Halloween, 2024–an anomoly or a new beginning?
By Sandy . . . Halloween 2024 is behind us. This Halloween was same-old, same-old in some respects
and something of an anomaly in others.
Once again, no children were snatched by registrants—or by anyone, apparently–as they walked the streets, and none were lured into the homes of registrants with promises of candy and then harmed.
Once again, as far as we could determine, Patch abstained from its “red dot” Halloween maps except for a handful in Illinois whose editor doesn’t seem to have gotten the facts about this. Thank you, Patch.
Once again, politicians decided to get on the “sex offender Halloween” bandwagon, like this Kentucky legislator who wants to create a state law barring registrants from participating in Halloween activities that involve children and the attorney general in Illinois who announced the importance of checking the sex offender registry before trick-or-treating.
Once again, law enforcement could take a lesson from Patch as some are still tying compliance checks of registrants with Halloween safety for trick-or-treaters, as in this example from Marion County, Tennessee, where law enforcement involved “multiple agencies” in “Operation Trick or Treat” and this
one from Milwaukee County, Wisconsin where one officer is quoted as doing this “because I love making our community safe.”
The next time your local law enforcement talks about how understaffed they are, you might check to see if they are like the one that sent “more than 20 deputies” out on Halloween to be sure all registrants had their lights off.
That example is from Greene County, Missouri, where, ironically, in nearby Newton County, a traffic altercation occurred that injured a trick-or-treating three-year old—thankfully, not seriously—and killed the young adult accompanying the child.
That traffic accident was an anomaly as the individual who was killed is, as far as research has determined, the only pedestrian Halloween death this year.
Another child was involved in a car-pedestrian accident in Alabama but also escaped serious injuries, and two teenage pedestrians were injured, both non-fatally, in Colorado. No other reports of Halloween evening pedestrian-automobile accidents could be found, making this year the safest for trick-or-treaters in a long time.
Another anomaly is the last-minute avalanche of sensible articles giving factual and helpful warnings.
Some, like this one in Colorado, made it clear the focus would be drivers who chose to drink and drive. Likewise, the Florida Law Enforcement Liaison Program announced, “Buzzed Driving is Drunk Driving,” for their 2024 Halloween campaign.
In the 24 – 48 hours before Halloween, media outlets from California to Texas, from Pennsylvania to North Carolina to Florida peppered the internet with pieces about Halloween safety for kids while trick-or-treating. With headers like, “Why cars might be the scariest thing this Halloween,” “Halloween’s biggest risk? Keeping kids safe from traffic,” and “What makes Halloween so scary? Being a pedestrian,” the primary focus was clear.
Whether this year really is an anomaly or whether it is the beginning of a break-through remains to be seen. For now, we can be thankful for the present victories.
God I would hope that this is a tipping point, and that people are starting to wake up to the insanity that extra Halloween vigilance of persons forced to register are not really there for the best interest of the public. That they are having their tax dollars wasted by hundreds or thousands of deputies going out and doing compliance checks. I personally don’t go out that much, mainly because that’s not who I am anymore, and partly because I just want to live a quiet life without outside interference.
I posted this in another thread and I’ll say it here. Our state had a Crackdown on bad drivers during the holiday. About 9,000 tickets were issued.
In my area alone there are people driving the wrong way, fights, and other things going on. None were registering offenses or from people who are on the registry.
A long time ago they used to have the media follow parole around as they did checks. What a waste of time. I know in another County they still have people who are on parole or probation go to a community center and watch a film on how their actions hurt others. Meanwhile, other people who are on the registry but not subject to to Draconian lockdown are trying to live their lives as best they can.
RINSE & REPEAT, Sandy
That’s the nature of bipolar politics. New to the scene is Susie Wiles. My tin hat says, there’s hope to be had thru her. Does she comprehend the divisive and thus destructive nature of the SOR regime? Does she recognize the significance of the human involuntary servitude inherent to the database driven enterprise in capitalist systems? Find the human slavery and you also find the fascist. The great dividers with claims of saving children when really the seek to indoctrination or conscription. Autocratic systems avoid due process ex post and then force additional due processes hence forth. Prince and repeat.
The US AG nominee is the very man who unseated the former speaker I made note of here for his family ties to Artificial Intelligence lore. (The penultimate use of database theory which some call computer science) That history and family ties are real but soundly rejected as of the date of this nomination.
The confirmation processes are going to get heated on this score, because we know tech is the tail waiving the dog these days especially in the political class. All being a natural outcome from hitching the American wagon to unfettered uses of a database first evidenced by its application to the sex offender.
Halloween is in the process of slowly being phased out. Each passing year I hear from people “nobody showed up this year” and it’s become the norm which will continue. until “trunk-r-treat” is normalized as routine and “safe” replacement. Which ironically defeats the purpose of Halloween to begin with.
Can’t wait for law enforcement and the media to lose their EASY and self-selling fear-pandering for easy PR annual child safety propaganda event.