More than 90 percent of American homes celebrate Christmas. But the small minority that is trying to impose its will on the majority is so vicious, so dishonest—and it has to be dealt with.
Christmas comes to my hometown—and yours—every year, usually about four days after Halloween. Even as the last pumpkins are removed from front porches, and the bags of candy corn and miniature candy bars and apple-flavored bubble gum and other tooth-rotting delights go on sale at half-price, and the cards wishing loved ones a “Spook-tacular Halloween!” are tucked away in memory boxes, stores put up their Christmas decorations, local “Lite FM” stations shift into 24-hour holiday tune mode (love that “Jingle Bell Rock,” just can’t get enough!), and Sunday newspapers start to bulge with ads for Christmas sales.
For a full two months—one-sixth of the calendar year—the United States of America is knee-deep in Christmas cheer. Everywhere you look, you see bright lights and ornament-spangled wreaths, and myriad images of the baby Jesus, Mary, Joseph, the Three Wise Men, and other important New Testament figures such as Santa Claus and Rudolph and Winky the Slightly Drunk Elf, who has loads of bargains for you at your local home improvement store. By my unofficial count—and by unofficial, I mean I’m inventing this figure, but if anything it’s probably a little low—there are approximately 874 billion-kajillion decorations, signs, lights, songs, trees, and ceremonies celebrating Christmas by name in this country, every year.
There are also hundreds of thousands of churches, where you are free to worship and to pray.
But don’t let those superficial indicators fool you. The truth is, the secular media and the godless merchants have been conspiring for years to eliminate any religious references to the holiday season, and if we’re not diligent, it won’t be long before Christmas disappears altogether.
Haven’t you heard? There’s a war on Christmas, and the heathens are winning!
Just ask Bill O’Reilly. Each year around the holidays, the most popular and powerful talk show host in all of cable television dedicates an inordinate percentage of his programming to waging a heroic fight against the heathens who are trying to Grinch this country straight to hell.
Or John Gibson, another Fox News warlord who penned a book titled The War on Christmas: How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought, one of my favorite conservative-themed book titles of all time. (It’s right up there with Ann Coulter’s latest, Kill Them All!: My Plan to Wipe All the Godless, Serial-Killing, Baby-Eating Liberals from the Face of the Earth Before I Turn 50, Which Is Sooner Than You Think.)
Or the late televangelist Jerry Falwell, who in 2005 ran a “Friend or Foe Christmas Campaign.”
Or the Alliance Defense Fund, which runs a campaign called “Merry Christmas: It’s okay to say it.” And here I’d been avoiding the phrase for years, for fear of arrest.
Or organizations such as the Catholic League and the American Family Association, which spend a good deal of time and effort going after the liberal media and those who believe in the separation of church and state, apparently because they’ve already solved such nagging problems as starvation, poverty, abandoned children, and other issues that should bother us more than, say, whether people say “Merry Christmas!” or “Happy Holidays!” when greeting one another in a big-box department store.
Like the so-called epidemics of shark attacks and child kidnappings from summers gone by (remember?), “the war on Christmas” is a non-story created by certain segments of the media in an effort to generate controversy and increase ratings.
It’s a perfect go-to issue for some conservative commentators and columnists and their fans. These folks are laughably—or should I say sadly—eager to believe we live a world in which millions of Jesus-hating Stalinists are engaging in a vast, nationwide conspiracy to take the “Christ” out of all things Christmas. It provides a perfect outlet for all that antiliberal vitriol. Who better to hate than the godless, Satan-friendly heathens who are attacking the baby Jesus?
Even if it’s all just a load of overhyped crapola.
There’s been talk of a war against Christmas for decades, but only in recent years has it become a perennial cause among conservatives.
In winter 2005, spurred on by a few isolated incidents and mis-reported events, conservative hysterics went into full Chicken Little mode and claimed Christmas was becoming an endangered species.
Leading the charges against the forces of evil: the great and all-powerful Bill O’Reilly.
As I once said in a Chicago Sun-Times column, O’Reilly is the most skilled and successful propagandist on television and radio today. He somehow keeps a straight face as he proclaims his show a “No-Spin Zone,” when in reality all he does is spin the facts to his own agenda. He’s got more spin moves than Allen Iverson in a game of one-on-one. (Once when I appeared as a phone-in guest on O’Reilly’s radio program to talk about the war on Christmas, I was put on hold as O’Reilly started ranting about the elitist, mainstream media. Later, as Bill and I engaged in some good-natured bantering—he’s always been fair to me on television and on the radio and has given me room to make my points—he challenged me to come up with “one example” when he’s ever spun the truth. “You just did it a few minutes ago when you talked about the elitist media and painted yourself as an outsider,” I replied. “You’ve got the most successful talk show on cable television, a nationally syndicated radio show, a nationally syndicated newspaper column, bestselling books, a Web site where you sell Factor merchandise. You make tens of millions of dollars a year. You are the elite media!” He didn’t really disagree with that, mainly because it’s the truth.)
O’Reilly is filled with holy anger, unleashing his fury on stores that dare to have their employees say “Happy Holidays!” instead of “Merry Christmas.” Also incurring his wrath are any media outlets that have the temerity to publish writings by those who say the war on Christmas is, you know, bullshit.
“I am not going to let oppressive, totalitarian, anti-Christian forces in his country diminish and denigrate the holiday and the celebration,” said O’Reilly. “I am not going to let it happen. I’m gonna use all the power that I have on radio and television to bring horror into the world of people who are trying to do that.”
Wow, just like Jesus would do!
Let’s take a closer look at just a few of the examples cited by conservatives as evidence of a widespread war on Christmas.
William Donahue of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights and other right-wing groups protested that the official 2005 White House holiday card was too generic. The card from George and Laura Bush, which was mailed to 1.5 million of their closest friends, had cover art of the two presidential dogs and the presidential cat roaming on the White House lawn. The greeting: “Best Wishes for the Holiday Season.”
Joseph Farah, editor of the conservative Web site WorldNet-Daily.com, told the Washington Post, “Bush claims to be a born-again, evangelical Christian. But he sure doesn’t act like one. I threw out my White House card as soon as I got it.”
I guess Farah was hoping the Bushes would use artwork from A Charlie Brown Christmas.
Donahue, a blustery, camera-loving blowhard who can always be counted on to deliver sound bites of outrage whenever there’s a religion-related news issue, told ABC News: “At a time when a lot of Christians today are very upset about the way our society is dumbing down Christmas, they certainly don’t want the president of the United States chiming in. We know he is a man of courage, so why is he giving in to the forces of political correctness?”
Damn, how did Donahue hear about the secret meetings of the Politically Correct Police, at which we outlined our plans to push our agenda on the world by forcing the president of the United States to send out generic holiday cards?
More from Donahue: “Prior to Clinton, none of the presidents had a problem saying ‘Christmas’ at Christmastime. Now Bush is pulling a Clinton. I expected more from this guy.”
Is it too much to expect Donahue to be a little more historically accurate when appearing on a national newscast? Let’s go back to 1955, when the official “Christmas” card from the White House read “Season’s Greetings,” with no written or visual reference to Christmas.
Of course, that famous liberal Dwight D. Eisenhower was president in 1955, and we all know he was a godless Communist, right?
Other conservative leaders got all worked up when city leaders in Boston referred to its beautiful, festively decorated, 50-foot spruce as a “holiday tree.” The Reverend Jerry Falwell threatened a massive lawsuit, which would be pretty funny if it wasn’t so sad and delusional. (“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I implore you. Take a look at Exhibit A, and tell me that’s anything but a Christmas tree!”) The mayor of Boston, sensing an opportunity for the easiest holiday-themed public relations victory since the judge ruled in favor of Kris Kringle as the true Santa Claus in Miracle on 34th Street, called a press conference and boldly declared, “It’ll be a Christmas tree as long as I’m around.”
Does is it really matter to actual Christians if their city’s ginormous tree is called a Christmas tree or a holiday tree? How many references to Christmas trees can one find in the New Testament, anyway?
The so-called Christmas tree is a cutesy touch that’s been added to our list of holiday traditions only in recent decades—and we stole the practice from pagan winter solstice rituals. Politicians and civic leaders that crusade for the Christmas tree might as well be defending the sacred rights of the Easter bunny and the St. Patrick’s Day leprechaun.
It’s all cartoon stuff, folks, and it has nothing to do with the birth of the baby Jesus.
One of O’Reilly’s pet causes was a story out of Dodgeville, Wisconsin, where a teacher allegedly changed the lyrics of “Silent Night,” turning it into a Jesus-free song about the weather.
“People are outraged!” said O’Reilly in December 2005. “We sent a demand letter asking them to immediately change the song and allow the actual lyrics of ‘Silent Night,’ and if they do not, if they insist on this ridiculous course of action, we’ll file a federal lawsuit.”
Again with the threat of a lawsuit. I thought conservatives were supposed to be against clogging up our courtrooms with frivolous actions.
First, is this really how you’d wage a war on Christmas—by having an elementary school teacher in Cheeseland alter the lyrics to “Silent Night” for a school play? With volleys like that, it would take only about 137,000 years to win this so-called war and erase Jesus from the equation.
One other problem with this example: it’s literally true, but it’s not accurate.
Nobody at Ridgewood Elementary changed the lyrics to “Silent Night.” They were simply staging a play called The Little Tree’s Christmas Gift, a play about a Charlie Brown-esque Christmas tree that sits on the lot, unsold. In the play, the lyrics to “Silent Night” are changed to reflect the sorry state of the tree: “Cold in the night, no one in sight, winter winds, swirl and bite . . .”
See, people do that with songs sometimes. They take a popular melody and put in some words, for effect. For example, the music for the “Star-Spangled Banner” was originally from an English drinking tune called “The Anacreontic Song.”
As the Think Progress Web site (http://thinkprogress.org) reported, the author of The Little Tree’s Christmas Gift (note that it’s not “The Little Tree’s Holiday Gift”) is one Dwight Elrich, who leads the New Covenant Singers of Bel Air Presbyterian Church in Los Angeles. The play, which has been performed in a number of churches across the country, closes with a cast-and-audience sing-along of “We Wish You a Merry Christmas.”
Yeah, that Elrich guy sounds like a real atheist waging a bloody fight against the Christmas holiday.
On another program in December 2005, O’Reilly told his 2.5-plus million viewers about a township in Michigan that “opposes red and green clothing on anyone ... they basically said ... ‘We don’t want you wearing red or green.’ I would dress up from head to toe in red to green if I were in Saginaw, Michigan.”
Well, I’d walk to Saginaw just to see Big Bill dressed in red and green from head to toe—but as Saginaw TV station WNEM-5 reported, the whole red-and-green story simply isn’t true.
Also not true: O’Reilly’s claim that a school in Plano, Texas, had enacted a similar ban.
O’Reilly, on December 9, 2005: “In Plano, Texas, a school told students they couldn’t wear red and green because they are Christmas colors.”
Dr. Doug Otto, the superintendent of schools for that district: “The school district does not restrict students or staff from wearing certain color clothes during holiday times or any other school days.”
As specious or thin as some of O’Reilly examples might be, at least he didn’t dedicate an entire book to the utterly phony notion that seculars are waging a war on Christmas. O’Reilly’s colleague John Gibson did just that—and the result is one of the most fundamentally unsound and unintentionally funny books ever written about the so-called culture wars.
The subtitle to The War on Christmas implies that Gibson is going to explain to us How the Liberal Plot to Ban the Sacred Christian Holiday Is Worse Than You Thought. In just 15 words, three points are made:
The cover artwork depicts a hand yanking on the electrical cord of a brightly decorated Christmas tree. On the back cover, the poor little Christmas tree has been left on its side, with broken ornament shards scattered about. Other than the angel figurine atop the tree, there’s not even a whisper of anything truly religious. If there’s a true war on Christmas, why not put the baby Jesus on your book’s cover?
In the introduction, Gibson cites a few isolated examples of political correctness run amok—for example, a New Hampshire junior high school student who reportedly was banned from a dance because he was dressed as Santa—and makes the claim that “almost everywhere a school district is limiting what Christmas carols kids can sing or hear, or a district is considering it. Almost everywhere a school district has decided that kids cannot have Christmas parties . . . almost everywhere school districts have either disinvited Santa or are giving him sidelong glances of suspicion.”
Ooh, he knows about our sidelong glances of suspicion! I knew we should have been subtle.
But really: This stuff is happening “almost everywhere”?
Gibson then asks, “Whose fault is this? Well, for those who like to jump to conclusions, no, it’s not just liberal Jews. I should state for the record that my Jewish son helped me research this book because he agrees that the war on Christmas has gone too far.”
Yes, and I’ll bet some of your best friends are Jews, too. But hey, thanks for bringing up that whole liberal-Jew thing just so you could shoot it down.
Gibson’s “evidence” of the widespread liberal war consists of a grand total of seven primary incidents in towns such as Mustang, Oklahoma, and Maplewood, New Jersey.
In the year 2000 in Covington, Georgia, we’re told, the Newton County School Board received a letter saying that the American Civil Liberties Union would pursue legal action if the board continued to use the word Christmas on the school calendar.
The bastards! Will they stop at nothing?
Another chapter is devoted to the controversy in Baldwin City, Kansas, where “Santa Claus was banned from the Baldwin City schools,” as Gibson puts it. The firestorm started when a man playing Santa Claus—an assistant minister at a local church—reportedly told a class of kindergarten students, “If you believe in Jesus, Santa will bring you toys.” There was a debate about whether the man actually preached in such a manner—he denied doing so—but there was concern that “Santa” was proselytizing religion when he should have been just handing out candy canes and saying “Ho ho ho.”
Gibson’s other examples are similar in scope and in silliness. Some minor debate gets turned into a full-blown (albeit local) controversy, with advocates on both sides getting all worked up over issues that could have been resolved with everyone taking a deep breath and invoking healthy measures of common sense.
But where are the stories of liberals trying to “ban the sacred Christian holiday”? We get isolated tales of individuals and organizations trying to ban the word Christmas or symbols of the holiday from certain activities or public places—but no evidence that anyone is trying to ban the holiday itself, which of course would be about as futile as trying to ban tomorrow’s sunrise.
One assumes Gibson selected episodes in places such as Eugene, Oregon, and Indianapolis to illustrate the far reaches of the liberal plot. But if the liberals are trying to get rid of Christmas, why aren’t they concentrating on the major markets? An overzealous parent here, an overreaching ACLU attorney there—in what universe does that constitute a conspiracy against Christmas?
Gibson’s own book is the best evidence that there is no such conspiracy. If these are the best examples he can provide, the sacred Christian holiday has never been more secure.
I am a Christian.
I was raised Catholic by parents who haven’t missed a Sunday at church for a half-century. (My track record isn’t nearly as impressive, but the walls do not shake and crumble when I enter houses of worship.) For eight years, I attended St. Jude the Apostle in South Holland, Illinois.
I know the Bible. I believe in God.
I am not shy about expressing my beliefs in superficial ways. There’s a Celtic cross tattooed on my forearm, and I wear a crucifix around my neck. At Christmastime, my house is adorned with decorations, including a tree, lights, and the biggest mistletoe money can buy.
If there really were a war on Christmas, I’d be on the side of Christmas.
But there isn’t.
Good Lord (so to speak), this is a country dripping in Christmas. If 50 percent of all the Christmas decorations, displays, musicals, plays, parties, and celebrations were wiped from existence next December, we’d still be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of Christmas-mania from coast to coast.
I’m not saying there haven’t been a few isolated incidents over the years involving some ridiculous attempt to make Christmas more generic, whether it’s some company president telling employees not to say “Merry Christmas!” in the workplace, or a moronic teacher telling a class of first-graders that Santa Claus is a myth and Jesus wasn’t really born on December 25.
But how exactly does that translate to a friggin’ war on Christmas?
The United States is an overwhelmingly Christian nation. The idea that some kid in a department store saying “Season’s Greetings!” instead of “Merry Christmas” constitutes an attack on the holiday is beyond silly and is an insult to true Christians.