"For decades, there have been yearly panics that a malicious neighbor is tampering with candy to harm innocent trick-or-treaters. Is this story true, or is the scary Halloween sadist that lives next door simply an urban legend?"--Halia Pratt, 6th grade
This is a question that sociologists and citizens have been pondering for decades. There is a lot of worry surrounding this topic, especially this year. The DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration) has sent the nation into a frenzy with the warning about “Fentanyl made to look like candy to children and young people.This is definitely not the first time that parents are being advised to inspect their child's candy bag, or even keep their children home to avoid the risk altogether, and it most likely won't be the last. But is this something that you should be worried about?
On August 30th, the DEA sent a nationwide warning about rainbow fentanyl. Fentanyl is an extremely powerful synthetic opioid that was originally made for medical purposes as a type of painkiller for cancer patients. Because of the amount of highly addictive opioids used in fentanyl, it began to be sold as a drug. “Opioids are a class of drugs naturally found in the opium poppy plant. Some opioids are made from the plant directly, and others, like fentanyl, are made by scientists in labs using the same chemical structure (semi-synthetic or synthetic),” according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
Even just 2 milligrams of fentanyl can kill you, so many parents were very worried by this warning. Even though the DEA report is only cautionary, and there is no mention of Halloween or candy throughout the entire warning, the link between candy and fentanyl emerged through police reports and news media. There were photos of the rainbow fentanyl shared within the report of rainbow fentanyl and many people posted them on social media saying they were photos of “fentanyl candy.” However, these reports don’t show findings of it being in candy, just spreading the rumor that they could be.
On August 30th, the DEA sent a nationwide warning about rainbow fentanyl. Fentanyl is an extremely powerful synthetic opioid that was originally made for medical purposes as a type of painkiller for cancer patients. Because of the amount of highly addictive opioids used in fentanyl, it began to be sold as a drug. “Opioids are a class of drugs naturally found in the opium poppy plant. Some opioids are made from the plant directly, and others, like fentanyl, are made by scientists in labs using the same chemical structure (semi-synthetic or synthetic),” according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
Even just 2 milligrams of fentanyl can kill you, so many parents were very worried by this warning. Even though the DEA report is only cautionary, and there is no mention of Halloween or candy throughout the entire warning, the link between candy and fentanyl emerged through police reports and news media. There were photos of the rainbow fentanyl shared within the report of rainbow fentanyl and many people posted them on social media saying they were photos of “fentanyl candy.” However, these reports don’t show findings of it being in candy, just spreading the rumor that they could be.
This is not the first incident that put nervous parents of trick-or-treaters on edge, in fact this report and the fear surrounding it comes from generations of Halloween Sadism.
Halloween Sadism is the belief that a neighbor is tampering with candy with the intent of potentially harming trick-or-treaters. Parents have been concerned with this theory for ages and routinely inspect Halloween candy. Not many parents prevent their children from trick-or-treating but many forbid their child from consuming any candy until it has been thoroughly inspected. The fear got so bad that some hospitals even started x-raying candy bags. This was an almost useless program because x-rays cannot see drugs or poison. A lot of this fear came from the fact that this horrible theory was directed at children who are one of society's most gullible and defenseless groups. The thought that someone was hoping to harm them brought great alarm.
“A basic logical principle is that one cannot prove a negative,” said socialist Joel Best who has been writing about Halloween sadism since 1985. Best continues in a blog post from a post on the University of Delaware's Library Institutional Repository, “Therefore, I can never prove that no child has been killed by a Halloween sadist. I can simply note that such a death probably would be a major news story, yet I can’t find any evidence of such a story being covered by major media.”
Best is saying that there is no evidence that Halloween candy has ever been tampered with, because if there was, we would have actual proof instead of what we have now: rumors. In the past 20 years there has not been one verifiable case of a child being harmed by candy in the course of trick-or-treating. The exception to this is William V. Shyne in 1950. Shyne was a doctor with an odd sense of humor at best. One Halloween he gave out roughly 450 laxatives (a drug or medicine designed to provoke bowel movements) to trick-or-treaters.
Despite the evidence proving that this is an urban legend, many people still believe in it. In 1970, the New York Times wrote an article addressing Halloween Sadism. The article begins, “That plump red apple that Junior gets from a kindly old woman down the block. It may have a razor blade hidden inside. The chocolate ‘candy’ bar may be a laxative, the bubble gum may be sprinkled with lye, the popcorn balls may be coated with camphor, the candy may turn out to be packets containing sleeping pills.”
When this article was published it included no sources, only blatant lies. “Children should not eat any of their collected goodies until they have been carefully examined by an adult,” the article continued. “In recent years, pins, razor blades, slivers of glass and poison have appeared in the treats gathered by children across New York State.”
There has never been a valid report of anything listed in this article, and yet it created hysteria across the nation. Articles and news reports like these have stoked an ongoing flame and to this day parents are obsessively checking their children's Halloween treats and warning their children. When asked, 3 out of 4 of the people interviewed for this article said that they believe in Halloween Sadism, or think that it is possible. “I definitely think it's possible that someone out there would do that. I don't know why,” said OSA Literary Arts 6th grader, Ruby Deetz.
Casey Watkins, 70, has been hearing this rumor for years. “When I became a mother I became aware of insidious acts of poisoning children, well I've never heard of anyone being poisoned but some of the things I heard about were razor blades in apples because–can you believe it, they gave out apples and then also some kind of rat poison in candy bars.” Despite the rumors, however, Watkins has never seen any proof that any of this has actually happened.
All of this leads us to wonder, if there’s never been any proof of Halloween sadism and tampering with candy, why are we still talking about it? Because of fear. While this theory is jst a theory, the fear of children or quite frankly anyone being harmed scares us. The fact that this harm could be coming from a well-known neighbor makes it even more nerve wracking. The fear makes us forget the facts, and the facts are that Halloween sadism is nothing more than an urban legend.
