Yes, it's that time of year again; When you can't say Happy Holidays because if you do someone will claim they can't say Merry Christmas because you did. And so we have to hear it on FOX "News" and all over social media ad nauseum until the Season is over: "I WILL SAY MERRY CHRISTMAS AND THEY CAN'T STOP ME!"
This has gotten to where it is primarily as a result of the media and many retail outlets using "Happy Holidays" during the winter holiday season because they realize that all of their customers aren't Christians. What this is is just good marketing. It leaves no one out...it's generic (and actually INCLUDES Christmas) so customers all feel like they are welcome. It's an attempt (and a mostly effective one) to make everyone happy.....
Except Christians i guess, because they apparently don't want anyone but Christians to have a "Happy Holiday".
To put this totally into perspective, lets do a brief analysis of the words involved.
"Christmas" means literally, "Christ Mass". It's a celebration of the birth (whether he was actually born on this date or not is disputed) of Jesus Christ. So if you celebrate Christ Mass this is for you.
"Holiday" is derived from "Holy Day". If you use this you are wishing everyone (even Christians!) a good Holy Day. So there really is NO DISPUTE HERE. Christians are not excluded. But that doesn't seem to be their problem. The issue for the complainers is that others are included...and they don't want that.
So how many Holy Days do they want to leave out so that their Christ Mass can be truly Merry?
Here is a link to just the December Holy Days and festivals celebrated by various religions and cultures around the world ;
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_multinational_festivals_and_holidays#December
As you can see, many are Christian and many are not. I've left off New Years essentially because it comes in January...but that's normally included when one says "Happy Holidays" as well. So i suppose that in order that Christians won't feel attacked (War on Christmas!), all of those others would have to be ignored....and Happy New Year would have to be wished separately just as a precaution.
The thing is, we who say Happy Holidays really don't care if someone just wants to say Merry Christmas. I know this is hard to believe, but it's true. The problem REALLY is that they don't want to hear anything BUT Merry Christmas. Because if one wants to take notice of any other Holiday in the season it's considered an attack on their Holiday.
I personally celebrate Winter Solstice. But that's just me. I might say "Good Solstice" to those people i know who celebrate it... or i might say Happy Holidays if i'm talking to someone who doesn't. But please feel free to say "Merry Christmas"...i won't hate you... i'll say "Happy Holidays" and i promise, i'm not making war on baby Jesus.
