Saturday, December 05, 2015

'Tis the season

To be clueless

One of my family members posted (or, rather, re-posted) a cheery little Christmas manifesto: How dare anyone besmirch the holiday season by inflicting “Happy Holidays” on Yuletide revelers, thereby harshing their Jesus buzz.


The three exclamation points really clinch the argument, as I'm sure you'll agree. Except that I didn't. I offered a mild demurrer:
This is not something worth a fight over. If someone wishes you “Happy Holidays,” it might just be a polite Jewish person who is mostly left out of the whole Christmas business. It might be a store worker who is merely following instructions not to make assumptions about the affiliations of the customers. It takes away from the spirit of the season to get worked up about this and it's probably not good for the blood pressure.
If you're anticipating my relative's reaction, you may well be thinking I was instantly subjected to a barrage of abuse, denunciation, and name-calling. Well, that would be wrong. My relative promptly agreed with me. But check out the actual wording:
Feel the same way. It was meant for those who accuse those of us who are entitled to our beliefs & customs as causing discomfort to other groups when we are expected to be considerate of their celebrations.
Ah, yes. It was merely a mild-mannered belligerence in the service of Christian peace and love. How could anyone object?

I put this in the same category as people who wave their Confederate “heritage-pride” flags and pretend to be amazed when others take offense.

5 comments:

Steve Watson said...

You know who the biggest Christmas-spoilers for me are? The ass-hats who made this an issue. In my 58 years,, I've been (in order) an agnostic, a Christian, and now an atheist, and never at any time until this idiotically trivial "issue" was invented did I worry about exactly what greeting to use at this time of year.

Kathie said...

Wishing you and your blog followers a Happy Winter Solstice, Zeno! Only three months after that until the Vernal Equinox :-)

BTW, does the syntax of your family member's second sentence seem as unclear to you as it does to me?

The Ridger said...

They've got an as where they want an of.

" All holidays matter ", right?

turtle said...

there is never to many voices of reason. cheers.

Kaleberg said...

Are there really still people who don't believe in New Years? I think even the Russian Orthodox Old Calendrists and New Calendrists agree on this even if they don't agree on when the year begins.