Monday, December 20, 2010

I want to ban Christmas

Are you one of those people who says things like: “Raaagh burble splutter NOW THEY WANT TO BAN CHRISTMAS it’s disgusting political correctness gone mad multicultural thought police our proud nation liberal elite great traditions militant atheists historic freedoms nanny state two world wars am I alone in thinking snort harrumph froth”?

If so, I always feel a bit sorry for you. My instinct is to tell you that the people who want to ban Christmas don’t really exist, but I fear that that might spoil the festive magic for you. In fact, I suspect many of you (the older ones) have secretly worked out that there is no Christmas Abolition Brigade, but you still like to play along because it makes it all so much more fun and magical.

Well, I have a gift for you. I hereby declare that I want to ban Christmas. And you can quote me on that.

I demand that laws be passed forbidding the use of the C-word and that this time of year be called ‘the holiday season’, ‘the festive period’, ‘Winterval’ or ‘Seculetide’. (I just made Seculetide up just now all by myself and I’m spankingly proud of it.)

I want carol singing to be replaced by readings from The Selfish Gene, I want nativity plays to be dumped in favour of re-enactments of the founding of the European Union, and I want shopping centres to be enlivened by children’s entertainers dressed not as Santa but as Harriet Harman. I will stop at nothing to achieve this.

OK, I don’t want any of this. This is a string of clumsy lies (apart from the ‘stop at nothing’ bit – I will indeed do nothing and then stop). But let’s face it: you people have no interest in truth. You just like to have a bugbear to shout about. And I hereby offer you my services.

Whenever anyone turns around to you and says: “Oh come off it, nobody really wants to ban Christmas,” you can smugly retort: “Ah, but that bloke off of the internet does, HE ADMITS IT! So you see, I’m not a loathsome bullshitter pandering to the paranoia of the ignorant, I’m a BRAVE CRUSADER FOR TRUTH AND OUR VERY WAY OF LIFE can I have some mince pies and a rabies shot now please?”

Merry Seculetide one and all!

(Come on, it’s clever wordplay: secular and yuletide, they both share a ‘ule’ syllable, so you can – oh, never mind.)

5 comments:

Liam Murray said...

In recent years I've noticed the "isn't this banning Christmas nonsense an example of right-wing hysteria" articles themselves becoming something of a trope used without reference to facts.

Our local celebrations (Ayr) ARE called 'Winter Wonderland', Glasgow's festival is indeed branded 'Winterval 2010' as is Edinburgh's I think - so no, Christmas isn't banned but it's certainly been marginalised for some strange reason. So rather than dismiss them out of hand I'd say they're an example of what Dillow calls small-truth-big-error fallacies.

Unless, that is, you get your way.

Have a good holiday...whatever you call it.

Hughes Views said...

Err but Liam, it woz the ancient pagan festivals wot got marginalised by those upstart Christians. And then along came that fat German husband of Q. Victoria to put the icing on the Xmas tree.

British traditions? Mostly humbug. Bah...

Seasonal greetings

Liam Murray said...

True Brian, good point. But it's a bit of a stretch to attribute the current trend against the 'C' word as the stirrings of some aggresive pagan fundamentalism!

I am hoping the Wickerman is on at some point over the next couple of weeks though..

All the best.

Anonymous said...

Liam,

What they are doing is to have a single 'brand' to cover all of the seasonal things that occur in Winter. Often starting from Diwali, sometimes through to Chinese New Year. This is on the basis of trying to attract people to shopping areas for a period of time, and not restricted to just those who will do their Xmas shopping.

Christmas is not excluded from those, it's still there. No-one is trying to ban it (apart from Freeman, obviously), which is what the fuss was about.

I can see that the Scots, with their massive Hogmanay celebrations (and then Burns Night), would want this season to me more than just about Christmas.

As the descendent of a practising (if slightly deluded) Druid, I'm annoyed by all these dodgy foreign ideas that have been supplanting the ancient worship of the Solstice since those Roman invaders turned up.

But I will tolerate these new fangled religions, as long as they don't ban Woad.

Bird of Paradise said...

They whine becuase they dont think its right for everybody to be happy while they blabber about misery and suffering when thats all brought about by those nations communists goverments