Difference between revisions of "Halloween Trick or Treating"

Revision as of 07:35, 25 October 2020

Trick or Treating during Halloween season is one of the most practiced traditions, and can be a lot of fun.

In this day and age there are quite a lot of options for vegan candies to choose from.
For vegan candies, check the vegan candies page.

That said, while it would be preferable to buy fully vegan candies, trace animal products in candies do not make much of a difference, and cause almost no harm--especially when it comes to stuff like a little beeswax or honey.

Trick-or-treating for vegan kids

Forbidding to go trick-or-treating to your vegan kids to not have them eat non-vegan candy may cause more harm than good.

First of all, the health difference between vegan and non-vegan candies is pretty much null--both of them are really bad, and especially in terms of caries they should be avoided.
However, it'll probably be fine to go all out eating sweets a few days a year, especially during such a wide-spread tradition like Halloween, where a child would probably be very unhappy to not be able to participate with friends and/or community to go trick-or-treating, when simply making sure for them to brush their teeth after eating the candies would wipe away the concerns.

Secondly, some vegan parents may prevent their kids to go trick-or-treating for ethical reasons, trying to prevent the consumption of animal products.
Non-vegan candies that are already bought and set aside for Halloween are unlikely to prompt more buying by taking a part of them, as the leftovers remaining after trick-or-treating season would be given away, thrown away, or be eaten occasionally for the purpose of not wasting them, regardless.

Thirdly, it might give a bad impression to people that know your family is vegan, easily falling in the stereotype of 'extremist vegans', reinforcing the idea that vegans have cult-like behavior, and possibly pushing the other kids to be more distant from yours.
When taking into consideration the fact that trace animal products do almost no harm, and that taking candies during trick-or-treating season likely doesn't affect the already-high candy demand significantly, it's apparent that this would likely be counterproductive.
A similar situation can be seen with Jehova's Witnesses, that consider Halloween a pagan festivity and forbid their kids from trick-or-treating. And while veganism isn't a religion, it's very easy for people to see unreasonable restrictions for ethical reasons to be the same as unreasonable restrictions for religious reasons.

Instead, here is what you can do.

A practice that is called 'Switch Witch' consists of being a 'witch' that, similarly to Santa Claus, visits your child at night, and changes the candies for something else, but better. This could include toys, or vegan candies--but it's important to make sure that the exchange is in favor of your child, giving them a higher value/quantities of candies, to not create unnecessary resentment. It would be important to consider your child's favorite candies when doing this--for example, chocolate is usually coveted, and for him/her chocolate bars might only be worth having them switched for an equal or higher amount of vegan good-tasting chocolate bars.
The non-vegan candies could be re-distributed to others asking for candies, or be given for free at your work to colleagues--thus filling in the offer in the non-vegan candy market that was previously taken, effectively making up for the little harm that could have been done.

Similarly to this idea, another option would be to offer your child his favorite candy replacement for every candy he would bring home.
For example, the child could be offered to have his favorite vegan, tasty, and yummy chocolate bar for every X amount of candies he brings home (making sure that it's not unfair). This would incentivize your child to participate in the activity without holding back/feeling bad, and to then be able to re-distribute the non-vegan candies in the same night, without having to wait for a good enough moment to be the Switch Witch--at which point the candies might not be able to be given away to other kids as easily. On top of that, your child wouldn't possibly hold any resentment against you, not having to trick him to change the candies without his knowing.