What's wrong with "Merry Christmas"?

[sistermagpie]

> Tonks:
> I think that Geoff is saying what many Christians in the U.S. feel 
> and that is that pe ople who are not Christian and hostile to 
> Christianity are trying to remove any signs of Christianity from 
the 
> country.

Magpie:
I didn't think that's what he's saying--it doesn't sound like that. 
He's not in the same country. Afaik there isn't the same debate going 
on there.

Tonks:
> This “war on Christmas” would be the same as some group in a 
Muslim 
> country trying to eradicate the Muslim religion from that country 
> bit by bit. (of course, it would be much harder there since there 
is 
> no seperation of church and state.)

Magpie:
By "War on Christmas" I was referring to the imo completely bogus 
campaign to claim that anybody's trying to get rid of Christmas or 
any Christians are being kept from openly celebrating it. 
Christianity isn't being eradicated bit by bit imo--there is no war 
on it. What you describe as "Christians seeing where it's leading" is 
imo mistaken. It just seems ironic to on the one hand reminisce about 
the days when non-Christians allegedly didn't exist and then in the 
next breath claim that Christianity is being eradicated bit by bit. 
Those other people weren't eradicated back then and they were getting 
less acknowledgement than Christianity is getting. 

Tonks:
> When a company that I do business with in the U.S. and the U.K. 
both 
> send me the same e-greeting card after 5:00pm on Dec. 24th and the 
> one from the U.S. says "Happy Holliday" and the one from the U.K. 
> says "Merry Christmas", that says to me that the corportations in 
> the U.S. are going overboard on political correctness. Just 
> what "holiday" are they talking about? CHRISTMAS! Damn it... call 
it 
> what it IS.

Magpie:
The fact that you feel frightened at the fact that your card isn't 
specific enough to Christmas says Christinaity is still enjoying a 
very priviledged place in the US to me. Nothing's been eradicated in 
that e-mail. And of course no religious observance has any reason to 
expect a corporate e-mail to mention it anyway.

Tonks:
You missed my point. Don't wish me a Happy Holiday on December 25th.
It is no other Holiday that I know of except Christmas. (I thought
that Yule was on the longest night or something and that was not on
Dec. 25th. this year.)

Magpie:
Fine, you're annoyed that on Christmas Eve it seems a lot more 
obvious to just give an actual Christmas greeting but is that really 
something to call a "war" or claim your religion is being eradicated? 
Maybe the company is sending a mass e-mailing and so knows that it's 
going to go to at least some people who don't celebrate Christmas and 
they think it makes more sense to use an inclusive greeting so that 
the non-Christian isn't getting a specific wishing of Christmas while 
the other person is getting an inclusive greeting. The "holiday" in 
that case meaning they hope they have a happy day off. They don't 
have to send a greeting at all, but I can easily imagine them saying 
hey, let's send out a mass e-mailing to all our clients. I guess we 
should make it neutral since we don't know all their backgrounds. 
That seems more natural to me than them saying let's not wish anybody 
merry Christmas because we're trying to get rid of it.

Of course, speaking of the past, I also remember when "happy 
Holidays" meant Christmas and New Year's and it didn't occur to 
anyone to think it was anti-Christmas.

Tonks:
The ones on the other side of the fence, such as Alla are younger
and live in big cities like New York. New York city and a town with
the population of 3,000 (or even 36,000 where I live now.) in Mid-
American are too very different worlds. So to some extent, we are
not even fighting the same battle here. IMO.

Magpie:
Right--and what's the battle, exactly? Because it seems like your 
point is that you're used to total Christmas world where no one else 
exists and don't like having less priviledge that way. I just don't 
think this indicates your religion is actually in any danger any more 
than a Jewish person's personal religion or ability to celebrate 
Passover was in danger back when your small town always said Merry 
Christmas. As you say, you don't want to lose the culture you know 
and love, but you yourself admit that that culture is based on the 
privileging of your religion over others. I can understand not liking 
the change, but think it's unfair to claim its the same as being 
persecuted or forbidden to practice your religion or celebrate 
Christmas openly.

Tonks:
One of the companies that I work for sent a memo around saying that
we say "Merry Christmas", that we are not a "Happy Holiday"
company. I applauded him for being so bold. Then I realize that I
have been so brainwashed by society in recent years to say “Happy
Holidays”, I couldn’t bring myself to say Merry Christmas until 
two days before Christmas. I even met other people in the street that 
I know are Christian and they know that I am and we both blurted
out "Happy Holiday", what is wrong with this picture?!! We are being
conditioned by society. A society that apparently has changed and I
want it to stay the same as it was in my childhood… at least at
Christmas.

Magpie:
And nobody arrested them for sending out a memo directing everyone to 
wish everyone the Christian holiday? Looks like Christmas is in no 
danger then, doesn't it? Is your being "conditioned" to say Happy 
Holidays first really such a tragedy when as you yourself say you can 
just as easily say merry Christmas if you so choose? I know I'm one 
of the people coming from one of those areas of the country that's 
always been aware of non-Christians, but to me this sounds like 
psyching yourself up to be less polite--your boss just officially 
chose to make sure Christmas-celebrators be personally validated 
rather than lean slightly the other way and avoid reminding 
minorities that they are minorities.

Tonks:
I rest my case!! This was a CHRISTMAS concert, but they felt they
could not call it that. It was not an all inclusive Holiday concert,
and you were offended by that. That is just my point. Something that
is a Christmas 'tree', or concert can not be called what it
obviously is, because the PC police feels it will offend someone.
And you were right to be offended anyway, because it was not
a "Holiday" concert. If it were really a "Holiday" concert it would
have been more inclusive. It should have been called a Christmas
concert, because that is what it was! I am not saying that I am
opposed to a "Holiday" concert, but don't take one thing and try to
call it something that it is obviously not.

Magpie:
Err...she said it was a winter concert/holiday concert, didn't she? 
It was supposed to be inclusive, and it still leaned heavily towards 
Christmas. The "holiday tree" business is, imo, completely 
exaggerated, part of drumming up fear for this supposed war on 
Christmas. If somebody wants to call their decorated tree a holiday 
tree because it's public property or whatever, that's not them 
telling you what to call your tree, it's you complaining about what 
they're calling their tree. It's maybe annoying if somebody calls it 
a Holiday tree, but there aren't any real p.c. police. The only time 
anybody could be told to call them that is, presumably, if they're on 
some property and somebody complains--which is little different from 
your boss announcing that he (and all his employees) should say merry 
Christmas because you're a merry Christmas company.

Susan:
> >
> But it shouldn't have been a Christmas concert.
>
> It should have been a concert that encompassed the beliefs of ALL 
the
> children at the school...and I know personally several who are 
Jewish

Tonks:

How odd, if it were a 'school' concert, that any religious songs would
be done at all. Was it just a concert that rented the school space, or
something actually put on by the 'school'? I am inclined to think that
it was a group renting the space. I went to see the Islamic Sufi
Whirling Dervish dancers at a school one night, but it was not a 
school
function. I was under the impression that if it is a school function
that not even songs talking about Santa can be sung. I know that Santa
can no longer visit schools in my area.

Magpie:
She was there, I would think she knows what was going on. Maybe the 
p.c. police haven't eradicated Christianity and in fact kids are 
allowed to sing Christmas Carols with reference to Christianity in 
school? She said they also included a Hannukkah song, which is also 
possibly religious. Choosing to leave out any actual religious 
Christmas Carols is probably down to individual people involved, both 
parents complaining or administrators deciding what people will want. 
We're just working through this stuff now, there's going to be 
compromising and people on both sides making demands. I mean, it 
seems odd that you said it was "bold" on the part of your employer to 
send out a company wide memo validating Christmas but then think a 
school couldn't sing a Christmas Carol. I work for an actual church 
corporation and nobody's ever told me what I'm supposed to say to 
anyone.

Magpie:
> I'm afraid I still don't get it.

> But who are you referring to here? Are you making a comment about
> what I guess would be just called "bad Christians?" Or "weak 
Christians?"
> People you don't think practice their faith correctly--like 
basically
> an internal disagreement amongst people of the same church?

Geoff:
Just in passing, I have to say that I didn't quite get what you were
referring to in the above paragraph.

Magpie:
Sorry, I meant I didn't understand what phenomenon you were referring 
to when you talked about people "diluting" Christianity etc. '

Re: HP, Brit-picking (going through stories to remove things that 
stick out as wrong for Great Britain) is an important part of HP 
fanfic for most writers. People still get it wrong, and there are 
writers who are lazy, but I just thought you might like knowing that 
in general making the story correct in terms of British culture is 
considered a basic requirement for quality. So many authors have 
specific people to go through their stories and make corrections, and 
there are communities for questions about the culture etc. And people 
blatantly sticking in Americanisms are loudly mocked.:-)

That said, I assume that a lot of this conversation is very US-
centric. 

Tonks:
'Norm' means what is commonly accepted as what the average person
does, or what the majority of people do. And the culture that I love
at Christmas use to be the norm almost everywhere in the U.S. If you
are 56, you remember that. Unless you have always lived in
California. The culture that I knew in my youth is gone, and I can't
say that it is being replaced with something better. ;-(

Magpie:
I completely sympathize with your feeling times have changed. But I 
just have to point out that more than once when you've described this 
culture and how good it was, you've even defined it by being 
exclusive, depending on different people not existing when of course 
they did exist. It seems like it's easier for me to say Happy 
Holidays without feeling like I've lost anything, so I can't really 
understand how that feels. But I still don't think that makes it 
persecution or the eradication of anything. 

Trying to please everyone is always going to require compromise and 
probably few people will be truly happy about it. We haven't yet 
worked it out yet. Many groups are used to not having their holiday 
even known by most people, much less acknowledged just because they 
walked into a store. So for another group to say--whoa! A company is 
not specifically validating the holiday that I personally am 
celebrating? That's oppressive! It just seems a little silly.

Carol:
Until about ten years ago, people, including store clerks, wished each
other Merry Christmas and thought nothing of it. The greeting was
warmly given and warmly received. No one had heard of a holiday tree,
holiday card, holiday stamp. Now store managers order their employees
to wish customers "happy holidays," a meaningless generic greeting.

Magpie:
I didn't, and I was a store clerk about ten years ago. I said Happy 
Holidays unless somebody wished me merry Christmas first, which of 
course meant that's what they celebrated. Since my store had a pretty 
big Jewish clientele, it was natural for me to not automatically say 
Merry Christmas. It was just as warmly given and warmly received, and 
there was nothing meaningless about it. Like I said, I remember 
when 'Happy holidays' meant Christmas and New Year's as well, and 
wasn't considered anti-Christmas.

Carol:
 It's a
specific holiday you care about, and I'm sure you don't want it to get
lost in the mishmash that makes every day from Thanksgiving to New
Year's Day "the holidays" in the U.S. I haven't decided whether the
desire of merchants to make a profit or political correctness is more
to blame, but the loss of specific holidays, each with their own
identity and significance, is, to me, a sad loss.

Magpie:
Except you haven't lost it. If you know what holiday somebody 
celebrates you're perfectly welcome to wish it to them, just as you 
just said Happy New Year. Specific holidays with their own identity 
and significance is understandably a little at odds with crowds of 
strangers. If it's about greeting the person in a way that will give 
them the most pleasure, it just seems logical to me--your ideal is to 
avoid wishing them a dominant holiday that they don't celebrate and 
so might already make them feel a little left out and to wish them 
the holiday they do celebrate.

-m