The Reason for the Season

I'm positive that not a damn person likes being told how to celebrate a holiday, less so that we have to at all. Yet we're always going to hear dipshit phrases like "War on Christmas" and "It's Murrry CHRISTMAS, not X-Mas or Happy Holidays!" herpy derpy durrr and flippy dee derp. Even though the number of Christians is out-numbered by atheist and 'other', as a nation, the rest of us have always humored all of the Christian holiday traditions usually superimposed rather deliberately over the original pagan traditions they stole from.

I love Christmas. I even enjoy the nativity scenes and Jesus songs, even though I was brought up on the Santa side of things, a fact that didn't change even when I'd fancied myself a Christian through this little gap of my life (from around 8 years old to around 15 or 16, but don't hold me to accuracy because my memory of how old I was for anything is not the best). I have no idea why, but I even found something I wrote when I was younger still, maybe 4 or 5, that said "I love God and Jesus." I was probably told to because Christianity was always the predatory norm. I vaguely remember my mom seeing it and me asking who God and Jesus were after the fact and her laughing. Like most kids, I was pretty trusting, especially if it came from an adult.

So the idea that Christian values are threatened has always been laughable. Despite the fact that religion was indeed where morality saw the first written history, nothing actually skewed my morality quite like religion. I actually have a 'friend' or two on FB that often posts some of the most appalling, hateful shit then, in the same breath, justifies it because they're strong in faith and God's love. In fact, my own experience often meant full-grown adults left me crying in bed at night after telling me to witness to my parents or they'd go to hell. This wasn't Jehovah's Witness crap either, but both Lutheran and Methodist branches of plain ole Christianity. 

Any values outside of Christianity are the ones in real danger. You might get the over-reactive Christian pretending there's actually some chance the whole feeding-Christians-to-lions thing is going to make a comeback but aside from singular psychos blowing themselves up in churches (usually more racially motivated than religious), there are far more incidents of Christians endangered or even murdering atheists and 'other' with the justification of God on their side. But of course, these nutcases are rightfully penalized under the law because, thankfully, justice doesn't have a creed and doesn't care who you worship when you harm another human being. Still, Muslims and Jews and atheists statistically have far more cause to fear a world without separation of church and state and it's not because they're wrong, but because the default is always the Christian way of doing things.

While I don't intend to run through my beliefs here, it does need to be said that I've often said 'bless you too' in response because I know when I see crazy and I'm not willing to die to assert my lack of belief in any god. While that may also be an over-reactive example, I've certainly been physically assaulted by someone (rather, someones) who doesn't much like my atheism in their Christian bubble, so I do exercise caution. Much like I try not to offend strangers I run into on the street because you never know which psychos have a conceal-and-carry and are looking for a stranger to take out their bad day on.

These days, even the most reckless and honest among us are picking their battles. My go-to response for the victim complex when it comes to someone celebrating differently or not at all is the reactionary eye-roll. It's well and good to vent on the internet (although I choose that carefully too), but it's never worth it to make an ego-driven argument on the subject face-to-face. For one, I hate violent confrontation. Yelling not only hurts my ears but it sends my blood pressure soaring with the anxiety. For two, I'm not so invested on people appeasing my ego. That's really all it is. I know I'm not going to change a mind made up so the only thing left to fuel it is the need to show off my supposed knowledge until one of us is too worn out to bother.

No one wins these arguments. Or at least no one really ever walks out of a shitty argument feeling good aside from a deluded narcissist who has the superpower of immediately twisting the facts to create a mental victory.

The reason for the season isn't that important. It's a dumb argument no matter how intelligently made. People who keep trying to enforce this shit are battling some sort of insecurity and want to share the misery and that's that. They're probably even upper-middle class people in most cases, with a surface-level enviable life. They probably did exactly as they were told with their entire belief system and questioning it is something they were traumatized against so they panic at the first hint of anything else. I can't say for certain and if it's that bad, they won't dare to look very closely at it anyway. I'm not trying to judge why they find it acceptable behavior, but it doesn't change the fact that the rest of us just aren't that tolerant of it at some point.

The rest of us, we've been pretty damn tolerant. Above and beyond even. Just don't play the victim when you're screaming about Jesus being the reason for the season and someone disagreeing. It's not a war on Christmas. Christmas itself is notoriously salved over many pagan traditions. Pagans managed to take it in stride, secure in their own beliefs. They were flattered, even. Cultural appropriation screechers could take a page from this as well. Personally, I'm flattered when someone tries to copy me. If they do better, then I learn from that too. Really it all comes down to insecurity. Do we sulk or do we exercise some pride that people are inspired by a good idea?

The Christians in my life are all outwardly secure people. I have no problem when they want to say grace or observe rituals that are important to them. They don't insist I join in and I don't ridicule them. The real key to a better humanity doesn't come from assimilation but in being secure in yourself. I won't insult my readers with cookie-cutter simplifications, but it all comes down to being okay with being 'the only one'. In truth, there's no such thing. There is always someone else to share a belief with. But when you're in a situation where you are 'the only one' (and especially learning to embrace periods of actual solitude where you do have to look at yourself), it shouldn't terrify you or send you reaching to recruit someone. Until you are secure in your own reasons, you are the one that is dangerous to others.