Soon, the fan-favorite holiday, Halloween arrives with nostalgic treats, magic-filled memories, and scares. Apart from festivities and trick-or-treating associated with the spooky season, this holiday also raises serious environmental issues for our planet.
From synthetic costumes to decorations, Halloween contributes a considerable amount of waste to our planet and highlights unhealthy habits concerning our responsibility for the destructive consumption scene. With every house and apartment in America buying massive bags of individually wrapped treats for the notorious “trick or treat,” this one night alone, along with previous preparations, creates mass amounts of pointless scrap.
The location of where these plastic encasings end up is also an extremely important factor to the damage of this holiday. “People throw candy wrappers out on the ground and do not pay much attention to where they end up,” said BSGE sophomore Zara Ahmed. As a result of “fun times” the location of these scraps will usually end up on public streets, sidewalks, and parks, scattered carelessly, disrespecting not only public service cleaning crews but our planet’s health.
With Halloween approaching, some BSGE students and staff were interviewed to get their statements on this ongoing issue. On average, many people do not pay much attention to the pollution during Halloween, whether it comes from wrappers or costumes.
Sophomore Zara Ahmed mentioned that she “never really considered how much Halloween pollutes, but now this makes me think more about it.” Additionally, 8th graders Avery and Isabelle were interviewed, and their ideas aligned with this, never having considered the pollution following Halloween and its impact on our planet. However, they did mention how they always pay extra attention to where their candy wrappers end up, making sure they get thrown away in the trash.
Most people agree that clothing can be recycled and worn multiple times for different purposes. Some found a new purpose for clothing left unworn in their closet for a long time, while others took a different path and purchased a pre-made costume.
Assistant Principal Shana mentioned that her costume for this year is a thicker, heavier one-piece costume and for this reason it can also be used “even after Halloween as a robe or a jacket.” 10th-grade student Millie Blackburn mentioned how she is reusing old clothes and hand-me-downs from her sibling to construct a “My Little Pony” costume for this year’s Halloween festivities. In previous years, she has used similar methods by sewing together her own mermaid costume.
Many others were also thoughtful about ways to further reduce their pollution this Halloween. Assistant Principal Shauna proposed that instead of mass-produced typical Halloween candies served in individual, single-use plastic wrappers, locally sourced apples or in-season fruits should be given out instead. Although this may defeat the purpose of Halloween for some, it sure is better for the environment and the growing bodies of many young kids celebrating.
While Halloween is weakened in the following ways , the magical and nostalgic charm remains the strongest in these celebrants’ favorite Halloween memories and activities. Reusing materials when creating costumes or crafts, along with selecting minimal packaged candy, and paying attention to where their trash winds up, will minimize peoples destructive ecological footprint.