Halloween is fun, but I hate trick or treat

I have admitted before that I am a Halloween Scrooge when it comes to trick-or-treating. Not many people stop to actually think what they are encouraging their kids to say. "Trick or Treat" is an ultimatum, a threat. It means, "if you don't give us candy, we are going to do some kind of trick to you" and some kids actually follow through with the trick (eggs smashed on your house or cars, toilet paper in your bushes, soap on your windows...or worse sometimes) if you don't hand over the goods (or if your candy isn't to their liking).

Don't get me wrong, I am not against Halloween, itself. I think dressing up to be someone or something else is fun. It's FUN to pretend, and to play out a fun fantasy, and enjoy choosing and wearing a costume, scarying each other in harmless fun, eating taffy apples and drinking cider, parties, scary movies, and all that. It's just the door-to-door crap and running around in the streets that I am against. It's not even safe with all the perverts and creeps in the world, many of them who look like an average law-abiding citizen.

Anyway, that's my rant about trick or treating.

Have a Happy Halloween!