Christmas comes but once a year, so the saying goes, but semantic arguments are forever. 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, forever.
Of course, this whole nonsense about whether to say ‘Merry Christmas’ or ‘Happy Holidays’ has only been in place since Bill O’Reilly, commentator extraordinaire (Fuck it, we’ll do it live!), the most passionate of pundits, the looniest of the loons, although the competition for that title has become severe, and sexual pervert without parallel (the idea of jamming a felafel up a lady’s hoo-haw is just gross, but even a loofah is kind of kinky), decided he could convince his loyal viewers, and they were legion, that liberals had declared war on Christmas. Maybe he believed it himself, maybe he was just showing off. We may never know.
He based this on a couple of stories of schools which had disallowed nativity scenes, which happens every year because they are, by definition, a religious display and, according to the principle of separation of church and state, should not be on state property, and also on the fact that lots of liberals say ‘Happy Holidays’ instead of Merry Christmas.
I’d never thought about it much before, I think I usually said Merry Christmas, but now I try to say Happy Holidays. Because, you know, it’s a war so all hands on deck.
You don’t hear much about O’Reilly any more. He got to be too much even for Fox News, probably all the sexual harassment stuff, and there are plenty of younger, fresher, and just as angry pundits out there. But his War on Christmas lives on, as every year you hear a few people arguing over whether or not you should say Christmas, and how often and under what circumstances.
This is Bill O’Reilly’s legacy. May we never forget.
