Wednesday, November 27, 2013

Let's Declare a Truce in the "War on Christmas" This Year

Yes, folks.  It's that time of year again.  The time where we break out the decorations, spend ourselves into near bankruptcy, and when the extremist amongst us continue their never-ending "War on Christmas".  This is the fake culture war ginned up by FOX News every year, and exists solely in the minds of Bible-thumpers who get their Jesus-panties in a bunch when their favorite retail store puts up a sign that says "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas", and Atheists who get like Damien from "The Omen" and go into conniption fits whenever they see a Nativity display.  Sadly, those of us who would love to just get through the holidays in relative peace usually wind up in the midst of stupid nonsensical family arguments over when Jesus was born, whether Christmas is really a religious or secular holiday, and whether or not America was founded as a Christian nation.  (Newsflash, people: IT WASN'T.)  We, the vast majority of reasonably sane people in America, would like to respectfully ask that we not do this thing this year.  Just once, let's give the "War on Christmas" meme a rest.

With everything going on in the world today, war, poverty, sickness, general human suffering (you know, those things Jesus actually cared about), if your biggest concern every Holiday as a Christian is whether your kid's school calls it a "Holiday" party instead of a "Christmas" party, of if the mayor of your little bass-ackwards town calls the town tree a "Holiday" tree, then I suggest you immediately (a.) open your Bible, (b) READ IT for once, and (c) go take a look in the nearest mirror and re-evaluate how you practice your faith, because clearly YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG.  Besides which, you can't possibly expect anyone to take you seriously as a Christian when you claim to want to "keep the Christ in Christmas", but refuse to tip your Gay waiter because you don't like his/her lifestyle.

And to my Atheist friends, you all know that I love and respect you.  I respect your right to believe as you wish, and I'm perfectly ok to let you do you.  But you have to understand that most of us just aren't into your thing.  Furthermore, you have to realize that every year from September to around the middle of February you're going to be inundated with Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, Santa Claus, mistletoe, deck the halls, and all the rest.  So just deal with it.  Seriously, hide in a closet somewhere for the next few weeks if you don't want to be bothered with Christmas, but don't go trying to steal everyone else's joy just because we choose to believe something you do not.  Exactly how does it make you any better than the Bible thumpers to insist that any and all references to religion be totally scrubbed from the holiday?  The truth is, it doesn't.

When it comes to the holidays, I tend to take the attitude of Ebenezer Scrooge.  Yeah, he was a bit of a jerk (at least before the spirits of Christmas past, present, and future got to him), but he did make a good point in the beginning, "You keep Christmas in your way, and let me keep it in mine."  Let's do that, shall we?  Let's just let each other do his/her own thing this holiday season without all the drama, whether your thing is "Merry Christmas", "Happy Holidays", or "Bah, Humbug".  And for those of you who insist on having this insipid argument every year, find a beach somewhere to carry out your little crusade and just consider the rest of us civilians AWOL.

Happy Thanksgiving.

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