Have a very Merry Christmas.

(A very merry secular Christmas that is.)

When choosing who’s image to put up and celebrate this year, remember that both Santa Claus and Jesus Christ are equally fictional, but nobody ever invaded a country or slaughtered droves of innocents in the name of Santa Claus.

(Perhaps in the name of Saint Nicholas, but not in the name of the jolly bearded capitalist who comes down chimneys)

A few great things about the secular traditions of Christmas:

• Santa Claus looks kinda like James Randi.   (Although much more portly.)
• The myth of Santa Claus helps kids associate coal with bad behavior and undesirability at a young age
• Christmas lights reinforce the message that energy should be seen as something to celebrate
• Christmas combines the message of helping others and hoping for world peace with the happiness achieved by giving and receiving material possessions and luxury items, showing that the two desires are not mutually exclusive
• It encourages happiness through consumption and thus combats the idea of guilt associated with consuming
• The combination of Christian concepts with ancient Pagan rituals and modern pop culture inventions shows that religious celebrations and traditions can be kept without the religion associated with them.
• Santa Claus is an excellent analogy for god – an all present watcher who has magic powers and whose existence in reality is ridiculous enough to see through once past a young age.
• Bringing Christmas Trees indoors demonstrates that man’s ability to alter nature and use resources is not necessarily sinister or something to fear.
• Christmas is an excellent excuse to buy someone a book or even a documentary regarding something that they are ignorant of but stand by with conviction.
• Poinsettias, Mistletoe and holly are all toxic and thus must be kept away from young children who put things in their mouth.  An excellent way of confronting the “If it’s natural it can’t hurt you” notion.
• Christmas demonstrates that Red and Green go together.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, December 25th, 2008 at 1:32 pm and is filed under Bad Science, Culture, Events, Good Science, History, Misc, Paranormal, religion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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