The politics of Halloween in Armenia
”A Christian would never celebrate a Satanic holiday,” declares a teenage Armenian girl in a recent anti-Halloween reel circulating on social media. For over a decade, Halloween has been a contentious topic in Armenian society. Before that, Armenians knew Halloween only through screens, viewing it as an unusual holiday Americans celebrate. While some young Armenians embrace the holiday's fun and creativity, celebrating in Yerevan's clubs and bars, many others view Halloween as a Satan-worshipping practice – and even protested against it on Yerevan's streets this year.
It's intriguing how seemingly trivial celebrations like Halloween, which carry little cultural or political weight in Western Europe, can become deeply politicised in countries like Armenia. While most people in the West see Halloween as just a lighthearted day to have fun, many in Armenia view it as a Satan-worshipping holiday imported from the West to undermine Armenian society and erode traditional Christian values. Halloween, like so much else, shows the significant cultural divide between Eastern and Western Europe.