Festive Cheer

I don’t do Christmas very well. I am an under-consumerist atheist with a phobia of unwarranted false displays of affection, so there isn’t much of the festivities for me to really enjoy. I detest shopping so much that an hour of it leaves me emotionally exhausted and as irritable as all hell. And when some of my friends (nearly always girls) tell me how much they enjoy shopping as if that would suddenly make me realise the error of my opinion, I shake my head in an unfestive way.

Christmas, in case you are from Mars, is a kidnapped pagan festival (that’s where the trees and holly come from) converted to be the celebration of the inaccurate birth date of an over-hyped rabbi. It has since been re-kidnapped by The Coca-Cola corporation and Hollywood, acting on behalf of the manufacturers of tacky products the globe over.

It is the time of the year that every one insists that you have some “seasonal cheer” despite the fact this forcing you to be cheerful has an even more detrimental affect on one’s mood than a whole sleighful of carol singers singing Christmas hit singles.

It is a time when everything is enfestived (a word closely related to infested). Shops can’t get enough silver shiny things to adorn their products and every public space - and I mean EVERY PUBLIC SPACE - is filled with nauseatingly tinny versions of nauseating tunes sung by nauseating children. Children who will soon be receiving a deluge of gifts all, ironically, made by other children their age. Albeit in Santa’s many sweatshops in less Christmassy places.

So I think Christmas should be banned, then? No. I think it should be made to go behind closed doors. Those of a religious bent should go off to their churches quietly, with only a special TV programme on in the morning for them to sing along to. The kids should receive their presents, but from their parents and not some mysterious recluse who lives in an igloo for 11 months of the year and then in every single shopping mall for the other month.

In no places except churches or in the privacy of the homes of those with serious taste deficiency should Christmas music in any of its guises be played. Tinsel is outlawed outside of homes, and people who cut trees of from their roots and put out of the way of sunlight so they slowly die whilst covered in silvery crap should be prosecuted under the protection of wildlife laws. Gangs of children found hanging around and going from door to door singing the above mentioned songs should be served (in the UK at least) Anti-Social Behaviour Orders. Believe me, “Away In A Manger” should be classified as a dangerous weapon. And finally, any mention that someone should get some “festive cheer” should be classed as assault, and retaliations such as bludgeonings and disembowellings should be accepted as self-defense.

Oh, but it should still be a holiday. Anyway, Merry Christmas everyone.