Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

From the Quotation of the day mailing list, 2005-12-08:

"In February [2002], CIA lawyers prudently asked for and obtained from the administration a formal exemption from President Bush's pledge to abide by 'the spirit' of the Geneva Conventions. The CIA was aware, if no one else seemed to be, that the new White House policy authorized American officers to commit acts for which the Second World War Allies had hanged Gestapo and SS officers and Japanese prison-camp commanders." -- William Pfaff, columnist and foreign policy writer.

(submitted to the mailing list by Mike Krawchuk)

I just caught a Christmas-themed commercial on television, with a carol as the soundtrack and images of Christmas trees and Santa. [While writing this, a second one came on.] In case anyone hasn't noticed, or is reading this weeks from now without looking at the timestamp, it is not yet Samhain (All Hallows), much less (US) Thanksgiving. I also note that a friend on the other coast described an in-person sighting of Christmas mall-decorations going up already, a few days ago.

May I please get time to enjoy the holidays ahead of it before we get into full Christmas overload (which also makes it harder, at least for me, to enjoy Christmas itself as much)? Clearly, the not-commercialized Christian holidays are getting not only shortchanged, but in the case of All Hallows (aka All Saints Day) and All Souls they're actually being obscured, papered over (in wrapping paper) by the Christmas-and-no-other-holidays crowd. Or is it that they're not-Protestant rather than not-commercial? The non-church-holiday-but-still-with-religious-overtones Thanksgiving is being denied its proper time in our attention as well, saved from being completely ignored only thanks to its football matches and ... its customary, but now apparently obsolete, role marking the start of the Commercemas Christmas shopping season. And Samhain, the Celtic New Year holiday from which we borrowed some of our older All Saints Eve (Hallow E'en) traditions and use as the inspiration excuse for most of our modern ones is clearly a major target of this War On All Holidays Other Than Christmas -- are the Catholic holidays serious targets as well, or mere "collateral damage" in this war?

Either way, it's clear that the economic weight of Christmas, the 800-pound gorilla of holidays, is being used to crush other holidays, drive them into obscurity, and prevent those of us who value tradition and wish to remember the reason for every season from being permitted to properly celebrate Other Holidays as they are meant to be celebrated -- that is, as holidays in their own right, not merely as landmarks on the road to Christmas!

We who care about any of these other holidays must stand up for our rights! Do not let them diminish the rest of the holidays! We are being oppressed, and if we do not challenge this annual expansion of Christmas, stop the slide down this slippery slope, sooner or later there will be nothing left in the calendar -- no Flag Day, no Independence Day, no Easter, only Christmas, Boxing Day, and three hundred and sixty three days of Christmas Eve! Look at how Lincoln's and Washington's birthdays have already been crushed, smooshed together into a single, unremarkable (except for linen sales) "Presidents Day"! Every holiday you hold dear is at risk if you do not act.

The Jewish major holidays have been poorly represented in public consciousness for a long time, with the minor Channukah elevated to prominence as part of the backdrop for Christmas. And the Muslim calendar is so poorly understood on these shores that most people have no clue when its holidays are -- count the number of times you hear "Happy Ramadan" this December despite the month of Ramadan having ended about a week before the end of October (this year ... it'll be even funnier in years when Ramadan happens in July). I've already mentioned what happened to George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, and to assorted Catholic Holidays that Aren't Christmas. So I say to you: Muslims, you are being oppressed; Catholics, you are being oppressed; Patriots, you are being oppressed; Jews, you are being oppressed (yet again); and Protestants who believe Easter is a more important religious holiday than Christmas (everybody has a birthday -- how many have a rebirth-day, huh?), you too are being oppressed! Old-calendar Orthodox Christians, you are being oppressed (do you think any of these Noelists are going to wish you Merry Christmas in January? But you do get to take advantage of the "after Christmas" sales for your Christmas shopping, which is some compensation...) So it's clearly not simply a "Christians gainst everybody else" thing, as some of the Christmas Over Everything people try to portray it, since even some (many!) Christians get short shrift here -- don't let them get away with this.

Protest to the shopkeepers, those craven servants of "political correctness" who have bowed to the pressure of the Noelists (or have been bribed by their shopping money) to replace these other holidays with ever more Christmas, however they try to Disguise their Christmasism with supposedly innocuous "Happy Holidays" (as if they were paying attention to any holidays not contemporaneous with Christmas -- ha!) and "Season's Greetings" (note how no other season is credited with its own greeting?). Boycott the stores, even entire malls, that start Christmas too early and trample the freedom of those who would celebrate Hallowe'en and Thanksgiving as holidays separate from Christmas, preferring to celebrate Christmas in its own season instead of in other holidays' time! Make certain that the media understand that we are tired of this War Against Holidays Other Than Christmas and that we are equally tired of being dismissed as inconsequential cranks. Remind them that we speak for countless others too cowed by commercial political correctness to give voice to their own dismay at the obscuring of the other holidays -- the lurkers support us in email!. Insist on being greeted with "The Monster Mash" instead of Christmas carols tomorrow and the next day, with "Boo!" or "Happy Hallowe'en" instead of garlands and Christmas trees. Insist that until Thanksgiving we honour the memory of those who settled this great nation , and overeating, with pretty autumnal brown and orange and gold (which make the red and green and tinsel of Christmas seem all the more special when they show up as the transition from the Thanksgiving decorations than when they've been up so long they become background noise -- the Noelists are harming their own favourite holiday in their quest to drive all other holidays down). If you enter a store before Thanksgiving and see a Santa hat, find the manager and insist it be replaced by a hat with a buckle on it. Don't let them crush our holidays!

And if anybody says anything about a so-called "War On Christmas", remind them that Christmas started it!