One great benefit about living in Japan (that I never thought about before moving) is that Thanksgiving and Christmas are not holidays here. Thanksgiving is completely ignored, but since marketing exists here, we're still subjected to crappy Christmas songs at businesses. In fact there are no religious holidays of any kind here, which is as it should be in a sane, civilized society.
As for saying "Merry Christmas", I stopped over 40 years ago because I refused to say anything that Christo-fascists or other conservatives wanted to hear, even if they weren't around.
If I know for a fact someone is Christian I wish them a Merry Christmas. If I know they’re Jewish, a Happy Hanukkah. If I don’t know if they’re either, or neither, I say Happy New Year or happy holidays, or have a nice winter break. It’s not that complicated!
I will admit it does bug me a little, to be fair, to get an automatic Merry Christmas back if I choose that greeting first since I am Hanukkah people, but I run that risk if I choose that option. Unfortunately for those of us who don’t celebrate that remains the standard, the default. That’s why happy holidays is so useful! It’s inclusive and there’s nothing fucking wrong with that. As ever, when you’re used to privilege, equality feels like oppression. Fucking snowflakes. 🙄 So desperate to be marginalized, it’s pathetic.
Do you also wish them a happy new year? And advent? Hang on, googling a list of christian holy days in December. Huh, only one I didn't already know about: Feast of the Epiphany. And apparently new year doesn't count. So you should say "Happy Advent, Merry Feast of the Epiphany, and Merry Christmas, but not Happy New Years because that's not a Christian holiday. That one's mine and you can't have it."
Fox News realizes that they have to head off a civil war within the MAGA movement before Trump takes office once again, or else things will get very messy for them, very quickly.
Ta, Robyn. I'm looking forward to time off spent with my beloved in our mountain aerie, celebrating the return of the light. We'll light the menorah, make air fried latkes, and play with the cats and dogs. Happy holidays!
I’m an atheist, but I believe people have the right to believe whatever they want to believe, believe you me. I also celebrate Christmas, simply as tradition and a fun holiday when things really do feel a little better, a little more festive and people are nicer to each other. I’m simply in nephew Fred’s camp - “xmas is a kind, forgiving, charitable time, the only time when men and women open their shut-up hearts and think of people as fellow travelers to the grave, and not some other race of creatures bound on other journeys.”
But the “war” on Christmas is simply another wingnut culture war idiocy. I often prefer to say “happy holidays” to strangers, because Jewish people and non-Christians do exist, and there are several holidays during late November to early January, including, but not limited to, Thanksgiving, Xmas, Hanukkah, New Year’s Eve and my birthday.
People greeting others should be plenty, and the people who fear Xmas is slipping away are the same people who believe white people are being replaced. So who cares what they think. Watch Charlie Brown, Emmet Otter, Elf and A Christmas Story, drink egg nog, hug your mom, burn scented candles and be grateful you have a warm house and food and maybe gifts to give others. Think of people in Syria and Ukraine and donate time or food or money if you can.
The real war on Christmas was the friends we made along the way.
The war on Christmas was really Bill O’Reilly’s hobgoblin. He got the ball rolling on Fox. I’m surprised it lasted this long after his career ended in disgrace.
Didn’t Wild Bill get fired from Fox (or cancelled, in wingnut parlance) for waging a war on women with a luffa and his penis, until Fox paid him like $30 million to go away? That’s a classy network they got over there. They have an entire department devoted to the payoffs and firing of sexually abusive men. It’s just a part of being deeply conservative.
The Massachusetts Puritans were the ones who waged the first, and hardest, war on Christmas in North America. They condemned it as a modified pagan festival, a solstice feast that had been moved around a little as calendars were modified (which it was), and certainly not the actual birth date of Jesus. They made it an offence to celebrate Christmas, punishable by a fine. Nobody since then, certainly not Jewish (or Buddhist or Hindu) people have come down on Christmas that hard. Only strict Christians ever did so.
But God forbid we should ever point out anything Woke.
Christmas in Europe had long been associated with drunken revelry. That’s why the puritans banned it in England under Cromwell. Of course, the tradition of a bacchanalia around the winter solstice dates all the way back to Roman times if not before. And it goes without saying that no one actually knows what Jesus’ actual birthday was since none of the gospels give us a date for it.
The whole idea of Christmas being this sacred family time and the holiest day on the Christian calendar is largely an invention of the Victorian era.
And what's wrong with drunken revelry anyhow? As jolly entertainment it beats the crap out of accusing women of witchcraft and hanging them. Pour some more brandy over that Christmas pud right now! For tonight we'll merry merry be, for tonight we'll merry merry be ...
Sorry, but I'm not giving up on the fight until I can walk into a grocery store and not have yet another weird variation on Christmas pop start playing. Or the Carol of the Bells. I had to make an emergency run to the Apple store because my first-gen Airpods finally died. I sing in a Catholic choir - it's fucking Advent, which has its own songs that are not pushing incessant cheer at you.
Season's Greetings has been around literally for centuries. It came from a time when Christmas was celebrated from December 25th to January 5th (the day the wise men came bearing gifts). Those are the 12 days of Christmas the song refers to.
Some of my Italian-American friends would gradually move the 3 kings closer and closer to the stable in their Nativity set up and have them arrive on Epiphany.
Of course, we, being of mixed Catholic background ... Roman rite (Polish side) , Eastern Uniate rite (Carpatho-Russian side), then started with Russian Xmas eve and then Russian Xmas.
One great benefit about living in Japan (that I never thought about before moving) is that Thanksgiving and Christmas are not holidays here. Thanksgiving is completely ignored, but since marketing exists here, we're still subjected to crappy Christmas songs at businesses. In fact there are no religious holidays of any kind here, which is as it should be in a sane, civilized society.
As for saying "Merry Christmas", I stopped over 40 years ago because I refused to say anything that Christo-fascists or other conservatives wanted to hear, even if they weren't around.
Stolen from a Disqus commenter:
'The war on Xmas cannot end until Xmas ends its illegal occupation of November.'
If I know for a fact someone is Christian I wish them a Merry Christmas. If I know they’re Jewish, a Happy Hanukkah. If I don’t know if they’re either, or neither, I say Happy New Year or happy holidays, or have a nice winter break. It’s not that complicated!
I will admit it does bug me a little, to be fair, to get an automatic Merry Christmas back if I choose that greeting first since I am Hanukkah people, but I run that risk if I choose that option. Unfortunately for those of us who don’t celebrate that remains the standard, the default. That’s why happy holidays is so useful! It’s inclusive and there’s nothing fucking wrong with that. As ever, when you’re used to privilege, equality feels like oppression. Fucking snowflakes. 🙄 So desperate to be marginalized, it’s pathetic.
Do you also wish them a happy new year? And advent? Hang on, googling a list of christian holy days in December. Huh, only one I didn't already know about: Feast of the Epiphany. And apparently new year doesn't count. So you should say "Happy Advent, Merry Feast of the Epiphany, and Merry Christmas, but not Happy New Years because that's not a Christian holiday. That one's mine and you can't have it."
which is not generally considered a Christmas color.
Purple purple pink purple! Shout out to any other recovering catholics in the house
it's purple, purple, rose, purple. Rose is an Advent color
What about the War on Christmas Music?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pf1k7aa17Vw
I say put the Christ back in XMas!!!!
Or maybe putting the Christ back in "Christians"?
Let's put Christ back in Chrysler.
You better hurry up before Stellantis kills it off...
Fox News realizes that they have to head off a civil war within the MAGA movement before Trump takes office once again, or else things will get very messy for them, very quickly.
Here's a festive holiday carol for all of you:
https://youtu.be/yiffJfYdZWg?feature=shared
Evil always turns on itself. Because it has no where left to go.
Ta, Robyn. I'm looking forward to time off spent with my beloved in our mountain aerie, celebrating the return of the light. We'll light the menorah, make air fried latkes, and play with the cats and dogs. Happy holidays!
The War On Christmas Is Over WHEN I SAY IT'S OVER!
C'mer gentiles, Imma shove Dreidels up yer keaster and harvest your first born!
I am and always have been a Halloween person! Long live creepy shit!!!🕷️
Viva La Calavera Catrina!
I’m an atheist, but I believe people have the right to believe whatever they want to believe, believe you me. I also celebrate Christmas, simply as tradition and a fun holiday when things really do feel a little better, a little more festive and people are nicer to each other. I’m simply in nephew Fred’s camp - “xmas is a kind, forgiving, charitable time, the only time when men and women open their shut-up hearts and think of people as fellow travelers to the grave, and not some other race of creatures bound on other journeys.”
But the “war” on Christmas is simply another wingnut culture war idiocy. I often prefer to say “happy holidays” to strangers, because Jewish people and non-Christians do exist, and there are several holidays during late November to early January, including, but not limited to, Thanksgiving, Xmas, Hanukkah, New Year’s Eve and my birthday.
People greeting others should be plenty, and the people who fear Xmas is slipping away are the same people who believe white people are being replaced. So who cares what they think. Watch Charlie Brown, Emmet Otter, Elf and A Christmas Story, drink egg nog, hug your mom, burn scented candles and be grateful you have a warm house and food and maybe gifts to give others. Think of people in Syria and Ukraine and donate time or food or money if you can.
Happy holidays!
The real war on Christmas was the friends we made along the way.
The war on Christmas was really Bill O’Reilly’s hobgoblin. He got the ball rolling on Fox. I’m surprised it lasted this long after his career ended in disgrace.
Happily, Bill-o is still deader than a can of corned beef.
Didn’t Wild Bill get fired from Fox (or cancelled, in wingnut parlance) for waging a war on women with a luffa and his penis, until Fox paid him like $30 million to go away? That’s a classy network they got over there. They have an entire department devoted to the payoffs and firing of sexually abusive men. It’s just a part of being deeply conservative.
On Fox, they just call that, “being an alpha male.”
Next ime any of these clowns mentions 'alpha males' ask them what language 'alpha' originates from.
Crickets, betcha.
War on Christmas?
The Massachusetts Puritans were the ones who waged the first, and hardest, war on Christmas in North America. They condemned it as a modified pagan festival, a solstice feast that had been moved around a little as calendars were modified (which it was), and certainly not the actual birth date of Jesus. They made it an offence to celebrate Christmas, punishable by a fine. Nobody since then, certainly not Jewish (or Buddhist or Hindu) people have come down on Christmas that hard. Only strict Christians ever did so.
But God forbid we should ever point out anything Woke.
Christmas in Europe had long been associated with drunken revelry. That’s why the puritans banned it in England under Cromwell. Of course, the tradition of a bacchanalia around the winter solstice dates all the way back to Roman times if not before. And it goes without saying that no one actually knows what Jesus’ actual birthday was since none of the gospels give us a date for it.
The whole idea of Christmas being this sacred family time and the holiest day on the Christian calendar is largely an invention of the Victorian era.
And what's wrong with drunken revelry anyhow? As jolly entertainment it beats the crap out of accusing women of witchcraft and hanging them. Pour some more brandy over that Christmas pud right now! For tonight we'll merry merry be, for tonight we'll merry merry be ...
'Do not fear witches.
Fear those who burned them alive.'
What a bunch of Dickens.
Sorry, but I'm not giving up on the fight until I can walk into a grocery store and not have yet another weird variation on Christmas pop start playing. Or the Carol of the Bells. I had to make an emergency run to the Apple store because my first-gen Airpods finally died. I sing in a Catholic choir - it's fucking Advent, which has its own songs that are not pushing incessant cheer at you.
The Sanrio group is not complete without Pochacco!
https://sanriowiki.com/wiki/Pochacco
Season's Greetings has been around literally for centuries. It came from a time when Christmas was celebrated from December 25th to January 5th (the day the wise men came bearing gifts). Those are the 12 days of Christmas the song refers to.
Some of my Italian-American friends would gradually move the 3 kings closer and closer to the stable in their Nativity set up and have them arrive on Epiphany.
Of course, we, being of mixed Catholic background ... Roman rite (Polish side) , Eastern Uniate rite (Carpatho-Russian side), then started with Russian Xmas eve and then Russian Xmas.