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O'Reilly lauches pre-emptive strike in the war on Christmas

arg-fallbackName="JacobEvans"/>
I'm sorry, I fucking love Christmas. Santa, presents, food, winter. So long as that Jesus character isn't there to ruin my fun, but even if he is, I think I can get over it.
 
arg-fallbackName="Dusty341"/>
Christmas is annoying. I love my family, but they get so needy around the holidays.
 
arg-fallbackName="Nogre"/>
Christmas really has nothing to do with Christianity. The only parts are certain caroles, the nativity, and a few other small things. But the tree has nothing to do with religion. Should they be able to display a nativity? No. A tree? Sure. It's as silly to group the whole holidy together and label it religious as it is stupid to group all citizens of the US together and call them anything at all.
 
arg-fallbackName="borrofburi"/>
Dusty341 said:
Christmas is annoying. I love my family, but they get so needy around the holidays.
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I love my family, but they heavily emphasize all the religious parts of "christmas"... My mom will probably scream and yell at me with threats of disowning and withdrawing all financial support (threats that have become nigh worthless) when I refuse to go to church for christmas eve service. Hell, I might just go anyway, take communion, placate her, and have a more happy christmas overall.
 
arg-fallbackName="Abi"/>
Funny how they even defend having tree when it was originally a pagan tradition.
 
arg-fallbackName="Salv"/>
Darwin tree! That's awesome, I'm going to start celebrating Darwin around christmas time, for no reason other than pissing my family off who just happen to be mostly fundies.
 
arg-fallbackName="Logic-Nanaki"/>
As a scandinavian, i am baffeled, bamboozled even surprised to see what kind of ranting O'Reilly, or even the average american is doing every year the x-mas-thingie is closing in.
i had a youtube discussion about this topic, someone saying that atheist should not be allowed to celebrate CHRISTmas.
i just tried to explain to him that i dont celebrate christmas, but Yule.
he never got what i was trying to explain. but hey, i got compliments from him saying in the line of that i'm not the baby-eating satanic evil atheist he imagined.
and a compliment from someone saying its the first time he has seen a civilized conversation between an atheist and a christian.

ps. sorry if there is some broken english in here
 
arg-fallbackName="Giliell"/>
Heck, I'm almost with O'Reilly on this: stop this nonsense.

Christmas is christmas, a christmas tree is a christmas tree is a christmas tree (cookies for those who get the poetic innuendo)

Even if all the world was atheist, it would still be a christmas tree.
You can't have your cake and eat it. Either you simply accept being what Dawkins calls "a cultural christian" and continue with the traditions and celebrations, or you abstain, but then you don't get the tree either.
Because otherwise you're as much a hypocrite as they are, wanting the good stuff but not acknowleding the origins.

And now you can guess who's going to have a christmas tree, christmas presents, a christmas feast and about 4 billion calories in christmas cookies.
 
arg-fallbackName="Baranduin"/>
Giliell said:
Heck, I'm almost with O'Reilly on this: stop this nonsense.

Christmas is christmas, a christmas tree is a christmas tree is a christmas tree (cookies for those who get the poetic innuendo)

Even if all the world was atheist, it would still be a christmas tree.
You can't have your cake and eat it. Either you simply accept being what Dawkins calls "a cultural christian" and continue with the traditions and celebrations, or you abstain, but then you don't get the tree either.
Because otherwise you're as much a hypocrite as they are, wanting the good stuff but not acknowleding the origins.

And now you can guess who's going to have a christmas tree, christmas presents, a christmas feast and about 4 billion calories in christmas cookies.
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That still don't convince me of accepting "civil baptisms" instead of "civil registration", cultural christian or not. And civil registration is compulsory.

A christmas tree is a christmas tree is a christmas tree... but only between christians (RA#17). For the rest of us... (RA#239). It's not poetic, but for this time I agree with Quark.

Uh, and (RA#76). That's worthy too. :evil:

And #214, so I'm going to eat something.
 
arg-fallbackName="xman"/>
What hypocrisy! First they hate it and now they cherish it.
Wikipedia - Christmas tree said:
Pre-Christian roots

Historically, there has been opposition to the custom of the Christmas tree because of its pagan origins. In 1851, parishioners in Cleveland, Ohio, USA condemned as a pagan practice the actions of the pastor, Henry Schwan, for decorating one of the earliest Christmas trees in an American Christian church.[citation needed] Robert Chambers in his 1832 Book of Days asserts that the festivities of Christmas "originally derived from the Roman Saturnalia, had afterwards been intermingled with the ceremonies observed by the British Druids at the period of winter-solstice, and at a subsequent period became incorporated with the grim mythology of the ancient Saxons. Two popular observances belonging to Christmas are more especially derived from the worship of our pagan ancestors,the hanging up of the mistletoe and the burning of the Yule log." Regarding the Christmas tree itself, Chambers assumes that it "seems to be a very ancient custom in Germany, and is probably a remnant of the splendid and fanciful pageants of the Middle Ages."
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_tree

So xtians are allowed to appropriate any cultural symbols they like, but nobody else is? Give me a break. Calling it a holiday tree makes MORE sense than calling it a Christmas tree.
 
arg-fallbackName="Giliell"/>
xman said:
So xtians are allowed to appropriate any cultural symbols they like, but nobody else is? Give me a break. Calling it a holiday tree makes MORE sense than calling it a Christmas tree.
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'
Well, now you should invent another word for holiday, because that's obviously a religious term
Yes, christians have stolen left right and centre from all the cultures and traditions they came in contact with (which makes it so successful, in my opinion), but that doesn't change the fact that it's been here for a long time.

There is no living tradition for a holiday tree even though it goes back to pagan traditions, which are nothing but different religious crap. In Germany the tradition of putting up a christmas tree goes back to the 15th century, that's neither a recent thing nor a clearly pagan origin...
 
arg-fallbackName="Baranduin"/>
Giliell said:
There is no living tradition for a holiday tree even though it goes back to pagan traditions, which are nothing but different religious crap. In Germany the tradition of putting up a christmas tree goes back to the 15th century, that's neither a recent thing nor a clearly pagan origin...
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Wikipedia said:
In Russia, the Christmas tree was banned shortly after the October Revolution but then reinstated as a New-year fir-tree (Новогодняя ёлка) in 1935. It became a fully secular icon of the New year holiday, e.g. the crowning star was regarded not as a symbol of Bethlehem Star, but as the Red Star. Decorations, such as figurines of airplanes, bicycles, space rockets, cosmonauts, and characters of Russian fairy tales, were produced. This tradition persists after the fall of the USSR, with the New Year holiday outweighting the Christmas (7 January) for a wide majority of Russians[citation needed].
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Wikipedia said:
The choice of the evergreen is universal through all cultures that have adopted the winter celebration, such that "the holidays" have become a human festival as well as a Christian festival. Thus the term "holiday tree" serves the purpose of engaging larger groups of people regardless of their practiced or non-practiced religions.
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The section of Controversy is also worthy to read.

The fact it has pagan or christian origins is irrelevant. The fact is that the tradition can be reinterpreted, modified, etc, and that it has been done for a long time before now.

And I don't think English speakers are going to think about changing the word "holidays" more than Spanish speakers think about saying something else instead of "adià³s" (godspeed). The word has lost its original meaning, it's no longer considered religious, and that's fine. That is: Christmas is clearly perceived as religious, holidays not.
 
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