Nine Years Later, It's Still [CENSORED]mas
This essay I posted back in 1995 is, regrettably, even more applicable today.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Now that the "holidays" have passed, and most revelers have recovered from their New Year's hangovers, it is time to reflect upon the officially enforced AWOL status of what used to be known in ancient times (circa 1960) as [CENSORED]mas..
TV spewed "Happy Holidays!" wishes every which direction, especially local newscasters (TV news, by the way, is what Ken & Barbi did when they grew up; and brother, have they been fruitful and multiplied...) Scoreboard graphics during football games were festooned with the same greeting, as though all networks' equipment was implanted with the same computer virus. Its pervasiveness, though, was the equal of its vacuous genericity. Or hasn't it struck anyone that wishing others "Happy Holidays!" could be done year-round? The next holiday is Groundhog's Day (except for the groundhogs, of course), and then comes Valentine's Day, and St. Patrick's Day, and so on. I'm going to spend Flag Day sending out greeting cards to everybody I know wishing them a "Happy Holiday!", since any old one seems to do.
"Season's Greetings!" is another randomly twisting piece of verbal fluff caught in the spin cycle of the godless. What exactly is that supposed to mean? There are all manner of different seasons: meteorological (spring, summer, fall, winter), hunting (elk, deer, muskrat, mink, goat, fiddler crab, spotted owl, liberal), sports (baseball, football, basketball, hockey, post-, strike-shortened), cooking (dill weed, barbecue spice, celery seed, minced onion, parsley flakes) - well, that one is seasonINGS, but in the great there/not there of the "Winter Festival," what does that matter?
Brian Ward of West Orange, NJ was reprimanded by a high-school principle for singing "God rest ye merry, gentlemen," on school property. Supposedly his exercise of his Constitutional right to free expression "degraded" the religions of fellow students who don't have a "holiday" around the Winter Soltice. At Tufts, Secret Santas have become Secret Snowmen because the store declared that "we're not all Christians," the premise apparently being the misconception that ol' Kris Kringle chose the moment of You Know Who's birth to crash through the stable roof, and squashed Him beneath the inn room he brought for Joseph and Mary.
The public-school calendar in Portland, OR lists every December "holiday" imaginable - Kwanszaa, Hannukah, and that pagan favorite, The First Day of Winter - EXCEPT the C-word. Excision by omission wasn't enough for the city of Pittsburgh, which actually renamed the season of that JC guy's birth "the Sparkle Season." Apparently nobody told the city fathers (and mothers) that those sparkles will go away by putting one's head between one's knees and breathing deeply into a paper bag.
For every instance of silence (other than "Silent Night," of course) and insipidity, there is also the jackboot - with bells attached. At Grand Central station in New York, a [CENSORED]mas tree - which is NOT a [CENSORED]ian symbol - was erected on the condition that it be "balanced" by a menorah instead of a nativity scene. Naturally, a group of Muslims took offense and demanded more "balance" by supplanting both the nativity scene and menorah with a carbomb. Authorities gave up, and the tree fell over, whereupon endangered species activists launched a protest against the destruction of still more spotted owl habitat.
The winner in the cowardice category is the mayor of Richmond, VA, who caved in to the Advocates for Intercultural Richmond subcommittee of the Human Relations Commission and agreed not to put up a [CENSORED]mas tree for fear of offending Richmond's enormous Muslim and Korean communities. Instead, the mayor unveiled (oops, sorry, Muslims) a "Unity Tree" - a large fir with lights and decorations. No, I don't see the difference, either, unless the decorations looked like little sticks of dynamite.
Closing this truly vicious circle ("May the circle...be broken...), another New Jersey school held a contest the object of which was to write down as many "[CENSORED]mas characters" as possible in the allotted time. One team, obviously ignorant of the "holiday spirit," quickly jotted down that JC guy, Mary, Joseph, the three wise men, etc. They got a zero. Why? Because their teacher only awarded points for Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, the Norelco Santa, the Energizer Bunny, Ed McMahon, and President Clinton. The answer "Newt Gingrinch" was worth double.
We are reminded, one more time, of the pretzel into which the First Amendment has been twisted. For [CENSORED]ians to simply exercise their right to freedom of expression is held to be an infringement upon those same rights of their lost countrymen. The cultural majority must be muzzled and repressed to suit the prejudices of the cultural minority, in the hopes that if it can be perpetuated long enough, majority and minority will change places, and those accursed religious kooks can be silenced permanently. An extreme extrapolation, it is true, but we're dealing, in the Religious Left, with extremists. Just ask "Father Frost," the yuletide imposter the old Soviet communist regime conjured to usurp the throne of the God-Man whose name is Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. The Soviet Empire is a pleasantly fading nightmare, and Jesus Christ of Nazareth is still at the right hand of God.
Menorahs do not offend me, nor Christmas trees or Salvation Army Santas. Let Kwanzaa afficianados celebrate whatever it is they celebrate to their heart's content. But anti-Christian bigotry that treats religious traditionalism as being subversive - THAT I have a problem with. It shows just how much the world needs preaching, and a-preaching I am gonna go in 1996.
[And 2005.]
Call it my New Year's resolution.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Now that the "holidays" have passed, and most revelers have recovered from their New Year's hangovers, it is time to reflect upon the officially enforced AWOL status of what used to be known in ancient times (circa 1960) as [CENSORED]mas..
TV spewed "Happy Holidays!" wishes every which direction, especially local newscasters (TV news, by the way, is what Ken & Barbi did when they grew up; and brother, have they been fruitful and multiplied...) Scoreboard graphics during football games were festooned with the same greeting, as though all networks' equipment was implanted with the same computer virus. Its pervasiveness, though, was the equal of its vacuous genericity. Or hasn't it struck anyone that wishing others "Happy Holidays!" could be done year-round? The next holiday is Groundhog's Day (except for the groundhogs, of course), and then comes Valentine's Day, and St. Patrick's Day, and so on. I'm going to spend Flag Day sending out greeting cards to everybody I know wishing them a "Happy Holiday!", since any old one seems to do.
"Season's Greetings!" is another randomly twisting piece of verbal fluff caught in the spin cycle of the godless. What exactly is that supposed to mean? There are all manner of different seasons: meteorological (spring, summer, fall, winter), hunting (elk, deer, muskrat, mink, goat, fiddler crab, spotted owl, liberal), sports (baseball, football, basketball, hockey, post-, strike-shortened), cooking (dill weed, barbecue spice, celery seed, minced onion, parsley flakes) - well, that one is seasonINGS, but in the great there/not there of the "Winter Festival," what does that matter?
Brian Ward of West Orange, NJ was reprimanded by a high-school principle for singing "God rest ye merry, gentlemen," on school property. Supposedly his exercise of his Constitutional right to free expression "degraded" the religions of fellow students who don't have a "holiday" around the Winter Soltice. At Tufts, Secret Santas have become Secret Snowmen because the store declared that "we're not all Christians," the premise apparently being the misconception that ol' Kris Kringle chose the moment of You Know Who's birth to crash through the stable roof, and squashed Him beneath the inn room he brought for Joseph and Mary.
The public-school calendar in Portland, OR lists every December "holiday" imaginable - Kwanszaa, Hannukah, and that pagan favorite, The First Day of Winter - EXCEPT the C-word. Excision by omission wasn't enough for the city of Pittsburgh, which actually renamed the season of that JC guy's birth "the Sparkle Season." Apparently nobody told the city fathers (and mothers) that those sparkles will go away by putting one's head between one's knees and breathing deeply into a paper bag.
For every instance of silence (other than "Silent Night," of course) and insipidity, there is also the jackboot - with bells attached. At Grand Central station in New York, a [CENSORED]mas tree - which is NOT a [CENSORED]ian symbol - was erected on the condition that it be "balanced" by a menorah instead of a nativity scene. Naturally, a group of Muslims took offense and demanded more "balance" by supplanting both the nativity scene and menorah with a carbomb. Authorities gave up, and the tree fell over, whereupon endangered species activists launched a protest against the destruction of still more spotted owl habitat.
The winner in the cowardice category is the mayor of Richmond, VA, who caved in to the Advocates for Intercultural Richmond subcommittee of the Human Relations Commission and agreed not to put up a [CENSORED]mas tree for fear of offending Richmond's enormous Muslim and Korean communities. Instead, the mayor unveiled (oops, sorry, Muslims) a "Unity Tree" - a large fir with lights and decorations. No, I don't see the difference, either, unless the decorations looked like little sticks of dynamite.
Closing this truly vicious circle ("May the circle...be broken...), another New Jersey school held a contest the object of which was to write down as many "[CENSORED]mas characters" as possible in the allotted time. One team, obviously ignorant of the "holiday spirit," quickly jotted down that JC guy, Mary, Joseph, the three wise men, etc. They got a zero. Why? Because their teacher only awarded points for Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, the Norelco Santa, the Energizer Bunny, Ed McMahon, and President Clinton. The answer "Newt Gingrinch" was worth double.
We are reminded, one more time, of the pretzel into which the First Amendment has been twisted. For [CENSORED]ians to simply exercise their right to freedom of expression is held to be an infringement upon those same rights of their lost countrymen. The cultural majority must be muzzled and repressed to suit the prejudices of the cultural minority, in the hopes that if it can be perpetuated long enough, majority and minority will change places, and those accursed religious kooks can be silenced permanently. An extreme extrapolation, it is true, but we're dealing, in the Religious Left, with extremists. Just ask "Father Frost," the yuletide imposter the old Soviet communist regime conjured to usurp the throne of the God-Man whose name is Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. The Soviet Empire is a pleasantly fading nightmare, and Jesus Christ of Nazareth is still at the right hand of God.
Menorahs do not offend me, nor Christmas trees or Salvation Army Santas. Let Kwanzaa afficianados celebrate whatever it is they celebrate to their heart's content. But anti-Christian bigotry that treats religious traditionalism as being subversive - THAT I have a problem with. It shows just how much the world needs preaching, and a-preaching I am gonna go in 1996.
[And 2005.]
Call it my New Year's resolution.
posted by JASmius at 2:23 AM
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