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Sunday, December 04, 2005
What the Hell is a 'Holiday Tree?'
What the Hell is a 'Holiday Tree?'
I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the world's biggest Christmas fanatic, aside from giving gifts. I don't put up a tree, I don't decorate, I don't bake cookies and I don't sing Christmas carols (well, not while sober). I don't send out Christmas cards. I don't wear red and green clothing. I don't run down the street shouting, "Merry Christmas!" to everyone I see, like Jimmy Stewart in It's A Wonderful Life.
How outrageously self-centered would I have to be, though, to consider myself "offended" when others do those things?
82% of Americans belong to one Christian denomination or another, according to a 2002 Pew research poll, while only 1% consider themselves athiests. An ABCNEWS/Beliefnet poll conducted the year before showed the number of Christians to be 83%. Only a tiny percentage of non-Christians take offense when the vast majority of Americans don't hide their religion. And why should they? Don't they have a right, guaranteed by the First Amendment to the Constitution, to the "free exercise" of their religion? Yet the loudly-complaining far Left demands that no one be allowed to "offend" them. I have yet to see a Constitutional right to "freedom FROM religion."
In recent years, the attack on public recognition of the major religion in this country has become offensive in itself. More stores are advertising "holiday sales," more organisations are holding "holiday parties" and more people are putting up "holiday trees" every year. Even the Capitol Christmas Tree had come to be called a "holiday tree" since the late 1990s, until House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) forced its offical name to return to normal this year. Fear of giving offense to 1% of the population is causing a great deal of offense among the rest of us. If I lived in a country where the population was more than 80% Muslim, I don't think I'd complain about public celebrations of Ramadan. If I lived in Israel, I wouldn't demand they refer to the menorah as a "holiday candlestick" just for me.
What the hell is a "holiday tree," anyway? What's it for?
I was recently invited to a "holiday party" by a local Republican group. I will not attend, on the grounds that they didn't specify precisely what holiday they're celebrating. Is it Christmas? Hannukah? St. Lucia's Day? The Feast of St. Nicholas? Portugese Independence Day? Winter Solstice? A Week Before The End Of The Year Day? Baby-Eating Day? (I'm sure the Liberals would believe that.) I could get into a good old-fashioned Saturnalia, but I need time to get my tunic dry-cleaned. I don't celebrate generic holidays. If they aren't important enough for you to name them, they aren't important enough for me to celebrate them with you.
When they're done savaging Christmas, perhaps the militant secularists will go after Easter. How much fun will it be when the Holiday Bunny leaves Holiday baskets full of Holiday candy for the kiddies to find? After the children dye and decorate Holiday eggs, you can hide them and have a Holiday Egg Hunt. Maybe the whole family can watch the Holiday Parade on tv.
How does that sound any more ridiculous than secularising Christmas -- changing a tradition of centuries, celebrated by millions of families, just to appease a tiny, hate-driven minority? Do you think they wouldn't force Bing Crosby to re-record his biggest hit song as "I'm Dreaming of a White Holiday," if they could? Or would the Political Correctness Police have a problem with that, too? After all, there isn't much snow in the South, and children there might feel left out.
No one will make you celebrate Christmas at gunpoint. No one will kidnap you and drag you to a Christmas party, force you to sing Christmas carols off-key or demand that you wish anyone a "Merry Christmas." No one will make you enjoy yourself. You are free to not celebrate, as I am free to celebrate, a holiday that was a part of American society before there was a United States. If I wish you a "Merry Christmas," try not to launch into a diatribe about how I'm forcing religion down your throat.
Maybe I'll put up a Christmas tree, after all... just in case any militant secularists happen by.
Posted at Sunday, December 04, 2005 by CavalierX
 | | | Name
December 4, 2005 06:05 PM PST
Jokes on them. Holiday means holy-day. Whenever some PC idiot wishes you a happy holidays, come back with "happy holy-days to you too". | |
| | | Irish Diablo
December 4, 2005 08:17 PM PST
Hey Cav, I beat you to this story a good week or so ago. I was nearly as extensive, in fact, I got to the point in a few paragraphs. | |
| | | Name
December 4, 2005 08:32 PM PST
I wish I had written this. Well done, and MERRY CHRISTMAS! | |
| | | Jamie
December 4, 2005 10:19 PM PST
Merry Christmas and happy Holy-days to you, too!
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| | | JM
December 5, 2005 08:47 AM PST
Thanks, Jamie and... Name(s). Have a Merry Christmas. | |
| | | JM
December 5, 2005 08:50 AM PST
>I beat you to this story a good
>week or so ago
Well, gee whiz, Jimmy Olson, I guess you "broke" the shocking news that the Left is engaged in a War on Christmas. :) | |
| | | SalGal
December 5, 2005 11:18 AM PST
I am commanding everyone at my blog to visit this one just for this entry. You rock, Cav! | |
| | | Shellie
December 5, 2005 02:41 PM PST
Well said! I don't know where I've been this CHRISTMAS season but I've been slowly hearing about all this "holiday" crap. I agree with "Name" Happy HOLY-Days & Merry CHRIST-mas to all! | |
| | | Name
December 5, 2005 10:06 PM PST
I think everyone's missing the point. The problem is not with individuals celebrating christmas, but the government doing so using tax money that was contributed by non-christians as well! | |
| | | JM
December 5, 2005 10:21 PM PST
>The problem is not with
>individuals celebrating christmas,
>but the government doing so
Actually, the problem is self-righteous Leftists telling others what to do and how to think. As for the government recognising Christmas -- by which I assume you mean the federal government -- there's nothing wrong with it. If you think so, let's put it to a nationwide vote, shall we? | |
| | | Name
December 6, 2005 12:41 AM PST
There's a difference between the govt recognising Christmas and govt celebrating it -- "buying", and "decorating" the christmas tree with taxpayers' money. Sure, it may not amount to anything significant, but separation of church & state is important nevertheless. Let me take it to an extreme: if the next president turns out to be a muslim and he organizes big feasts at the govt's expense for breaking ritual fasts, would that be considered okay?
Your suggestion of taking a nationwide vote goes against the pluralism of the country. The majority's opinion is essential for maintaining civil peace, but should not be an instrument of enforcing opinions on others: that is out of place in a democracy. | |
| | | JM
December 6, 2005 04:44 AM PST
>There's a difference between the
>govt recognising Christmas and
>govt celebrating it
Not really, since it's a Federal holiday. You don't like it, here's what you do: get your Congressman to write a bill taking Christmas off the federal calendar, and see how far that gets.
>separation of church & state
No such thing. Please point it out in the Constitution. If you think the First Amendment does it, you're wrong. The First Amendment says that the Federal government may not create an official State religion, such as England had. For more information:
http://guardian.blogdrive.com/archive/192.html
>Let me take it to an extreme
No, because that would be ridiculous. If going to the extreme is the only way for you to make your point, you've already lost the argument. If we elect representatives to Congress who vote to make Ramadan an official Federal holiday, that's democracy in action. The government works for us, not the other way around.
>Your suggestion of taking a
>nationwide vote goes against the
>pluralism of the country
Right, because in Liberalworld, the minority controls the majority. I'm sure that's hidden in the Constitution, too.
>enforcing opinions on others
Who is forcing you to celebrate Christmas? Who is forcing you to go to church? I want names and addresses. Tell you what -- when I get to specify how every dollar of my tax money is spent, so do you. Until then, you vote for people who will do things the way YOU want, and I'll vote for people who will do things the way I want, and we'll see who's in the majority. Fair enough? That's how a Republic works. | |
| | | Laura
December 6, 2005 03:09 PM PST
At least for the present this is a free country with free speech. Why is it that everywhere I turn the liberals are telling me what I can say and what I should believe? We seem to be gathering speed down the hill to Socialism/Marxism. | |
| | | Juliet
December 6, 2005 03:51 PM PST
I'm going to a Republican Christmas party tonight. I'm pretty sure they said "Christmas" though. | |
| | | JM
December 6, 2005 08:30 PM PST
>We seem to be gathering speed
>down the hill to
>Socialism/Marxism.
We were, all right... the 1990's were one long drowsy slide down the slippery slope. But we're awake now, and we're not going to let the Libs lull us back to sleep. | |
| | | JM
December 6, 2005 08:31 PM PST
>I'm pretty sure they
>said "Christmas" though.
ROFL... Keep me posted! | |
| | | Name
December 6, 2005 10:18 PM PST
I showed an extreme case only to highlight the flaws in this policy, not to take a position.
Nobody ever said they were forced to celebrate Christmas, I merely pointed out that the govt's christmas celebrations are paid by many non-Christians hard earned tax money, which is unfair.
Your position of "you're not majority? hard luck" is befitting for a theocratic country like Saudi arabia or iran that we all love to advise and "democratize", but not a plural society like usa. Remember, the strength of a society shows in the way it treats its minorities. | |
| | | JM
December 6, 2005 10:32 PM PST
>I showed an extreme case only to
>highlight the flaws in this policy
Reductio ad Absurdum is Liberal Rule for Arguing #6.
>the govt's christmas celebrations
>are paid by many non-Christians
>hard earned tax money, which is
>unfair
Grab a bullhorn and mount a soapbox in the town square, scream out your objection to Christmas being a Federal holiday until the cows come home. I already told you how to change it -- by democratic means. I object to MY hard-earned tax dollars being spent on entitlement programs and pork barrel spending. Bet more people agree with me than you. When I get to personally decide how the government spends my tax dollars, so will you. I think that's fair.
>Your position of "you're not
>majority? hard luck" is befitting
>for a theocratic country
And what sort of theocracy would an agnostic like myself advocate? ROFL!! Perhaps you'd better look up the definition of "democracy" before embarrasing yourself further.
>the strength of a society shows in
>the way it treats its minorities.
Ahh, so now those few who don't celebrate Christmas are persecuted, denied jobs, hunted down and herded into "re-education" camps, are they? Liberal melodrama cracks me up. No one will force you to celebrate Christmas. No one will nail a wreath to your door and point a gun at you until you sing "Holy Night." If they do, you let me know. | |
| | | SalGal
December 7, 2005 11:48 AM PST
I wouldn't have any problem with a Muslim President that gave a Ramadan feast at the taxpayers expense and I'm a full-on Conservative Christian Republican (except that kind of sounds redundant). There are TONS of things I don't want my tax dollars spent on, but you can't make everybody happy all of the time. Give and take. Take and give. Quit whining about how unfair it is to you and start finding ways to make it better for yourself. My rudimentary understanding of what democracy means is you vote and the majority wins. So if you don't like it, get you and your like-minded friends together and vote for enough candidates to get you into the majority. Even the majority has respect for the little guy, we're not heartless. Just you are. | |
| | | TCM
December 8, 2005 05:00 AM PST
Commercialism aside, the religious aspect of Christmas has been largely overshadowed by the spirit, which is a shame. Many children look forward to presents every year but have no idea why they're getting them. But be it Christmas, Chanukah, Kwanzaa, Saturnalia, or Xmas, people all over the world celebrate the spirit of kindness, generosity, and goodwill. Since when have these been Liberal traits? If the idiotic Left has it way, we'll soon be saying "peace on earth and goodwill toward persons," and someone will want to boycott Linus. Let's hope that day never comes. Merry Christmas, Cavalier, and thanks for another great post! | |
| | | JM
December 8, 2005 05:18 AM PST
>peace on earth
Hey, aren't you being a little "Terracentric" here? Well, have a Merry Christmas anyway. :) | |
| | | Name
December 8, 2005 09:09 PM PST
Great Post...........For the guy that said he went to extreems? He didn't , he went INSANE!! A Muslim president in THIS country????? Come on now.............Not in my liftime...... | |
| | | mannning
December 14, 2005 06:00 PM PST
Maybe we can squash the Grinches and Scrooge Stores of this nation by simply boycotting them!
In any event, Merry Christmas. | |
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