{"id":82520,"date":"2022-10-31T16:01:00","date_gmt":"2022-10-31T20:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=82520"},"modified":"2022-11-08T10:45:39","modified_gmt":"2022-11-08T14:45:39","slug":"razor-blades-in-halloween-candy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/razor-blades-in-halloween-candy\/","title":{"rendered":"Razor Blades in Halloween Candy: What Is Halloween Sadism?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

How worried should you be about razor blades in Halloween candy or other forms of tampering? What is Halloween sadism?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From razor blades in Halloween candy to poisoned Pixy Stix to rainbow fentanyl\u2014fear about tainted Halloween candy persists. However, before you get too worried, you should know how much of this urban legend is true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read on to learn about the origins of razor blades in Halloween candy, Halloween sadism, and how to tell fact from fiction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Origins of Razor Blades in Halloween Candy <\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s an issue that crops up every year in one form or another\u2014purported attempts to kill or injure children with tainted Halloween candy. Fear around contaminated Halloween candy can be traced back to a letter to the editor published in The New York Times<\/em> in 1970<\/a>. In this letter, a woman raised the idea that someone could put razor blades in Halloween candy, specifically in apples. It was a hypothetical, with no truth behind it, but the story spread like wildfire, and soon enough America was in a panic. Throughout the 1970s and \u201980s, police and the media warned parents to examine every piece of trick-or-treating candy before allowing their kids to eat it, and to discard any homemade treats.<\/strong> In some cities, hospitals even offered to X-ray candy to check for razors, pins, and the like. All of this despite the fact that there was never any evidence that anyone had ever actually tampered with a child\u2019s candy.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this article, we\u2019ll review the backstory of \u201cHalloween sadism.\u201d From razor blades in apples to cyanide in Pixy Stix, we\u2019ll look at the horror stories around Halloween candy that have circulated in America over the last 50 years, and examine the evidence to see what\u2019s true and what\u2019s urban legend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The DEA Warns of Fentanyl That Resembles Candy<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In August, the US DEA published an advisory<\/a> warning parents to be<\/a> on the lookout for \u201crainbow fentanyl,\u201d a drug that could be mistaken for candy. Fentanyl is an opiate that\u2019s highly addictive and can be lethal even in relatively small doses. The drug can come in the form of brightly colored pills, and the DEA claims that this particular form of fentanyl is specifically meant to target children. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But how much truth is there to this? Should you be worried about fentanyl making its way into your kids\u2019 Halloween candy?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What the Evidence Tells Us<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Sociologist Joel Best, a leading expert on urban legends, has collected data on Halloween candy incidents for over 30 years, and has authored several books and articles on the topic. In his article The Razor Blade in the Apple: The Social Construction of Urban Legends<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>he refers to the issue as \u201cHalloween sadism\u201d since the incidents are assumed to be perpetrated by malicious people with no other motive than a desire to harm children. Best says that in years of research, he\u2019s found no evidence that a child has ever died or been seriously injured due to a contaminated Halloween treat<\/strong>, with one exception. In one case, a child died from ingesting cyanide placed in a Pixy stick, but it was later determined that it had been the child\u2019s father who had poisoned him.<\/strong> In another case, a child died from ingesting heroin on Halloween, and it was initially reported<\/em> as having come from his trick-or-treat candy. But the court later found that the child had gotten the heroin from his uncle\u2019s home. So, in both of these cases, the relative responsible for the child\u2019s death had used the popular Halloween stories to try to cover up their crime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Urban Legends Can Lead to Moral Panics<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Best says, based on the evidence, stories about contaminated trick-or-treat candy are urban legends that have led to an ongoing moral panic.<\/strong> An urban legend<\/em> (also called a \u201ccontemporary\u201d legend) <\/em>is a story that is told as true even though there\u2019s little to no evidence to support it. If the story is alarming enough, and people believe it, this can lead to a situation in which a widespread unjustified<\/em> fear spreads among the population, called a moral panic<\/a>. These panics are sometimes driven by authorities in society, either because they also believe them or to intentionally direct what people worry about. <\/strong>Some of the moral panics we\u2019ve seen over the last 50 years or so include fears around drugs, video games, Satanism, heavy metal music, sex offenders, and human trafficking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Best points out that these stories reflect the social anxieties of a given time<\/a>. Heightened fears after September 11, 2001 resulted in warnings to avoid trick-or-treating in malls. In more recent years, fears around legalizing marijuana have sparked concerns about edible THC candies making their way into children\u2019s Halloween goodies. But there is, again, no evidence that this has ever happened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Considering all of this, how worried should you be about finding fentanyl in your kids\u2019 candy? Is this a different kind of situation? Here\u2019s what the expert says.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Learn to Spot Urban Legends<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

So, in the interest of better-safe-than-sorry, the DEA article<\/a> has photos of what rainbow fentanyl looks like if you want to keep an eye out for it. The telltale difference between pills and candy is the imprinted letters and numbers on pills. But what we might want to really<\/em> be on the lookout for is misinformation.<\/em> Urban legends and conspiracy theories that provoke moral panics pose a far greater threat than the mythological Halloween sadist. <\/strong>There are many different forms of urban legends, but the ones that get out of hand and cause moral panics usually contain some of the following elements:<\/p>\n\n\n\n