{"id":308872,"date":"2026-10-17T19:54:19","date_gmt":"2026-10-17T19:54:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/308872\/"},"modified":"2026-10-17T19:54:19","modified_gmt":"2026-10-17T19:54:19","slug":"bucks-county-halloween-display-sparks-backlash-from-community-nbc10-philadelphia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/308872\/","title":{"rendered":"Bucks County Halloween display sparks backlash from community \u2013 NBC10 Philadelphia"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A Halloween display outside a home in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, is drawing backlash from some residents and the local NAACP, which says the decorations evoke America&#8217;s painful history of racial violence.<\/p>\n<p>The display, outside a home in Bristol Borough, features what appear to be bodies wrapped in black bags hanging from a tree.<\/p>\n<p>While the homeowner considers the decorations part of a spooky Halloween setup, others say the imagery is deeply troubling.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m just looking at it and I&#8217;m just thinking to him, like, &#8216;do you not see what&#8217;s wrong with this?'&#8221; Bristol Borough resident Roshea Newkirk said.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.naacpbucks.org\/\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.naacpbucks.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Bucks County NAACP<\/a> has called on the homeowner to voluntarily remove or modify the decorations.<\/p>\n<p>In a statement posted on social media, the organization said the imagery evokes the country&#8217;s history of lynching and racial terror. While Halloween decorations are often intended to frighten or shock, the organization emphasized that &#8220;intent does not erase impact.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The controversy also reached a Bristol Borough Council meeting this week, where officials confirmed that the borough had already contacted the homeowner about the display.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Just so you know, our borough inspector did stop there and talk to him, but we were unsuccessful,&#8221; an official said during the meeting.<\/p>\n<p>When asked what that meant, the official explained that the homeowner did not want to remove the decorations.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;He feels they&#8217;re Halloween decorations and he won&#8217;t take them down. And we don&#8217;t have an ordinance against anything like that,&#8221; the official said.<\/p>\n<p>NBC10 also spoke with the homeowner off camera. He said he purchased the decorations as a kit online and never intended to offend anyone.<\/p>\n<p>Not everyone in the neighborhood finds the display offensive.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;At first I looked at it, and it&#8217;s a little bit different. Like, but then I&#8217;m looking, it&#8217;s Halloween. My house is scary. My house is always scary. It&#8217;s always set up scary. Same thing. Dead bodies laying around, skeletons. It&#8217;s Halloween,&#8221; Bristol Borough resident Mike Wade said.<\/p>\n<p>For now, the decorations remain in place as the Bucks County NAACP continues to call for their removal or modification.<\/p>\n<p>This story was originally reported for broadcast by NBC Philadelphia. AI tools helped convert the story to a digital article, and an NBC Philadelphia journalist edited the article for publication.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Halloween display outside a home in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, is drawing backlash from some residents and the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":308873,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[197,28,30,29],"class_list":["post-308872","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-bucks-county","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308872","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=308872"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/308872\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/308873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=308872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=308872"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=308872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}