10-20-05

Why does Halloween have to be scary? On the Sci-Fi channel, they are having their 13 Days of Halloween. Thirteen days of scary, gory, monster filled movies. Why? Let’s try to follow the trail. Halloween(or Samhain, All Hallow’s Eve, All Saint’s Day, or Day of the Dead) occurs at the end of October or beginning of November. By this time, the trees have all changed color and most have lost their leaves. The nights are colder, and most, if not all, of the harvest has been brought in. This leaves dead-looking crops, bare, dead-looking trees, and hibernating, dead-looking animals. It’s obvious where the celebration of death comes from.
In a society where Christianity is prominent, people fear death. Partially because of the threat of a hell, and partially because of a fear of the unknown. With fear, comes people who thrive on fear. Who strive to put fear into others. With the motion picture industry these days, fear is not hard to produce. They have come up with a myriad of ways to chase, threaten, torture, and dismember people. These cause death, which then induces fear.
I see the connection, but still find it disturbing. What kind of minds come up with these things? I was watching a preview for ‘Saw II’ and was appalled. What kind of person would think this up, let alone enjoy watching it? The scariest part is the answer. Human minds…my mind. I think my fear in all of this is that I know, if I allowed myself, that my mind could come up with far worse. And beyond that, there would be the impulse to follow through, and the ego to think I could get away with it.
What prevents me, or you, dear reader, from acting upon those dark impulses? Torture, rape, and killing with out reason is rarely found in any other animal species. So is it human instinct or animal, that prevents us from doing something uniquely human? Is it our basic animal nature that says live in harmony(unless you’re eating your neighbor), or is it the human part of us that also creates art and invents religion that keeps us from the mass-murder of stupid people? I suppose in keeping with the balance of nature, that which is positive about our nature can’t exist with out the negative.
When you incorporate all of this with pagan beliefs and the Wheel of the Year, I suppose you see it a little more clearly. The cross-quarter of Samhain(Halloween, death) is Beltane(fertility, life). I knew before this rant that balance is necessary. I think I’m just realizing that there is bigger emphasis on the death side of things than life. We don’t have a secularized holiday celebrating the final fertility rituals of spring, so why do we have one for the final harvest?
Easter you say? Yes, that is a widely celebrated Spring ritual, but it falls a month short of the cross-quarter, and while technically fertility is celebrated by rabbits and eggs, most people miss that connection. Unlike Halloween, where the macabre is celebrated by all. Ghouls and ghosts prevail in every store. What shouts death more than a ghost?
I’m no longer sure where I was going with this rant(I know…nothing new), but I think we should all make it a point to keep in mind that this time of year should be a celebration of death, of the turning of another year. And I suppose, if being scared floats your boat and gets you in the mood, then…BOO!