1. Deadly Halloween
Photo by
Rune T
Prepare to question everything you think you know. Although, if you Google for “Candy Urban Legend”, this is by far the most popular subject that comes up, I had never never heard that this story was anything but gospel.
After all, my mom, and the moms of all my friends, local news stations, school bulletins, free candy x-ray programs at the local hospitals, EVERYONE warned me as a child not to eat ANYTHING that wasn’t factory-wrapped, lest I ingest rat poison, razor blades, LSD, arsenic, or crazy-lady fingernail clippings. Even as a kid, the logistics of this seemed slightly screwed up. I remember thinking, disappointed, as some freshly baked ****erscotch cookies were being confiscated and destroyed, that nothing was to stop some psychopath from unwrapping a Dum-Dum, dipping it in poison, then carefully re-wrapping it.
I never forgot those ****erscotch cookies, and now I feel really, really, super-sorry for whoever it was in my neighborhood who baked them, because it turns out that
THERE HAS NEVER BEEN A DOCUMENTED CASE OF HALLOWEEN CANDY DEATH OR INJURY. Some dad poisoned his kid’s Pixy Stix for the insurance money, and another kid died after got into his uncle’s heroin right after trick-or-treating, but that’s about it.
This makes me question every cautionary tale I’ve ever heard. What’s next – there isn’t a evil goblin who’ll chew off my ears if I don’t finish my broccoli? But seriously, I have to wonder if this doesn’t have something to do with modern children’s reluctance to eat anything that doesn’t come in a package with a brand name and cartoon mascot, hmmmmm?
08-23-2010, 12:23 PM
