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You may have heard about this on network news, but here locally in a Seattle podunk suburb called Puyallup, school officials have decided to ban all Halloween festivities for the entire district.

The decision was based on two factors. The first being the fact that teachers reported that the events surrounding the holiday distracted students and took away from class time. The second, and more prevailing reason was due to the fact that local members of the Wiccan religion claimed that many of the costumes are offensive to "real witches". Yeah witches costumes offend me too, but not for the same reason (see my Halloween post).

Puyallup, Washington isn't the only district to make this decision. School officials at an Illinois school made a similar decision to downsize Halloween festivities in favor of more academic time.

Puyallup is also home of Boy Scout devotee Hans Zeiger who not surprisingly has his own take on the events:

"Last December, I returned to Puyallup High School for the first time since graduation to discover that the administration had banned the display of class Christmas trees at the annual Alumni Assembly. For decades, students of the sophomore, junior, and senior classes had decorated Christmas trees to show forth their class pride. Now, political correctness has overwhelmed school tradition. I found, in the course of conversations with older alumni, that I was not the only one offended by the onslaught of the Office of Diversity Affairs and its vicious holiday code.

And now we must pay our respects to the local witches. Let us cancel one holiday to offend the Christians; let us cancel another to please the Wiccans.
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As for me, I actually consider it a good development that Halloween is off the calendar in Puyallup. But political correctness is worse than Halloween, so it's no time for celebration."

I agree that Halloween shouldn't be celebrated in schools, but Zeigler is correct in pointing out the district's blatant inconsistencies in regards to Christmas. They would have been smarter just to note that the holiday takes away from academic time and keep it at that.