Bathurst, a city in New Brunswick Canada creates bylaw making Trick- or Treating for anyone above the age of 16 illegal. Teens walking the streets will be fined 200 dollars. Along with the age restriction there is a curfew set at 8pm.  

According the Guardian, “Changes to a controversial Halloween bylaw that banned trick-or-treating for older teenagers and set an early curfew on the pursuit of sugary loot don’t go far enough,” said Deputy Mayor of Northern New Brunswick community.

Halloween originates from Celtic traditions and has been celebrated close to 2,000 years. But the fun part of the holiday, known as Trick- or- Treating, beginning sometime in the 1920’s and 1930’s. This tradition has been around for almost 100 years. Prohibiting teens from celebrating the holiday will not help the community.

Prohibiting teens from participating cuts off older brothers and sisters from being able to escort their sibling, perhaps making it more unsafe for children. Junior Mona Firoz said, “That’s stupid! It is a holiday, everyone should be able to celebrate it.” Teens should be able to be out during Halloween instead of being stuck at home due to a ridiculous law.

In addition, the law will be hard to enforce. It is not easy to ask kids for their ID. Kids do not have any easily accessible type of identification other than their physical features, possibly opening the possibility of persecution based solely on how old a kid looks. Kids will be stopped merely because they “look” older.  

It would be more realistic to impose late night curfews for teens instead prohibiting them completely. “Homeowners will be beginning to stop or run out of candy around 10-12pm,” said Mir Khan. “Anything after 12 o’ clock is fiendish, nothing good can be happening that late.”