If you want to read something so stupid it will make you shake your head in amazement that anyone would publish it, try this ridiculous cautionary tale from the year 2030, as a man tells his grandson about the good old days when you could buy Christmas wrapping paper and say "Merry Christmas" without being arrested. And it's written by a freaking Rabbi, who laments that Americans didn't "take to the streets" to stop people from saying "Happy Holidays." The fact that it isn't a parody or meant ironically only shows how utterly moronic it is.
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What I loved was the store seeming gloomy and empty - as if the retail industry in this country would ever do anything that would hurt their Christmas season shopping totals; after all, that is the time that most retailers actually make some money for the year.
How astute of the writer to know that we lovers of civil liberties are really, secretly, pushing the conservative Muslim agenda.
/sarcasm
The beginning of true engagement on issues is truly modeling your opponents' positions -- what is the Right Wing's problem? I have encountered this Muslim thing so many times. Do they really believe it?
Good choice, Ed. Too many completely moronic bits to list them all, but I particularly liked these ones:
"In those days, you weren't welcomed in 'progressive' circles if you were a Conservative."
Whereas the Heritage Foundation welcomed progressives with open arms.
"Well, David, that's the dark little secret that only your Grandpa and a few others knew. These people weren't anti-religious as much as they were anti-Christian: anti- the majority religion that made America, America. They weren't against Allah or African gods. They hated the Christian God. Many simply despised Christians of Faith, hated them as people."
Actually, I hate all religions, but I couldn't give a toss about Christmas. Whatever.
"People who were raised Christian but rejected it and were therefore embarrassed by it. And, of course, the ACLU had its atheists, too. They despised America's Judeo-Christian ethos."
"Grandpa, we were taught in school that our country was founded on our Judeo-Christian-Islamic heritage. And that our Founding Fathers were guided greatly by the principles of the Holy Koran."
"Yes, another victory for liberalism: rewrite history and deny the facts, all in the name of 'inclusion'."
I'm confused. First the liberals only hated Christianity and wanted to expunge it from America, then they despised America's Judeo-Christian ethos, and in the end they rewrote history to include all three Abrahamic faiths. Not very good at eliminationism these atheist liberals.
"e drove on Route 50 until we came to Falls Mosque, Virginia. I remembered when the city had been renamed from the original Falls Church when that section of Virginia was granted the right to no longer live by American law but, instead, by its own shariah law now that 40% of the people in that area were Islamic. "
For fuck's sake.
This stuff isn't stupid, it's completely insane. It's pretty apparent that the 35 odd percent of the country who still think Bush is doing a bang up job are motivated almost entirely by their fear and hatred of the liberal bogeyman, despite the fact that their side controls the whole of government, including the Supreme Court. It's hardly an original observation, but this utter dislocation from reality is tearing the country apart.
http://www.buchanan.org/pma-99-0517-spero.html
One wonders, given Pat Buchanan's history, why a rabbi would be an advisor to his presidential campaign. Of course, one wonders about a rabbi pushing the "war on christmas" meme as well; at least he's consistent.
For most of my sixty years, defenders of christianity have bemoaned the materialism that has become the hallmark of the holiday, but now it appears that professional Defenders Of The Faith want that materialism/commercialism sanctified. They say the lord works in mysterious ways, but I can't see this as any sort of plus for religion.
"Well, David, that's the dark little secret that only your Grandpa and a few others knew. These people weren't anti-religious as much as they were anti-Christian: anti- the majority religion that made America, America.
Okay, talk about revisionism - there is not a single, solitary version (or perversion, if you will) of Christianity that can take credit for the founding of the country - the founding of the original colonies, yes, but not the country. At the time of the Revolution and the adoption of the Constitution, Protestants and Catholics could not even agree that the other side was "Christian," for crying out loud.
Fear mongering by another name! One of the aspects that really bugs me about these sorts of appeals to the fear of the zealots comes from this near desperation at trying to make everybody else conform. If one is so damn sure of their own commitment to their faith, and they perceive the end of their own lives, knowing (okay, believing) that they will be receive in heaven, why do they insist on trying to make everyone else freak out. It just doesn't make sense. Unless of course, they are worried, indeed terrorizingly anxious that they might just not get there.
Ah, yes. The protagonist of our tale laments that the Good Old Christian National Christmas Tree has been replaced by the National Fern.
Funny that the writer of this crap is too stupid to acknowledge the pagan origins of the Christmas tree. Or weaths, or garlands, or trumpets, or any of the myriad Christmas symbols.
Or that, as Ed has pointed out, our Puritan "founders" banned the celebration of Christmas at one point. (Maybe they were in league with the p-ACLU, or "proto-American CLU".)
Never ceases to amaze me, how religious loonies conveniently forget pesky little details like facts.
Weird. Just last night, I got an idea for a story that's an inversion of "A Christmas Carol." Take a Scrooge-like TV commentator who "bah humbugs" anyone who fails to give their complete devotion to the holiday. On Christmas Eve, he is visited by three spirits conjured up by Wiccans to show him non-Christmases past and present, and a future where a tyrant enforces Christmas observance. In a none-too-subtle twist, Scrooge is terrorized by this dystopia and learns to appreciate diversity.
"You there, lad! What day is this?"
"Today? Why, it's Ujima, the third day of Kwanzaa dedicated to collective work and responsibility!"
"Merry Ujima, everyone!"
That is without a doubt one of the most asinine screeds upon which it's ever been my misfortune to lay my eyes. I think it actually hurt my brain to read it. I want the last five minutes of my life back...
In the "War on Christmas," Falafel O'Reilly considers himself a general. However, until just a few minutes ago, the Fox News Shop was offering several things to hang on one's midwinter tree, including The O'Reilly Factor Holiday Ornament. It has been changed to "Christmas" within the last hour, but I have screen shots.
At the moment, the online store is still called the Holiday Collection. Ed, would you like me to e-mail you the screen shots?