (meaning eve or evening), literally translating to “Saints’ Eve” or “Holy Even.”

Historically, this night marked the beginning of Allhallowtide, a period dedicated to remembering the dead, including saints, martyrs, and the faithful departed. Traditionally, it was observed with prayer, fasting, and church services to prepare for the solemnity of All Saints’ Day, rather than the secular celebrations associated with modern Halloween.

In the early 90s, our kids were painting Halloween scenes on windows on businesses in town. We bought a bale of hay, a cauldron with dry ice for smoke, made some fun homemade scarecrows with old clothes from Goodwill and pumpkin heads, carved pumpkins, hung some fake “cobwebs” and spiders with pipe cleaner legs. Good times.

Now people don’t to that anymore and just buy trite garbage from Wally World. None of it is scary and it all looks trashy.

"I see plastic things! They speak to me. They want to do things for them."

Yes, Recycle your used plastic!

Its the day before All saints and Reformation day. You used to grow your halloween decoration and make your own costume. Now its become a captive holiday of the toy industry and aspiring satanists. I really hate those oversized skeletons! What is the point!

There is a coven of witch dolls in black up the street that are positioned as dancing around a sprinkler head! (And a political sign for a Local Democrat candidate!)

I’ve always been kind of a Halloween Scrooge. Yeah, I did the trick or treat thing as a kid, when we could get into town. Solely because: Candy! Which was not something a kid got often.

When I see those houses with the dozens of macabre decorations, not the kind of innocent cute or seasonal things, I just assume the residents are just not right.

YMMV.

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