Ah yes, candy corn. The three-layered sugar triangle that manages to divide America more than politics at Thanksgiving dinner. Every October, the same debate pops up: “It’s delicious!” “It’s disgusting!” “It’s basically a crayon with better PR!” The truth? It’s all of the above, and that’s why we can’t stop arguing about it.

Here’s the thing: candy corn isn’t just food. It’s feelings. Food scientists will tell you that your taste buds are connected to the part of your brain that hoards memories and emotions like a squirrel with a death grip on an acorn. So if you grew up sneaking fistfuls of candy corn from a plastic pumpkin at Grandma’s house, it still tastes like warm nostalgia. If you didn’t, then all you taste is a sugar brick with a side of wax. And let’s clear up one more thing while we’re here: no, the orange, yellow, and white don’t taste different. BRACH’S admits it’s all one giant honey-flavored blob. Sorry to ruin the rainbow fantasy.

But why does this weird little kernel even exist? For that, we rewind to the 1880s, when candy companies were obsessed with molding sugar into farm-shaped novelties: pumpkins, turnips, chestnuts. Enter George Renninger, a guy at the Wunderle Candy Company in Philadelphia, who had the brilliant idea to layer three colors into one piece. The Goelitz Candy Company (you’d know them now as Jelly Belly) swiped the recipe around 1898 and sold it as Chicken Feed. Yes, chicken feed. Packages literally had a rooster on them because, at the time, corn wasn’t considered “people food.” That didn’t happen until wartime wheat shortages in 1917 forced Americans to take corn seriously. Until then, your candy corn was basically a gag gift for farm kids.

Fast-forward to the 1950s, when Halloween got swallowed whole by the candy industry. Ads for candy corn exploded, and suddenly this former barnyard joke became the official mascot of October. Today, BRACH’S still churns out more than 30 million pounds every fall, enough to circle Earth five times. (Because what’s scarier than running out of candy corn?)

Here’s the kicker: people are still buying it. A lot of it. Instacart says candy corn makes up 2–3% of all candy orders in October. Mississippi is out here leading the charge, buying 92% more than the national average. Hawaii, on the other hand, wants absolutely nothing to do with it, ordering 55% less. Guess sunshine and sandy beaches beat out waxy sugar nuggets every time.

So, where do I land in this candy-coated war zone? Team Candy Corn, ALL THE WAY. I love the burnt-sugar taste and that strange hard-yet-chewy texture everyone else insists on calling waxy. To me, it just screams fall. During the Halloween season, the glass pumpkin candy dish on my coffee table is always filled to the brim with my personal custom mix of candy corn and those electric orange colored mallow pumpkins! I measure everything carefully to ensure the perfect ratio of pumpkins to pyramids. Everything about it is pure seasonal ecstasy, like an orgasm in a candy dish. But while I’ll happily defend candy corn until my teeth rot, I draw the line at the brown ones. You know the ones, the “Harvest Mix” disasters that look like they should come with a bathroom emoji. Who thought poop-colored candy was a good idea? They don’t just look disgusting, they taste different. And that difference is terrible. Sorry, not sorry, but poop belongs in the toilet, not in my candy bowl.

Has my love for the sweet morsels of fall passion blinded me to all the drama surrounding the great candy corn debate? Yes. I still don’t understand any of it. Why has candy corn become such a seasonal Rorschach test? I guess some see childhood joy; others, pure dental regret and a childhood of psychological damage.  It’s not about flavor, it’s about identity, memory, and whether you’re the kind of person who thinks “Chicken Feed” sounds appetizing. Love it or hate it, candy corn is the cockroach of confections. It’s been here for 140 years, it will outlive us all, and every October, it will demand that we pick a side.