So even b3ta is doing Halloween now?
The Merkinization of the world marches on & on & on &on & on... etc.

Any of you guys turn up on my doorstep on Wed. looking for lollies (candy, sweets whatever) - be sure for a big surprise (and it'll not be a treat).

Am looking forward to all the slutty pics tho.

*If I can find them I'll post pics of me in a skirt*
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 8:54, 48 replies)

yeah hallowe'en's definitely just an american thing
it definitely doesn't predate the entire american civilisation by centuries.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween

you sleazy fuckwit.
(quintsy, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 9:35, closed)

So on All Hallows Eve
Pommie parents long ago sent their children out to collect yummy rewards from the neighbours?

Because dressing up like a slutty super-heroine has everything to do Samhain rite?

Fucking n00b!
Feel free to come back when you have a little more research than wiki you 1st uni student.
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 10:08, closed)

i wish you were trolling
you seem to be incredibly stupid.
(quintsy, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 10:47, closed)

Wow - a little OTT I can't help feeling
And yes, the basic trick-or-treat principle has been around for a long time, in various forms (night of misrule etc). And the Jack-o-lantern predates the carved pumpkin too. So it's a very old and perfectly respectable tradition.

If there's anything I do dislike about the modern version it's just that the basic dress-up-as-something-scary concept seems to be turning into a dress-up-as-whatever-you-like, which seems a shame - we have the rest of the year for that, surely.
( flatfrog Staring vacantly into space, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 11:00, closed)

thanks flatfrog, i couldn't be bothered to argue the toss with him
i suspect the dressing up as anything thing comes from needing an excuse to, fancy dress parties are pretty gay, but most people like having the excuse once a year
(quintsy, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 11:05, closed)

I looked into this recently...
...The dressing up element comes from guising which was a Scottish tradition of going round the local houses dressed up and being rewarded (or bribed to go away) with money and treats. The tricking element comes from another old tradition of mischief/misrule night. Both of these were exported to America with immigrant families and distilled into one "trick or treat" night that got affixed to halloween, the day before All Saints Day.

The Good Ole US of A might have exported "trick or treating" and pumpkins (instead of turnips which are a nightmare to carve!) back over the ocean, but the notion of halloween predates their country by several centuries (according to the OED at least!).
( e.m.m.y. foxtrot uniform charlie kilo india tango, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 14:07, closed)

I was going to say this
I am sure there are b3tans older than me here but we used to go guising back in the early 70's in Aberdeen. We'd dress up, ask "penny for the guy" (but never had 'a Guy' with us, infact I didn't know who Guy was) We'de be very dissapointed if we were given sweets instead of money and throw wet toilet paper at the windows of people who didn't answer their doors - we were proto-trick or treaters. Prometh-i-treaters as it were.
( spitsticker is not working on, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 21:49, closed)

I agree with you about the commercialisation of Halloween.
Trick or treat? The parents are tricked into spending fortunes on costumes, the kids are tricked into going out on a cold night in inadequate clothing and shivering while their neighbours are tricked into buying tons of sweets to placate the kids by rotting their chattering teeth. It's hard to see how anyone can profit from all of this. Oh wait. And that's why the modern version was exported from America.
Until recently Halloween was not celebrated in the UK except for a very small minority of people who claimed to belong to an ancient religion. Halloween was simply "noted" by its date on the calender but to the vast majority of citizens nothing else happened. There is no connection between the modern "celebration" and the ancient tradition, any more than there is a real connection between the attempted destruction of the Houses of Parliament and "Penny for the Guy."
There is a far stronger connection between modern halloween and an old proverb; A fool and his money are soon parted.
( edjogs Collared doves are shit., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 11:45, closed)

On the plus side,
something like Trick Or Treat could do wonders for community cohesion, provided it's carried out in a spirit of fun, rather than genuine malevolence.
( monster munch person, man, woman... camera... TV?, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 12:37, closed)

I read this as "I don't like fun and I look down on those who do"

( CQ Knows the truth, all of it., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 15:20, closed)

And I read that as,
"I know nothing about you but I consider myself superior enough to impose my infallible judgement on you based on a couple of sentences that you wrote."
On Halloween my children and grand children will all be coming to my house on their rounds and we'll all have fun with costumes and tricks and treats. That doesn't stop it from being commercial exploitation.
( edjogs Collared doves are shit., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 16:56, closed)

I used to go trick or treating
30 something years ago, in the wooly wilds of Kent.

It's not an American thing, or recent.

The difference between us and the spetics is that they seem to do general fancy dress, whereas us snaggletoofs stick to ghosts, goblins, and bloody corpse costumes.

Having said that, Haloween in the UK seems to have become much more significant in the last few years. I don't think that's anything to do with the yanks though.
(username failed moderation, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 11:54, closed)

Depends what you mean by recent.
I am less recent than you are and when I was a sprog it just did not happen.
( edjogs Collared doves are shit., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 13:23, closed)

I can still remember doing Guy Fawkes
with a huge fucking bonfire and stuffed mannequin thingy.

Never any "Trick or Treating" on Halloween.
That was in Zambia, Africa in the 70's.
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 13:31, closed)

i grew up in 3 different european countries
all had their own hallowe'en customs, this was mid 80s-90s
(quintsy, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 14:03, closed)

You did Guy Fawkes?
No wonder they burnt him afterwards.
( Draconacticus Reject shampoo. Demand real poo!, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 14:32, closed)

I went up the
"other secret tunnel to parliament."
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 23:30, closed)

Well, when I said thirty something years ago
that's what I meant by not recent.

I suppose it's obvious, but: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trick-or-treating

Several hundred years old, at least.
(username failed moderation, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 13:43, closed)

That wiki article is very vague, and largely irrelevant - 'souling' seems to be tangentially related, at best, and 'guising' - a bit closer, but not something I've ever heard of, possibly because it would seem to be almost exclusively Scottish. I'm probably not alone in my ignorance, as Wikipedia hasn't deemed it important enough for its own article. Any reference to older roots for the practice are thick with weasel-words such as "may" and "could".

'Trick or Treat' is recent, and imported from the USA. You can check this fairly easily by trying to find an old-timer who used to go Trick or Treating. I'll bet a pound to a penny that you won't find one.
( Happy Phantom has been to Hastings, Brighton, and Eastbourne too, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 14:14, closed)

I am one of those old timers and can vouch
for the veracity of your statement from first hand experience. The first experience I have of trick or treating was when my kids wanted to do it, early 1970s.
( edjogs Collared doves are shit., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 14:29, closed)

Going back to the original post,
we're discussing the 'Americanisation' of B3ta.

The suggestion is that the UK has somehow picked up the idea of trick or treating from the US.

Or at least that's what I thought we were discussing.

Just pointing out, while maybe it's not clear who started it, certainly there has been some tradition of doing it for at least 30 years in both countries.

And forms of it - people roaming around at Haloween in some kind of dress, and possibly collecting things, for centuries.
(username failed moderation, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 15:07, closed)

I came to Oz in the early 80's
Now I will admit that when we came here we were living out in the middle of fucking nowhere but, it really only has become a regular occurrence in the last decade or so that groups of kiddies have started roaming the streets at the end of Oct. Prior to that you may have gone to a dress up party but that was about it.

Any other antipodeans have similar/different experiences?
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 21:28, closed)

You could ask my bro'
He went to Perth in '69
( edjogs Collared doves are shit., Sat 27 Oct 2012, 21:50, closed)

Go on then.
I reckon the first time the missus and I got sprogs at the door was either 1999 or 2000 (from hazy memory).
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Sun 28 Oct 2012, 23:09, closed)

Oh, good grief.
The aren't sufficient facepalms on the internet for this.
( monster munch person, man, woman... camera... TV?, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 12:07, closed)

Halloween
was originally a pagan festival that had a resurgence after the fall of Rome.

Originally children collected vegtables and whatnot as gifts for spirits and such shite.

Now America treats it as a mini christmas for the kids and stuff.

Not an American idea at all.
( Razor What the fuck - a sig?, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 12:48, closed)

So you're saying that the modern American practise
of allowing your children to run rampant thru the local 'burbs to collect sweeties from you or egg your house is carried thru from Roman times?

In every "Anglicised" country I've lived in during my yoof (& later) - the American idea if Halloween has only really become prevalent since the late 90'sand early Noughties.
Prior to that I never used to get sprogs banging on my door on All Hallows Eve.
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 13:25, closed)

You never saw ET?
They went out trick or treating, and that was in the 70's.
(username failed moderation, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 13:44, closed)

That was in America though. The suggestion was that trick or treating has only been taken up widely in other countries thanks to the pervasive nature of American media.

However it's not true to say that because kids hadn't been knocking on your door before the 90s that halloween wasn't an event before then. All that tells you is that trick or treating wasn't the way it was celebrated.
( e.m.m.y. foxtrot uniform charlie kilo india tango, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 14:47, closed)

It was though.
I was trick or treating in the UK in the 70's and 80's.

I've lot the plot here.
(username failed moderation, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 15:03, closed)

E.T. was early 80's
But as explained way above it's not a new thing... As with all American "traditions" they stem from older traditions. Bleating about Holloween as a whole rather than it's commercialisation is dumb... I wonder if ROF refuses to have a Christmas tree?
( @><|= w0nu!) or cunt to my friends, Sun 28 Oct 2012, 10:06, closed)

'Trick or Treat' is as closely related to Pagan festivals as a magic present-giving fat man in a flying sleigh is to the birth of Jesus. It's also worth noting that we actually know the best part of nothing about Pagan festivals, and what little we think we do know is often no earlier than Victorian in origin. the Celts weren't big on writing down the 'how to' for their shindigs - most references are Roman, and not very reliable.
( Happy Phantom has been to Hastings, Brighton, and Eastbourne too, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 14:22, closed)

b3ta doing halloween, from behind
and no mess after all these years.
( Steerable_forehead Our Lady of Blessed Acceleration,don't fail me now, Fri 26 Oct 2012, 15:05, closed)

This wins the thread.

(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Fri 26 Oct 2012, 21:21, closed)

you really should change your name to boringofyre

(quintsy, Sun 28 Oct 2012, 15:56, closed)

Hey, that was really













































































































































































































































shit.
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Sun 28 Oct 2012, 23:07, closed)

Even David Thorne doesn't think Haloween is celebrated in Australia...
27bslash6.com/arguments.html

'Pumpkins'

(although I can't say I'd believe anything he says)
(Kliper Filllets Getting noticed by twats on the internet since, Sat 27 Oct 2012, 14:23, closed)

I like boobs
(magic the cat will someone please think of the kittens, Mon 29 Oct 2012, 14:05, closed)

Finally
Someone speaking some sense!
(Discocat is bringing sexy back, Mon 29 Oct 2012, 17:15, closed)