Christmas is a time for fun, a time for joy and a time of happiness.
Yeaaaaahhhh right.
Christmas brings out the very worst in people - it starts the moment you try to decide whom to give a Christmas card to and it ends when you complain bitterly that Auntie So-and-so bought you the exact same perfume last year as she did this year.
Usually sensible people get into huge amounts of debt, average Joes drink dangerous amounts of alcohol (resulting in last years rise of drink driving related deaths - Merry Christmas) and nearly all of us force massive amounts of food down our guts despite the frankly disgusting disparity in the wealth/poor division this apparently modern world still harbours like an abusive partner we claim is really caring inside - 'you just don't know 'im like I do, is all'.
And it's just not me this time.
Yeaaaaahhhh right.
Christmas brings out the very worst in people - it starts the moment you try to decide whom to give a Christmas card to and it ends when you complain bitterly that Auntie So-and-so bought you the exact same perfume last year as she did this year.
Usually sensible people get into huge amounts of debt, average Joes drink dangerous amounts of alcohol (resulting in last years rise of drink driving related deaths - Merry Christmas) and nearly all of us force massive amounts of food down our guts despite the frankly disgusting disparity in the wealth/poor division this apparently modern world still harbours like an abusive partner we claim is really caring inside - 'you just don't know 'im like I do, is all'.
And it's just not me this time.
Julia MacPherson, spokesperson of Mind says, 'Many people find it hard to cope with the demands of Christmas. We've found it's as common as relationship problems and health worries for causing stress.'
Oh yeah, and add to that what the good people at the Samaritans reckon, 'Christmas emphasizes how unhappy they are, the fact that they may not have a partner or many friends, while everyone else seems to be having fun'
In fact, the Channel 4 article I robbed those quotes from goes on to claim that the Samaritans expect at least 10% more calls over Christmas with the Suicide rate peaking in January.
Ho ho ho.
My blogging chum Tina stated in a comment yesterday; 'I love Christmas for the simple things it represents: hope, kindness, love even, friendship, reconciliation. As well as the nosh up of course'.
I can only agree with the nosh up part, the other stuff is a Clinton Cards illusion of what Christmas now represents.
I realise that this advent run down is turning into a major downer, but the fact is if I hate anything at all, I hate insincerity the most - and Christmas now represents that more fully than ever.
10 comments:
Well, yes and no. The stats don't lie and Christmas is a terrible time for people who are alone, or who are under so much pressure to provide gifts they can't afford. People generally get a bit stupid too.
However, leaving the losers out of it, Christmas is great if you just want to enjoy the simple aspects of it: time with friends and family, bit of time off work, good nosh up.
Oh, so all that shit you spouted yesterday about 'hope, kindness, love even' was just bollocks, on the basis of 'However, leaving the losers out of it'
Yeahhh, loads of love and kindness coming from that comment.
Not picking on you Tina, but you have so wonderfully illustrated my point - even seemingly rational folk like you seem to get caught up in the Christmas PR.
People - it's sold to you to make you buy like the well behaved little consumer automotons that you are.
as with pretty much everything else, christmas has to be what you make of it. if you let all the other bullshit, the commercialization, the greedy spirit of "me-ism" promoted by so many, the fact that for those less fortunate this can be a depressing, lonely time of year, the hateful hypocrisy being perpetrated this year in the US, if you let all that get to you on a personal level then sure, you will lose all joy in the season. And then it is easy to say, "see, this whole Christmas business is a load of crap." But the problem with that is you can use similar reasoning to pretty much take the joy out of living. All around is greed and selfishness and hypocrisy and hate and prejudice and so on. We cope with all of that by acknowledging it is there and then still finding the simple joy in life.
I'm about as cynical, pessimistic and misanthropic as they come, but I can honestly still say, I get a kick outta being here. Beats not being here any day.
(oh and sorry about that shameless self-promotion up there. hope you don't mind Herge!)
It's an interesting point Mr Faltanus - however Christmas is the worst excesses of our hypocrisy - love, joy, caring, family, forgiveness blah blah blah - none of this is really true and all of it is utterly conditional.
I don't believe it's about taking the joy out of living, it's about finding the true in something and not accepting lies and propaganda.
I'm all for a secular festival of society or something - just not Christmas and it phonery.
I think you can have those things, the good things, without getting caught up in the commercialism of it all - on a personal level at least. Christmas is only the same as the rest of the year, just amplified a hundred fold; you're either part of that crap or you're not.
And my comment about the losers was an intentional one to illustrate your point.
All I ever get is squidgy presents (socks usually). Perhaps I should give the Samaritans a call.
I admire the people who make sure that the down and outs get some proper Christmas nosh and a bed for the night. It's a shame that generosity of spirit only applies for one day a year.
I agree that it's mostly bollocks commercialism, but it does have some redeeming (geddit) features.
I know.
Herge, what you're complaining about is not Christmas-specific, it's Capitalist-shite-specific. I mean, it's the same with Valentine's Day (Come on, Massacre, anyone?), Easter (um, hello, freaking ABOUT DEATH, and about RETURN OF THE LIVING UNDEAD?), Halloween (yeah, more dead), etc. etc. etc. DEATH? LET'S DRINK AND HAVE A GRAND CELEBRATION!
Let's just forget all about the meaning behind it all, and why we need to remember. I lay odds that 9/11 will become another drink 'til you drop holiday in the States. One day, if not now.
Christmas does bring out the worst in people.
And sometimes it brings out the best. For instance, we just had our annual Christmas party for my co-workers. We throw a party every year. About twelve people came over, enjoyed some ham and cookies, played games, laughed and shrieked, and had a marvelous time together. No fighting, no politics, no bullshit.
It was wonderful. For the sixth year in a row.
Okay, I'll stop being a dink now.
or who are under so much pressure to provide gifts they can't afford.
Great point T. That's where Christmas gets all screwed up. I believe that we give "small" gifts to remember the gifts given to the Christ child by the wise men. They should be small tokens of remembrance, not huge mounds of stuff.
Besides, who has room for all that stuff anyway???
Except for Owen, we are giving consumables, and small ones at that.
As a Christian, the commercialism drives me crazy.
Off soap box. Thank you for your time. :-)
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