The 'War' on Christmas

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A Tiresome Media Invention

In contrast to the controversies described on the page about Pagan and Christian interpretations of Christmas, or Yule, this one isn't really worth taking seriously. Despite that it appears with depressing regularity each year in the media - in the US there even appears to be some kind of daft campaign by the religious right.

One of the reasons it's a total non-issue is that all the stories trotted out each year have themselves been around for years - Birmingham's supposed 'Winterval' celebrations for example have taken on mythic status.

It's worth mentioning here as it is totally anathema to our understanding of a shared Christmas festival. It's an attempt to divide people from each other, to encourage an entirely unhealthy attitude amongst Christians of being an embattled majority under threat from 'PC' do-gooders. There are even tinges of racism in the way in which it's always a craven bowing to ethnic minority community that is doing away with our Christmas.

All this from newspapers who would presumably be happy to chortle along with a plastic Santa Claus dropping his trousers, humorously.

Anyway, it's utter rubbish. Nobody is trying to stop Christians celebrating Christmas, the real threat to the spirit of the season is rampant consumerism, anxiety and the stressed and frenzied build-up to one day, and anything that encourages inclusion and the sharing of different stories is truer to the Christian meaning of Christmas than any attempt to keep Christmas British.

A couple of years ago, Oliver Burkemann wrote a comprehensive article for the Guardian newspaper on this very issue. Rather than dwelling on this strange modern media custom, I'd recommend anyone interested to give it a read.