Canberra Poetry Scare!

neanderthalsis said :

Ghettosmurf87 said :

dungfungus said :

Why is Australia involved in Halloween? I thought it was an American thing.

Yes, lets only ever do events related to UNIQUELY Australian things? I’m no cheerleader for Americanisation, but there’s about as much reason to celebrate Halloween as there is international talk like a pirate day. That is because it is fun! Get dressed up, be a bit silly and enjoy yourself. The cultural origins of Halloween are long since forgotten for the majority of people around the world that celebrate it.

There is a lot of Irish Catholic descendant families here in Australia that celebrate All Hallows Eve followed by All Saints day and All Souls day. As a lad, we even used to get soul cakes after the evening mass, this was well into the 90’s… The tradition of giving out soul cakes in Ireland and England is where the whole door knocking business on Halloween started.

I respect that – I recall there was an All Hallows College near Mt Panorama in Bathurst, that city being a large Irish Catholic region and cathedral city from the first days of settlement.
What I don’t warm to is the way the Americans have added the “trick and treat” door-knocking nonsense (often with fatal consequences) and the Hollywood horror movies that have been spun off.
In the same way, Coca Cola turned St Nicholas/Santa Claus into a marketing tool by depicting him as a portly fellow in a red and white suit.
And then there is the destruction of all those pumpkins when there are millions of starving people in the world.

dungfungus said :

Why is Australia involved in Halloween? I thought it was an American thing.

It’s only the “trick or treat” knocking on doors that annoys me about Halloween. If people want to go to a Halloween gig, that’s fine!

Ghettosmurf87 said :

dungfungus said :

Why is Australia involved in Halloween? I thought it was an American thing.

Yes, lets only ever do events related to UNIQUELY Australian things? I’m no cheerleader for Americanisation, but there’s about as much reason to celebrate Halloween as there is international talk like a pirate day. That is because it is fun! Get dressed up, be a bit silly and enjoy yourself. The cultural origins of Halloween are long since forgotten for the majority of people around the world that celebrate it.

There is a lot of Irish Catholic descendant families here in Australia that celebrate All Hallows Eve followed by All Saints day and All Souls day. As a lad, we even used to get soul cakes after the evening mass, this was well into the 90’s… The tradition of giving out soul cakes in Ireland and England is where the whole door knocking business on Halloween started.

dungfungus said :

Why is Australia involved in Halloween? I thought it was an American thing.

Yes, lets only ever do events related to UNIQUELY Australian things? I’m no cheerleader for Americanisation, but there’s about as much reason to celebrate Halloween as there is international talk like a pirate day. That is because it is fun! Get dressed up, be a bit silly and enjoy yourself. The cultural origins of Halloween are long since forgotten for the majority of people around the world that celebrate it.

dungfungus said :

Why is Australia involved in Halloween? I thought it was an American thing.

Don’t we go through this every year; hasn’t it been established that it’s originally a British tradition?

But to your comment, why can’t we just let people have fun? If Halloween doesn’t float your boat (it doesn’t do much for me) that’s quite okay.

Why is Australia involved in Halloween? I thought it was an American thing.