On October 31st every year children and adults alike dress up in costumes to celebrate All Hallows Eve when the veil between the living world and the dead is at its thinnest, and while everyone is able to wear a costume, not everyone is accepted to go trick-or-treating. 

There is a stigma around teenagers who continue to trick-or-treat. Teens should be allowed to celebrate the holiday just like other children because at the end of the day, teenagers are still children. 

Teenagers balance many things on their plates like getting good grades, playing sports, and working. Halloween gives them the chance for a fun and safe night out with friends where they can forget about all these responsibilities. They can dress up and get free candy. They can feel like kids again. 

There is too much pressure being placed on teens to grow up nowadays. Teens are told it is childish to go trick-or-treating, forcing them to give up the tradition in their preteens or early teenage years. 25% of adults say they stopped trick-or-treating by the age of 12, yet 18% believe that trick-or-treating should never end, regardless of age, according to baca.org.  

In some states, teens and adults could not continue trick-or-treating even if they wanted to. Cities such as Jacksonville, Ill and Rayne, Lou enacted statutes that say teens over the age of 14 caught trick-or-treating are guilty of a misdemeanor, according to npr.org. There are no laws banning adults from parading their infant babies around while collecting candy that the baby is clearly too young to enjoy. So why ban teenagers from this traditional activity?

There is a claim to be made that some teenagers will take advantage of the holiday to act up, however a few bad apples should not ruin the whole tree. In any case, there are always exceptions, and in this case some teenagers genuinely enjoy trick-or-treating. They want to cling to that last bit of childhood they have before all the responsibilities of being an adult come crashing down on them. 

Halloween should be a holiday enjoyed by children, teens and adults alike, so society needs to alter its social norms to fit teenagers in this holiday tradition of trick-or-treating.