We Can't Have It Both Ways, Can We?

The opinion on Christmas from B.S., former speech-writer for President N., [I'll just let both of those hang and make of it what you will] is making the rounds of the e-mail in-boxes again, although it's several years old. It seems to work in nicely with a previous post of mine, so I'll complain about it here. Mr. S., although Jewish to the bone, doesn't mind being wished a Merry Christmas because it makes him feel all warm and cozy about his fellow Judeo-Christian [Where's the Islam there? Shouldn't it be Judeo-Christ-Islamist?] believers and that's what I was talking about earlier. That's very broad-minded of him to accept the greeting as kindly meant and good taste of him to enjoy those over-decorated trees.
Where he crosses the line, though, is to expect everyone to feel that way, especially atheists. He describes how Christians probably feel pushed around about showing their religion and equates it to how he doesn't like being pushed around for being Jewish. It seems, though, that he is completely unaware that non-religionists have been pushed around. Atheists are supposed to take it. Sitting in his "beach house" (to separate that from some other house he might have) he feels sorry for Christians, a vast majority, and not for the little people who are starting to push back. I don't like being pushed around for being an atheist, and so for years I just didn't mention it. Even as a child brought up Christian I had trouble with public displays of my religion because I was only too aware that there were people who didn't subscribe and I could see myself in their shoes. Mr. S. seems to think looking at it from his shoes alone is good enough.
I'll grant you that some of our number could stand to shut up, even some intelligent high-profile ones. And Christians are free to complain about political correctivity swinging the wrong way on them, but they've had their day in the sun and their chance to run things better. And there were still hurricanes, floods, famines, and pogroms.
We worry about current events precisely because they are current and we base past experience on our childhood memories of being totally clueless. The 1950s were not the halcyon days of nuclear families and religious devotion. They were years of Cold War and witch hunts, peoples' lives ruined by rumor mongering. Do I remember any of that? Of course not, I was sent to bed before Huntley and Brinkley came on! The 1960s were years of political upheaval over the Vietnam War and Civil Rights. I do remember that, because I was sickened by images of war during the dinner hour. Fortunately, our area of Kentucky was not torn apart by riots ... like those of the white Bostonians rejecting school integration. This means, however, that I put out of my mind what wasn't happening in my happy little galaxy. I remember my home and family.
What is happening, contrary to what Mr. S. believes, is that there is a whole lotta demagoguery going on. People are being whipped up on both sides by individuals who enjoy power. These people scaremonger, but not with anything so blatantly ridiculous as the destruction of Christianity, because only the mentally ill would believe that could possibly happen (and on the other side, only the mentally ill atheists could believe Christianity in particular or religion in general can be toppled), but they start with little things, like the alleged War on that Holiday celebrating the birth of You Know Who. Everybody can get behind Christmas! Christmas is harmless! Why, even that Jewish guy with the beach house likes Christmas! If you can get people to believe the little lies, then the big ones becomes that much easier to swallow. If you believe the atheists are out to ban That Holiday, you can be easily led to believe that all religious holidays are up for the chop. And then you can believe these people are un-American. Then you think your elected officials should take a stand on the issue, and their seasonal greetings should say a certain phrase. And then you start scrutinizing what these officials do about their greeting cards, totally missing what they're up to on matters that do fall within their purview, like fixing the economy, or at least making sure that greed will not be given free rein to create "exotic financial speculations" again.
So what are atheists up to? Hell's bells, even if we were organized it would be impossible to say. There are as many kinds of atheists as there are religions. They all become atheists different ways: some are born into atheist families, some wake up one day and ask themselves whether they really believe all that, some wrestle with their beliefs ... and win, and some have had bad experiences. Some drop their faith suddenly, sometimes faith fades slowly away. Mostly I think these people want the right not to be marginalized. We're all hopping on that civil rights bandwagon that seems to be so handy. You wouldn't fault black people for having been marginalized all those centuries, would you? You wouldn't say, "Look, there are just more white people, so just go with the flow and keep your mouth shut. We're tired of hearing about all we've done wrong or are doing wrong and we aren't going to change anything just to make you happy. 'Majority,' ever hear of it? So stop making us feel bad."
Okay, maybe some of you would say that.

Oops, forgot to post this ages ago!

Just a Quick Kvetch

I was buying a large jar of catnip (I can mention this now that the presents have been handed out) at K-Mart (where I go first before braving the insanity that is Wal-Mart) and was actually being checked out in a timely fashion (!!!) when the clerk asked me what catnip did to cats. "Oh, it gets them all excited and then they go all relaxed," I said, because I don't think anyone has successfully written a government grant to study this. I added, "My grandmother used to drink a cup of catnip tea when she wasn't feeling well."
The woman behind me said, "You know what catnip really is?"
And right there I was glad that I didn't add my grandmother used to meow after taking a sip to tease my mom.
"A phamacist told me," she announced smugly, "that catnip is the bad stuff left over from the marijuana. I used to let my son make tea with it, but I don't anymore. Not after hearing that." [As if there's a "bad" part to marijuana that's thrown away.]
I humphed. "No, it's not. Catnip is a plant from the mint family. I've grown it. It's nothing like marijuana."
"Well that's what the pharmacist told me."

I let that go. I'm still wondering how that information got garbled.
Did she make it up out of whole cloth?
Was the pharmacist pulling her leg thinking she'd be much to intelligent to really fall for that?
Was he suspecting that her son only called the stuff catnip because she'd found some substance in his room and gave it to said pharmacist to check it out?
Did the pharmacist actually mean "It's the equivalent of 'marijuana' for cats"?

For the rest of y'all, be assured that catnip is an herb from the mint family with the familiar square stem of the rest of the mints. You can buy it anywhere, including economically large jars of it at K-Mart. You can grow it in your yard without experiencing any awkward visits from Drug Enforcement (unlike those who grow the harmless and useful hemp plants that look like marijuana, have absolutely no drug effects, but are still illegal because of the resemblance).

Decades ago when the anti-drug programs were being foisted (and, I thought, wasted) on me, I wondered why I needed to know what uppers, downers, LSD, and marijuana looked like. Even as a teen I thought this would only make it easier to make a drug transaction (not falling for the oregano ... OR CATNIP in the baggie). I was a sanctimonious little horror for whom pressing her eyeballs until she saw colors was interesting enough. But now I see it would have been important so that when I became a mother and I chanced upon a ziploc of dried herb while nosing through my child's room I would not fall for the old, "It's just catnip to make tea!" And then, when that child wanted to know how I got so I could tell the difference, I could say, "When I was your age, they showed us what it looked like in special drug-identification classes." And I'd go mix me a margarita and put my feet up.

Yeah, lady, I was a child of the 60s! Don't try to tell me about catnip!

See if you can tell the difference!

Wrestling with Christmas

Kathy contemplates the Meaning of Sensitivity

In Re: Snarky comments from friends.
Comment #1: "For an atheist, you sure know a lot of Christmas songs."
Comment #2: "Funny how many atheists celebrate Christmas."

Snappy (okay, not so snappy, more dilatory) retort to #1: It wasn't my idea to sing Christmas songs all the way back from Spartanburg.
Snappy (ditto) retort to #2: Funny how many Christians are actually celebrating Solstice with a Jesus veneer.

As an atheist, I feel perfectly entitled to put up an evergreen tree in the manner of my Germanic ancestors and celebrate the return of the sun in a dark and gloomy time of year. If I still call this holiday "Christmas," it's out of habit. Without the tree, the decorations, the twinkly lights, the dark would be unbearable.

I was, however, cheered to hear Nina Totenberg singing a Christmas song on NPR this Saturday morning. I remember thinking, Gosh, I thought she was Jewish! And she is, but her mother liked Christmas songs and Christmas trees. And there is much to like about them. When I was growing up, we had a Christmas songbook in the house and although I was unable to read music, I could read the words and had a good memory for a tune. I spent many a December singing Christmas songs. I loved to sing and I prefer old songs to new ones.

So, anyway, if Nina Totenberg can put up a tree or sing Christmas songs, then I can too. But that doesn't mean I think everyone should. I wouldn't call an isolated instance of a Jewish family with a tree and a few songs reason for all Jewish people to start putting up trees and singing "Adeste Fideles." That's up to them. I can only govern my own behavior.


The New Madrigal Voyces Edition of the Blonde Shikseh
The above photo was taken during my madrigal group's Christmas concert in Beaufort, SC in the early 1980s. Didn't have a problem singing the Gaudete then, don't have it now.

As a civilized being, if someone wishes me a Merry Christmas, I will return the greeting, the same as if they wished me Happy Hanukkah or Eid or Kwanzaa or July 4th. I might even thank them. I will not, however, wear the "It's okay to say Merry Christmas" button, because it's okay to say it to some people and not to others, others who perhaps recall a history of persecution by misguided Christians. You wouldn't wish someone a Happy Mother's Day if they'd just lost a child, would you? It pays to know something about the person you're laying a loaded greeting on. I've seen bad reactions from Jewish friends to Christmas songs ("Please don't start singing them until December!" - well, I agree with that) and cards ("Why are you sending me a Christmas card when you know I'm Jewish?" - Did that card say "Christmas" on it anywhere? Don't be such a touchy butthole!).

It would be presumptive of me to think everyone should be open to this ... and a little presumptive of the other side to think I would mean ill by it, but the onus is still on my side of the net because I started it. Because I started it, I get defensive. And that is what I think is happening now. Having gone for decades of their lives wishing people a "Merry Christmas" willy-nilly, people are mystified to discover that occasionally this gesture was unwelcome for one reason or another. In typical human behavior (see my reaction to the holiday card above), we don't apologise. Instead, we blame the victim for being overly-sensitive when it is our own insensitivity that has caused the irritation. By God, they should accept that greeting! We hadn't meant any offense! Besides, they should believe in Jesus anyway! Do 'em some good! Lighten up, infidels! Because the President of a patchwork nation of different peoples puts "Happy Holidays" or "Season's Greetings" on the intensely impersonal bulk greeting card, some Christians are up in arms and start blaming ... the atheists. It's the atheists' fault that honest, well-intentioned Christians cannot go around wishing anyone they damn well please a Merry Christmas. And that is because the atheists have declared a War on Christmas. (Gosh! I missed that meeting!) There was an actual abolition of Christmas; it was by the Puritan parliamentarians in 1640, a bunch of Christian kill-joys if ever there were. They claimed (rightly) that Christmas wasn't a holiday mentioned in or commanded by the Bible and felt people were having too much food, drink, shenanigans, and goings-on. Instead, people should fast and think about their past sins. (Thinks about past sins and a dirty little smile sneaks across face.)

So what is my problem? You know what? I don't think I'm the one with the problem. What business is it of anyone else what holidays I celebrate and how? I'm not sacrificing chickens (nothing intrinsically wrong with that, it's just, well, yuck!) or dancing naked (okay, maybe I am, but you don't have to look). You mind your bidness and I'll mind mine. And let's try to live in harmony, which does not mean "all on the same note."