Aldrin: Today's Halloween is what I prefer to call Hallmark Halloween.

Since it's a Saturday and also Halloween, this week's Share-a-Quote is about this highly commercialised holiday. The quote, however, is a long one and something I wrote 2 years ago (shameless re-post, I know).

"I love Halloween. Fires, dancing, soul-singing, tricks, treats, apple pie. Unfortunately, the Halloween I love depreciated over the years thank you very much American-spawned commercialism. Today's Halloween is what I prefer to call Hallmark Halloween, along with Hallmark Easter and Hallmark Christmas. Today's Hallmark and Hershey's holiday is about spooks (and marketing money out of it). Scaring people with images of gore, darkness, and death. Fearing otherworldy beings and mocking their existence (or non-existence). No, All Hallows is not about fear and scare. While fear is natural, it is not for this day. The whole point of this yearly feast is to grow appreciation and respect for that necessary fact of darkness. It's about death, our mortality, the fragility of life, and the inevitable end. This day marks remembrance. Of old things and of dead things; of roots, ancestors, the hidden and lost, the inevitable coming of winter (with our without snow, it's still winter), silence, darkness, last harvests, shadows, mysteries, and so on.

That is the All Hallows I know. Much like the Irish Samhain and Korean Chusok. Much like the local Undras. (Yeah, before it got bastardised, and yes with an R.)"


Originally posted here (and here).