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should trick-ortreating have a legal age limit?

geekydragon

beacuse dragons are awesome and im a geek.
im 16 and i still love trick-or-treating with my friends, because i like dressing up in a costume and its a huge social event for me because i basically get to clown around with my bff and geek about anime and video games. but my state is trying to set a legal age limit for it. should this be allowed?

on one hand, it could be scary to adults for teens and adults to be wearing a mask and coming to their door when they could basically mug you or something. also, letting teenagers run freely around at night, possibly vandalizing (TP,egging houses) things or doing something illegal is not a good idea.

on the other hand, they have no right to tell people their to old to do something. if a teen wants to go hang with friends,as long as they dont hurt anyone, they can. plus, how is having a teenager look after their little sibling/cousin/whatever any different then letting them go alone? they can still vandalize, they can still give adults a fright to see a teen in a mask. how does having a child stop illegal activity?

i feel that they should make it illegal to wear masks if you're over 13 but allow trick or treating in general for anyone under 18. the difference between Halloween night and any other night a teen decides to go out with friends at night is that people are out to watch them

so how do you feel? should legal age limits be set? and if so, what should the age limit be?
 
Thank you!

On a more serious note, while one could make the argument that masks tend to make teenagers (and everybody else!) harder to identify and, as a result, prosecute for vandalism, it would simply be impractical to enforce a law like this. It wouldn't only require governmental regulation of costume shops, but also some intrusive countermeasure to prevent homemade masks from being worn by people who would be considered too old to do so. This would necessitate a police or some other governmental enforcement presence to patrol suburban streets on a night when many would rather be home watching their own children engage in Halloween activities, or do so themselves, as opposed to being part of a group created entirely to regulate a holiday and to prevent what are generally considered harmless misdemeanors.

And that's all assuming that the law is even a good idea; Halloween-practicing countries tend to have laws that provide for the right to free association, and while curfew laws and the like set a precedent for targeting young people specifically for crime, a law that prevents a group from engaging in a popular holiday would probably not be popular and thus, in a free society, not sustainable unless some group is being denied basic rights or something along those lines.
 
Of course in most places there is established curfews for those under 18, so that in general.

The worst you should get is weird looks and people thinking you look too stupid. I stopped trick or treating when I was eleven.

When I hand out candy I don't give to older kids usually anyways.
 
not to mention, a lot of people (me being one) are going to go anyway and theres not much point in checking every single trick-or-treater for their age when the said trick-or-treater is doing nothing else wrong.
 
Im-Sorry-I-Thought-This-Was-America-Randy.jpg


that'd be taking it a bit far... i mean, telling people "hey, you're too old to get free candy now. sorry, that's a crime." it shouldn't be a crime imo
 
the only time i ever went guising ('trick-or-treating' for the american heathens) i was 13 and people thought teenagers seriously going round the neighbourhood looking for sweets is weird :B it shouldn't be ~illegal~, certainly, but i think there really comes a point where it's just kind of a weird thing to do

maybe that's just a cultural thing since once you're about ten you go straight into the vandalising/getting pished in shitty costumes part of halloween here?? it's really a little-kids sort of activity. like ball pits.
 
Uh... ... how... exactly would this work? Trick-or-treating isn't a legalised thing. Teenagers already do run around freely at night however much they like/their parents like. I mean, ban teenage activity on the street around Halloween?? Get people to call the police if teenagers call at their house asking for sweets?

Do teenagers even... do it much? I mean! Obviously they dress up and vandalise and shit but I don't think anyone really calls that trick-or-treating, right? Better to try to encourage people to call the police if they're being annoying.

idk the policy my entire life was "put all the lights off and don't go near the windows so people don't think you're in" on Halloween & we were lucky to live in an area where we got like two knocks a night maybe. but isn't the thing for teenagers, even in the US, to go to Halloween parties all dressed up? if they were seriously going for sweets and you were prepared to open your door to them then that's kinda cute.
 
i always get lots of candy when i go trick or treating. no one has ever refused to give us candy.

i fallow important rules of trick or treating politeness:

i dont go up to houses without lights

i only take one piece of candy at the places when no ones home and they leave a bowl out

i dont walk on grass if i can help it (sometimes i have to though)

and as long as i follow those rules, im not doing anything wrong, so i should be allowed to go without getting in trouble.


i never get invited to Halloween parties, so id rather get some exercise then sit on my lazy butt all night. i work for that candy!
 
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