Merry Holidays
A friend was telling me about some people at work making the following complaint, "I mean, I don't understand why people get so mad about saying Merry Christmas. It's Merry something. Shouldn't that be a nice thing to say?"
Now forgetting the question of whether or not an offended person is justified or being overly sensitive (I would lean to the latter as well), what I'm wondering is who is the person talkin
g about? Did they say Merry Xmas to a coworker and get shot down? I don't think so. I think they've created this phantom person and are now annoyed at them. Which to me seems a little ridiculous. Like, if you think "Tonya" is too adamant about her Hinduism, think that. But don't get all riled up about "these people" that may not even exist. I feel like people are so paranoid about offending people, that they watch how they speak and then get bitter at the fact that they just self-censored themselves. Whose fault is that?
Or maybe I'm wrong. I don't know anyone who cares, but maybe you all have a friend who
responds to, "Merry Christmas," with, "Excuse me, Hanukah's a holiday too," or, "I only celebrate Kwanza, thank you very much." And maybe I'm the insensitive one, and it really is upsetting to be the oddball during Xmas time. But in the end, I think, that 99% of the people who hear, "Merry Christmas," don't think twice about it.
Now forgetting the question of whether or not an offended person is justified or being overly sensitive (I would lean to the latter as well), what I'm wondering is who is the person talkin
g about? Did they say Merry Xmas to a coworker and get shot down? I don't think so. I think they've created this phantom person and are now annoyed at them. Which to me seems a little ridiculous. Like, if you think "Tonya" is too adamant about her Hinduism, think that. But don't get all riled up about "these people" that may not even exist. I feel like people are so paranoid about offending people, that they watch how they speak and then get bitter at the fact that they just self-censored themselves. Whose fault is that?Or maybe I'm wrong. I don't know anyone who cares, but maybe you all have a friend who
responds to, "Merry Christmas," with, "Excuse me, Hanukah's a holiday too," or, "I only celebrate Kwanza, thank you very much." And maybe I'm the insensitive one, and it really is upsetting to be the oddball during Xmas time. But in the end, I think, that 99% of the people who hear, "Merry Christmas," don't think twice about it.Labels: Religion
posted by chuckdaddy2000 at 11:15 am
6 Comments:
i don't really care too much about someone saying 'merry xmas' to me, but let's turn it around - if all muslims in the U.S. got together and started saying 'merry allahday' to everyboy and began making signs and lights based on it during ramadan, the fundies would be shitting a brick about it. some of the biggest preachers at the mega-churches would stop their secret gay activities for 5 minutes to preach to their 'flock' all about the evils of allowing the 'merry allahdays'sign down at the local Buy-Mart....
i wonder what my hero richard dawkins thinks about this subject. i'd definitely defer to his wisdom. but the more i think about it, the more i'm in favor of getting rid of anything associated with religion, however loosely, in order to get people thinking about it to quicken its demise ever faster. so from now on it's just 'happy holidays' from me
Merry Christmas!
Christmas has very little to do with Christianity these day. Should be changed to Merry CreditCard Debt Day!
Is Jesus still the reason for the season?
I saw a strange sign at Pioneer square last weekend. Someone was protesting a Xmas fest with a sign that read, "Don't celebrate! Christmas is a Catholic Pagan Holiday!!"
Now, I've heard that Jesus was probably born like in the summer, but they put Xmas when it is to correspond with pagan holidays. But why the Catholic comment? Just because everyone was Catholics? Just general animosity towards Catholics? Or just the rantings of a crazed religious freak?
Hey, I don't celebrate Ramadan, but I still want to be happy while it's going on. You can wish me well any damn time you want to. If you are handing me an evangelical pamphlet while you're doing it, I might get a little testy.
Joyous Yuletide to everybody in the ChuckDaddyXpress community. This is the best blog ever.
M5M
Mrs. Chuckdaddy here, making a guest appearance. Thank you all for making Chuckdaddy a happy blogger.
Where I work, U.S.-born Americans are the minority. I share a workspace with a Venezuelan, a Somali Bantu, and a Somali. I have two supervisors, one of whom is Vietnamese; the other is Ukrainian. When it's Eid (end of Ramadan), I eat potluck with my Muslim co-workers and wish them a Happy Eid.
To be clear here, I'm not a big devotee of the little baby Jesus. We're not really "tight," so to speak. However, I do come from a long line of Protestant Hoosier farmers and I grew up with a big Christmas celebration. And I like it a lot. I like the Christmas tree, I like Christmas music, and I like the memories of Christmas at my Grandparents. And I really, really like being wished a Merry Christmas. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy all over.
So I guess here's my point:
I don't look forward to a time or place where we have to homogenize our holidays or to employ euphemisms for fear of offending our fellow humans. I'd like to think that we aren't so sensitive nor our intentions so unkind that we can't freely wish and receive glad tidings for ALL of our holidays.
Although a stretch, here's to a little more kindness and a little more Peace in 2007.
Mazel Tov.
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