Your funders are showing.

" . . .let's just accept Christmas for what it is -- a crass, commercial holiday with the occasional good deed."

Crass definition: So crude and unrefined as to be lacking in discrimination and sensibility.

A not very subtle smear of Christianity, Tyee.

Janie Jones ...

Christmas is not exclusively Christian. It's not even really legitimately Christian for that matter. And your quote says nothing regarding Christianity, does it.

Christians just more or less adopted Christmas in the relatively recent past as yet another mode of proselytization of their social control goals.

Historically, Christmas, as we know it in North America, was tailored primarily for commercial purposes.

If you're interested in reading a legitimate history of Christmas, without theist misdirection and fluff, pick up The Battle For Christmas by Stephen Nissenbaum. A very interesting, entertaining, and very well researched piece of history.

Point of historic fact: For several generations now Christmas in North America is inarguably precisely what the writer said, "a crass, commercial holiday with the occasional good deed."

"Three Little Bears"

As far as Xmas carols go, please don't forget "Three Little Bears" on "Merry Christmas and Happy New Year" and performed by The Jimi Hendrix Experience. Another classic.
WRT Xmas being a Christian feast, it is. But almost all civilizations have a holiday or celebration at this time because it is the winter equinox and most civilizations celebrated the shortest day of the year. It also served as a reminder that the coldest season was upon them and they had to help out each other. Thus the gifts which has morphed into a greedy custom of shopping until you drop, rather than one of helping your neighbour, an ideas that Jesus himself tried to teach us.

Can I buy this CD somewhere?

Yes you can! - Not all of the SPCA's are carrying it this year, but you can purchase on iTunes, at Vancouver Vet Hosp., Victoria SPCA or through us here at

!
Cheers Tyee readers -
Jenn

Hannukah isn't Jewish?

While the trappings of Christmas may have been adopted from the pagan solstice customs that proceeded it, saying Christmas is not Christian is like saying Hannukah isn't Jewish.

Interestingly, astrologers, because of a rare conjunction of planets that happened around 0 BC that caused several planets to shine as one star along with the fact that shepards were in the field with their flocks, have pegged the birth of Christ to be in September not December but that doesn't really matter as the fact that he was born can be celebrated at any time, it doesn't have to be his actual birthdate.

I think North of Hope is on the right track though.

If people want to see it as a crass commercial holiday, they can do so. That is obviously not how I see it.

Clarification

Just to be clear, to Janie Jones and anyone else wondering, the statement was not directed at Christians, Christianity, or any Chrismas traditions not fueled by economic greed. Obviously, Christmas is much more to many people. But I also think it's a little naive to look at what Christmas has become and not see the commercialization of it. Just my opinion, and certainly not reflective of the opinion of The Tyee as a whole.

Clarification

Sure Christmas has become commercialized, every year, many Christians complain of just that but despite your above attempt at damage control your essay clearly defines Christmas as "a crass commercial holiday." Period.

Thanks for the backtracking on that though.

Janie Jones ...

"... saying Christmas is not Christian is like saying Hannukah isn't Jewish."

No, it is not. Jews, specifically, celebrate Hannukah; non-fanatic or orthodox theists of many different religions, and many completely non-religious people, do, and for many generations, have celebrated one version or another of Christmas.

Christmas, as we currently celebrate it, is a holiday with a number of different sources. It is a commercial holiday with some rather fluffy and inconsistent religious associations. Hannukah is exclusively, and quite specifically, a religious holiday, with profound religious intent and practices. The same can most certainly not be said for Christmas.

"... that doesn't really matter as the fact that he was born can be celebrated at any time, it doesn't have to be his actual birthdate."

If, of course, you accept the unsubstantiated, and rather doubtful supposition that Jesus, as depicted in the Bible, did in fact even exist. An increasingly dubious claim.

Please study your history before you make strawman arguments, unsupportable claims, and factually incorrect statements.

Your agenda is obvious

Your agenda is obvious SicPreFix. Pump up Judaism, a racist and supremicist creed and completely discount Christianity.

Don't try and tell me what Christmas means to me or any other Christian who celebrates it.

Janie Jones said: "Your

Janie Jones said:

"Your agenda is obvious SicPreFix. Pump up Judaism, a racist and supremicist [sic] creed and completely discount Christianity."

Wow! That is simply spellbinding, utterly astounding.

No, my agenda here at Tyee (if I in fact even have one), is to encourage and promote education, intelligence, accuracy, and the clear thinking of a science-based and delusion-free intellect grounded in an atheistic perspective.

Janie Jones also said:

"Don't try and tell me what Christmas means to me or any other Christian who celebrates it."

Ha, ha, you loon! I'm not trying to tell you what Christmas (or anything else), means to you. Obviously, Christmas will mean to you, and anyone else Christian or otherwise, whatever you want it to mean from Jesus to gollywogs and Broomhildes.

What I am trying to highlight here is that Christmas as we currently know and practice it is primarily a commercial holiday. That's history Janie. History and contemporary social fact.

To a primary degree Christmas as we currently know it was invented for commercial and corporate purposes.

If you wish to play hurt theist, go ahead. But still, a little look at historical reality won't hurt you, you know. You haven't read Nissenbaum's book have you? No, I thought not. It's not a judaic polemic, you silly girl, it's a history book.

Janie Jones, you really are quite a piece of work.

Thom Wong ...

Amidst all this silly bantering about meaning, I thought I should thank you Thom for the headsup on the music. I am going to give it a listen.

Cheers Thom, and have a Merry whateveritis to you ... Janie Jones and her ilk notwithstanding.

:)

It's 2009, not 5770

Don't presume to speak for everyone SicPreFix. If Christmas is nothing but a commercial holiday to you, you are obviously not a Christian.

And how will you and Nissenbaum be celebrating Hannukah this year?

Nothing like last year I hope:
http://desertpeace.wordpress.com/2009/12/13/gaza-reliving-the-chanukah-massacre-2/

And I'm not the slightest bit interested in reading his book.

Janie Jones ...

Oh goody! I do so love bantering with the holy and the self-righteous. Fun, fun, fun.

You just don't get it, do you. I am not talking about the personal and individual meaning given to Christmas by individuals such as yourself. I am talking about the overarching social function of Christmas in a global sense, combined with the varied influences and sources that have guided it to be what it now is, paricularily in terms of its function in the Western World at large.

Yes, to you it is a Christian festival, and that's fine. Do what you want with it. That's your choice. But that's just a personal and individual, as opposed to a more general and worldwide, aspect of its meaning.

What you do not seem to understand is that many people of many faiths, and many people of no faith at all, also celebrate Christmas. Therefore, as you seem to be incapable of understanding, for non-Christians that celebrate Christmas, which may or may not be a higher number than Christians who celebrate Christmas, it is most emphatically not a Christian holiday.

Janie Jones said:

"And how will you and Nissenbaum be celebrating Hannukah this year?"

I love Christmas and will be celebrating this year, as I usually do, with good friends. I do not observe Hannukah, nor any religious holiday, because I am not religious in any sense of the word whatsoever. For our non-Christian Christmas, my friends and I will do the good drink, good food, good conversation thing.

As for Nissenbaum, I havent the faintest idea what he will or will not do to observe Hannukah, or celebrate Christmas, or any other festival or holiday. I don't know him; I've never met him; he certainly doesn't email me to tell me what his plans are.

Janie Jones also said:

"And I'm not the slightest bit interested in reading his book."

Ha, ha, ha. Of course you don't you silly girl. Heaven forbid you stoop to actually educating and informing yourself. Wouldn't that be against the tenets of your faith, whicever giddy faith that may be?

You know, you're getting awfully close to posting implicitly anti-semitic inflamatory comments here. Are you sure you want to expose yourself that way?

"It's a trick, we always use it."

I was wondering when you were going to get to that.

Why is there is no such thing as "implicitly anti-Christian inflamatory (sic) comments" or implicitly anti-Muslim inflamatory (double sic) comments?"

Why is sauce for the goose never sauce for the hypocritical gander?

"It's a trick, we always use it."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUGVPBO9_cA&feature=related

If you don't even believe that Christ existed, why would you celebrate Christmas? Why not spend the day lining up for Boxing Day sales like the rest of non-Christian BC? Is the idea to remove Christ and his teachings from the world but to let people still have their holiday.

Why how generous!

Toiuche on the [sics] ...

and thanks for the spelling corrections. Kudos to you.

Janie Jones said:

"Why is there is no such thing as "implicitly anti-Christian inflamatory (sic) comments" or implicitly anti-Muslim inflamatory (double sic) comments?""

Huh? There are such things. Often. And in several places. Perhaps you choose to overlook them. Or perhaps it's your cognitive dissonance ringing the changes and seeing (or not seeing) only that which your personal bias wishes to observe -- after all, we are all prone to that to some degree or another.

As for my comments, they are not anti-Christain, they are anti-theist in general. Being an atheist I do not place any meaningful distinction or emphasis on the differences, however great or small, between the various delusions or manifestations of slavish ideology.

Janie Jones also said:

"If you don't even believe that Christ existed, why would you celebrate Christmas?"

Well, It's not a Christian event, so my belief or lack thereof, in your Good Man in the Sky is irrelevant. However, as to why I celebrate it, there are a variety of reasons:

1. I gain pleasure from the "festive" nature of the socializing that is concommitent with the event.
2. It is a socio-cultural so-called tradition of relatively recent (historically speaking) adoption that I grew up with and enjoyed as a child and still enjoy as an adult for the warmth it brings to my heart -- as a so-called Christian, you should honour, respect, and cherish such things in all mankind, shouldn't you?
3. Because it feels good.

Janie Jones also said:

"Why not spend the day lining up for Boxing Day sales like the rest of non-Christian BC?"

Because I neither celebrate nor enjojy the more extreme consumption obsessions. And while I may insist that the primary or core MO of Christmas is commercial, that doesn't mean that I as an individual must slavishly follow that particular practice of consumption any more or less than you do -- or do not; after all, I wouldn't really know.

Well Toiuche (sic) to you too.

Cloaking you statements in pseudo-intellectual bafflegab does not actually give them any more import but I am glad you have admitted your atheistic agenda.

What could be more anti-Christian than claiming the Christ didn't exist or that the main celebration of his existence i.e. Christ's Mass is not Christian? Talk about denial.

You're just trying to come up with a rationale as to why, when you are an admitted atheist, you celebrate Christmas when if you were truly what you say you are, it would be just another day for you. Instead you ride on its coattails and try to re-make it to fit your own agenda.

Non-Christian retailers may have an modus operandi in adopting the trappings of Christmas but that certainly is not the "core MO of Christmas."

And no, you wouldn't really know how I celebrate Christmas with my friends and family.

Janie Jones ...

It's all black and white for you isn't it? No room for the gray of nuance?

I know! You and mopled should start a radio talk show: All Your Cognitive Dissonances Are Belong to Us.

It'd be a great hit.

Cheery bye now.

More bafflegab

SicPreFix admits defeat, folds his tents and skulks off to celebrate a Christian holiday.

Addenda

SPF: "Hannukah is exclusively, and quite specifically, a religious holiday, with profound religious intent and practices."

If you are indeed an atheist as you say you are, how can you possibly believe that Hannukah or anything for that matter has "profound religious intent and practices?"

I am reminded by your apparent hypocrisy that the Jewish Bolsheviks (Solomon, Yagoda, Berman, Kagonovitch et al) who enslaved and murdered tens of millions of innocent Russian Christians are always excused by their co-religionists on the grounds that they were "atheists."