For years now, I’ve been watching most of the trick-or-treaters go to the house on one side of me, take one look at my house and walk right past it, and then go to the house on the other side.
I had no clue why. Maybe they were scared of my house or thought I’d give cheap candy (my house is a bit of a fixer-upper)? I completed my “curb appeal” projects; didn’t help.
Maybe they thought nobody was home? I not only have the porch light on, but also have the living room TV on, clearly visible through the (open!) front window, and it makes no difference.
Maybe they think I’m not participating (despite the clear signal of the porch light and jack-o’-lantern)? I put up a bunch of Halloween decorations this year, and it still didn’t help!
Well, I finally found out the reason, after hearing one kid scouting ahead yelling to tell his friends to skip my house: “there’s no bowl on the porch!”
…You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.
Yep, unlike my neighbors, who had apparently just left unattended bowls of candy on their porches, I was actually sitting there inside the house, with the bowl of candy, waiting for kids to knock or ring the doorbell before I opened the door and handed it out. You know, like how trick-or-treating is supposed to work.
This is ridiculous. Kids these days are skipping viable houses with candy because they can’t be bothered to actually knock on the damn door and say “trick or treat” to the person who answers? Residents are expected to be too lazy to answer the door, and just put out the candy without even receiving the traditional threat first? With no actual interaction with the neighbors for the kids to show off their costumes, what’s even the point‽
I finally stuck a sign on the door saying “yes, you have to knock or ring for candy!” and that helped, but even then, some kids are still skipping my house because they apparently can’t be bothered to read the sign.
Its probably a covid relic or something. Kids knock on my house when I’m not even there cause I have my own kids (and yes, I leave a bowl outside and they still knock)
That seems plausible, except that I’ve been living here since long before COVID and have been suffering a lack of trick-or-treaters the entire time.
Actually, that reminds me of another failed hypothesis: when I first moved in, the neighborhood was just starting to gentrify and was still a little rough, so at first I figured the lack of trick-or-treaters was due to the lack of families with children in the neighborhood in general. Plenty of 'em now, though.
There is never and has never been a legitimate reason for anyone to use the phrase “kids these days”.
Maybe take your irony detector to the repair shop, I think it may be faulty
Kids these days are getting shot in schools.
I took my kids last night and every house had people sitting on the porch with a bowl. None of the houses they knocked on opened the door. There were hundreds of kids around us and I didn’t hear anyone say trick or treat.
Ours were both types, but people in lawn chairs with a bowl got more attention for sure
I had a similar situation, and even if I left out a bowl on the porch, the kids would look but keep walking. Finally figured out that some neighbors had shared a link to my Megan’s Law profile on Nextdoor.
what ours changed to is we’d sit on the porch. we live in a nice warm climate so it doesn’t make much difference if we sit in or outside, but the older kids know if your porch light is on, you can knock. If it’s off, go away.
Maybe meet them half way and sit on the porch and hand out candy? I used to go to my parent’s house to help them hand out candy and I noticed it took a bit of effort for the smaller kids climb the stairs. There’s no railing and knowing how dangerously slick their steps got if they were damp, i started sitting at the bottom to hand out candy.
It seems trick or treating isn’t as popular with the kids as it used to be. Ironically, it seems more popular than ever with adults. Some houses I’ve seen look like they must rent a storage unit to keep all the decorations they put up. We used to fill a set of dad’s old clothes with leaves, splap a plastic punkin on top for a head and call it a day
The last time I left a bowl on my porch, literally the first group that came took all the candy and threw the bowl into my lawn. It disincentivized from doing so again.
I did this and they stole the bowl too.
Same, bowl was stolen :( at least they didn’t take the table it was on
I took my kids trick or treating tonight and, in the neighborhood we go to, everyone who is handing out candy sits on their porch or driveway and it’s like a big block party. Nobody goes up to the houses with nobody outside because it’s assumed they aren’t participating. Being in rural texas, I probably wouldn’t let my kids knock on those doors, only if that’s what was the norm for the neighborhood. People be crazy out here.
That’s sad. We only leave the bowl out during the time we are out trick or treating ourselves. All trick or treating is under fire, it seems. Have you heard of trunk-or-treat? Gah. And even people who live in safe areas will like their kids into a car and go drive to some affluent neighborhood where the decorations are fancier and full size bars are being given out. I greatly value the experience of knocking on my neighbors’ doors and it’s sad to see people discount this community building experience.
And even people who live in safe areas will like their kids into a car and go drive
Yeah, I’m annoyed about that sort of thing, too – albeit more about the car-brained laziness of parents idling a car from house to house instead of parking and walking with their kids, rather than the class issues – but that’s a different rant.
I greatly value the experience of knocking on my neighbors’ doors and it’s sad to see people discount this community building experience.
Thanks, you said what I was thinking but struggling to express.
I think maybe I’ll bring it up with my community association, to see if next year we can’t make some sort of organized effort to encourage door-answering (and communicate that renewed expectation to trick-or-treaters).
parents idling a car from house to house instead of parking and walking with their kids
And they drive like lunatics as well. Lots of them drive at high speeds in the night with kids running around and in a vehicle with poor visibility and don’t yield to pedestrians. I saw this one car last night weave through some pedestrians crossing the street. Like c’mon… this isn’t North Korea. Let them cross the street
My workplace (which isn’t a preschool, but has preschoolers) floated the idea of doing a “trunk or treat.” But my manager nixed it with the explanation that it was “cringey.”
I don’t agree with her on much, but I agree with her on that. Instead we decorated the doors in the center and had the kids practice trick-or-treating the proper way.
That’s a cool solution! I guess if trunk or treat is the only event a place can do it’s better than nothing but I’m glad to hear you got creative about supporting the old ways :)
That’s just how economy works. Anyway I always hated to interact with strangers and still do.
No candy for you!
I think you’re looking at it wrong. It’s likely not that kids are too lazy to knock but that your neighbors are too lazy to answer the door. The kids see everyone on the street leaving bowls out and assume that if someone on the street doesn’t have a bowl, then they’re not doing Halloween like everyone else is.
That’s not it at all. Literally, my children told me, “I don’t want to go up, I just want to go to the houses with bowls”. But it’s not a lazy thing, it’s a social anxiety thing. We don’t chat with strangers, we don’t make small talk with people we don’t know, we don’t ask people things we can find out without asking people things. We’re socially awkward parents and we have socially awkward children.
Millennials, the ones who would much rather text than call on the phone their dearest friends and closest relatives, are 35-40 years old. They’re the ones with halloweening children and those kids are just ask averse to face to face interactions with neighborhood residents as we are.
When I was a kid in the early-mid 2000s, knocking on the door was always a daunting prospect - people sitting out on their porch or steps were much more approachable, and much more the norm.
I sit on the porch with the bowl, it’s nice to see them walking around. It’s easier for both parties, and I can dress up too.
I think it’s because fewer houses are doing it, mostly. But I don’t understand skipping very decorated houses, and honestly wouldn’t leave out a bowl of candy here.
The sitting on the porch thing is traditional here now (my mom sat inside but I’m over 50 now and since being old enough to be on the treating side have always sat out with the candy and that’s more usual as far as I can tell) Though my kids always did go up and try if a light was on outside.
Maybe they are also a little more sensible too, lol - a princess last night looked in the bowl and said, nah there’s nothing I like, happy Halloween. My kids would have taken some anyway and traded it around, but it is always too much by the time they are done.
Overall I agree, they should yell TRICK OR TREAT but am glad nobody is, like egging your house if you don’t have a treat for them.
There’s a lady in my neighborhood who gives out juice boxes instead of candy. She’s become famous for it. In warmer years, trick or treating is thirsty work! I’ve heard that the parents sometimes ask for one.
I took my kids out, one is almost 3 and the other is just over a year. So few houses in our neighborhood had ANY appearance of anyone home, let alone participating that it took nearly two hours to get about 15 houses. In a pretty standard suburb. At least two houses that were heavily decorated had nobody home and no bowl out. Two also had colorful lights but when we knocks on the door they looked confused when there were two toddlers yelling at them. One just shut the door in our face and the other sort of stood there for a minute with his mouth agape and finally said “I don’t have anything”. I mentioned to that guy that he MIGHT want to turn his lights off or there would be kids all night, but walking past at the end of our evening, all his lights were on still.
I left a bowl on my porch and had two small groups of respectful kids each take a couple pieces each (video doorbells have changed the game a little).
Reading the responses in this thread, I’m kinda starting to think we need to bring the “trick” half of the tradition back so some of these neighbors get a clue.
I mentioned to that guy that he MIGHT want to turn his lights off or there would be kids all night, but walking past at the end of our evening, all his lights were on still.
I think this is definitely part of it. When I was a kid, lights == giving out candy. Now, tonight, I had multiple trick-or-treaters almost go by my house before they noticed I was sitting outside with a bowl, despite the lights and decorations.
