|
|
25.12.05
Peace on Earth.
23.12.05
We are erasing Christmas. Whether it is the conspicuous lack of the word “Christmas” on advertising signage or the chatter over the labelling of the “Holiday Tree”, there is a cover-up in progress. The idea, I suppose is not to offend anyone. You can always find something that offends someone (I may offend you shortly), so we’re well on our way down a slippery slope. At the bottom lies a bland and meaningless celebration of material consumption, which probably sounds good to retailers and economists.
But why is Christmas offensive? So you’re not Christian, good for you, I wouldn’t call myself one either, but why does it matter that other people are celebrating a Christian holiday? This country was founded on an Anglo-Christian hegemony, and our official holidays reflect that. Should we not call Victoria Day “Victoria Day”, since it could be offensive to people from any country that was ever an enemy of the British Empire? Will Easter become “Spring Celebration Long Weekend”?
Besides the vapidity of this melting pot, there is also a more insidious element. By removing the reasons behind why we celebrate at certain times of year, we further entrench the Anglo-Christian cultural monopoly, though under a guileless mask. If no one knows why we celebrate, no one can oppose, subvert, or reinvent it, and it becomes part of “what is”. By understanding the reasons behind cultural expression, one can decide how to react to it. Only with this knowledge can we move past “what is” and work on “what could be”.
In this “multicultural” society, “what could be” in an idealistic sense would be a pluralistic celebration of all faiths. We would learn each other’s stories and celebrate our differences and similarities beyond a superficial level, in a spirit of empathy, goodwill, and peaceful coexistence. Unfortunately, there’s that “we are right and everyone else is wrong” clause built into a few major religions that gets in the way. Add to this a generous dose of xenophobia, and an institutionalized penchant for preserving the status quo and we’re a long way off from making Chinese New Year or Yom Kippur statutory holidays. What’s more likely to happen (and is happening) is paying lip service to other faiths and cultures while Christianity remains dominant. Majority rules, and thus an inclusive approach to “The Holidays” still brings us back to the monopoly of Christmas.
Abstaining from celebrating doesn’t seem particularly effective either. The extreme left may not recognize Christmas to oppose its religious monopoly, at the same time the extreme Christian right, including the two nice gentlemen in suits who come to my door, don’t celebrate Christmas due to the level of paganism in “traditional” celebrations. Despite having completely different reasons, this is yet another example of the left and the right being on the same side of an argument, making the political spectrum look less linear than circular. Go far enough in your own beliefs and eventually your political adversaries will agree with you.
Does this leave the not-particularly-religious, socially-minded individual in a catch-22? Celebrate Christmas and you reinforce the colonial paradigm of North American popular culture. Celebrate “The Holidays” and you celebrate a watered-down version of Christmas that still is rooted in Christianity, only in disguise and with a few exotic decorations. Don’t celebrate and you find yourself with odd bedfellows in an ambiguous subject-position. Plus you don’t get to have any fun. Perhaps, like a lot of other things, I fall back on the panacea of libertarianism; celebrate whatever you want, but do it deeply, regardless of government endorsement or corporate sponsorship. Know why you are celebrating, and pass on or make up your own traditions, and share them with others. And I think we can agree on the universals: love, family, friendship, togetherness. How’s that for a blueprint? It’s my version of the holidays anyway, and you know what? I’m going to call it Christmas.
10.12.05
Empty lies Pandora's box.
06.12.05
My morning alarm failed the last two days in a row. Monday I woke up about half an hour later than I wanted to, today was nearly an hour. When I set it for Monday, I was playing around with the buttons after, ironically to make sure it worked, so I figured i may have screwed it up or turned it off somehow. Yesterday I set it and didn't touch it, and it didn't go off, again. This warranted a closer inspection of the alarm setting, in which I could find nothing wrong. Then I saw it, that little light that indicated that my current time was 12 hours off. I haven't had to use the alarm since we went back to standard time, or since the last blackout, whichever was more recent, so I never noticed the AM/PM thing. And my alarm clock isn't smart enough to do 24 hour time. I'm just getting back into the swing of things, cut me some slack.
05.12.05
Went back to work today. There are still delays in Montréal, so Montréal guy is hiring me to do work for him at UBC. I’m still going, just later, looks like sometime around February. We hope.
|
|
©d.tan  |
