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3 Tricks (and Treats) for a Humane Halloween

Dog Costume by ejorpin

Monster movies, eerie music, talking skeletons, and toy spiders are fun on Fright night, but animal abuse is always horrifying.

The following tips will help you have an animal-friendly Halloween:

1.   Watch Out for Everyone With Fangs and Claws

A good scare on Halloween can be fun, but no one wants to be haunted because their beloved animal companion was sickened, injured, or even killed while wandering around outdoors. Keep your animals safely inside—on Halloween and every other day of the year—so that they don’t get hit by cars, attacked by other animals, or tormented by cruel people.

Costumed visitors can make even the friendliest animals skittish and prone to bolting or biting. Stay with your animals in a quiet room, away from the door, and ensure that they are microchipped and wearing collars with current ID tags, just in case.

Keep chocolate and other candies, which can contain toxic ingredients such as Xylitol out of reach of animals, and do the same for candles and Jack-o’-lanterns, which can cause burns and fires if knocked over.

Dressing up isn’t always fun for animals because costumes can impair their ability to see, move, and breathe—and some are simply uncomfortable. Animals can also choke or strangle if they chew small parts from their costumes or become entangled.

2.   Treat Goblins and Ghouls to Vegan Goodies

You may have hideous monsters at your door, but that doesn’t mean that you have to dish out candy with vile ingredients such as cow’s milk, gelatin (a goo that’s made by boiling animal bones, hooves, tendons, ligaments, and cartilage together), or cochineal, a red dye that’s made from crushed beetles.

Instead, give out vegan candies, stickers, or other frighteningly fun “party-favor” items. PETA even offers spooky temporary tattoos to remind trick-or-treaters to treat animals with kindness.

3.   Dress Like a Devil—Don’t Act Like One

Only a real monster would wear fur, leather, or exotic-animal skins. If you’re wearing a costume, be sure to choose one with faux fur, pleather, vinyl, polyester, or other synthetic fibers. Or, if you want to look truly scary, dress up like Colonel Sanders, Ronald McDonald, a seal clubber, or other animal abuser.

Of course, if you really want to horrify your friends this Halloween, you can always show them “Glass Walls,” frightening video footage from factory farms and slaughterhouses. It will surely give them nightmares and convince them to go vegan once and for all. That would be worth all the candy in the world.

Have a happy and humane Halloween!

[Image by ejorpin at Flickr.com, cc]

Written by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), with more than 3 million members and supporters, is the largest animal rights organization in the world. PETA focuses its attention on the four areas in which the largest numbers of animals suffer the most intensely for the longest periods of time: on factory farms, in laboratories, in the clothing trade, and in the entertainment industry.

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