More on Halloween Traditions:This past weekend I went to a witches party. I'd never heard of anything like it before, but pretty much 6 or 7 of us women dressed like witches had dinner, and then we went to a "Village" in between Salt Lake and Provo. And it was so fun. There were women dressed like witches everywhere, cackling, dancing, shopping. Most of the witches were dressed in black: one of my friends even painted her face green; but others were dressed as Glenda the Good Witch. And the witches were all ages from 2 to 92. It was funny. I'd never seen anything like it before.
I know that since we're talking about food in class I should probably write about food. But fall is rich with culture (and I wrote about pumpkins in my last post). I've researched American witches on more than one occasion, particularly concerning the Salem Witch Trials. They are completely fascinating, but creepy. And though I LOVE Halloween and dressing up like a witch, I can't help but sometimes feel it's a little disrespectful to the women (and few men) who were killed because someone called them a witch. They were not witches. They were normal people who stumbled across accusations they could not overcome.
Nonetheless, the witch hunts in America don't even hold a candle to the witch hunts that happened in Europe. The number of women murdered on this count is completely atrocious, but it's very rarely talked about. But what's talked about even less is that Martin Luther instigated the Witch Hunts. And if he didn't downright start them, he made them explode. Witches in history have a horrible tale to tell, but no one ever thinks of them as real. But perhaps they were. Perhaps some of them really were witches. Did they deserve to die? Probably not. Witches are fascinating because they deal with something out of our reach. We cannot understand them from our day to day lives, and that is why they have such a center to modern day Halloween, fairy tales, and Disney movies.
And I'm sorry, but modern day witches are just creepy.
