Oh that's funny.

I said "Merry Christmas" to my friend-who-self-identifies-as-Jewish-although-he-does-not-practice-the-faith yesterday and he replied, "Happy Hanukkah". See how easy that is?

I try and upset those "war on anything..." people a little more by wishing people "feliz navidad". In one way I'm wishing them the Christian holiday, but I'm talking like a dirty* Mexican**. So their heads explode. I'm trying to somehow incorporate gay marriage into my holiday greeting for a hat trick.

* Some of the cleanest people I know are Mexican.
** Not all Spanish speakers are Mexican, some are actually United States citizens!

I grew up in multicultural central New Jersey, where my family celebrated Christmas and so did a lot of people around me, but not everybody did. "Happy Holidays" was the usual farewell at this season. Now that I have lived away from that area for many years, it actually brings a warm rush of affection and nostalgia for New Jersey for me to hear "Happy Holidays." I feel about "Happy Holidays" as I do about "Happy Thanksgiving": it is for all. No one is excluded. There is no political weight to the message. We would always say "Merry Christmas" to friends we knew celebrated the holiday, or at church or the like, but I liked the ecumenical nature of "Happy Holidays" so much. It's far, far rarer in my more homogenous part of New England.

I too despise the way O'Rielly has brainwashed his weak-minded followers to make wishing someone a pleasant holiday an aggressive political statement. But I'm not going to let him take "Merry Christmas" from me. I still say it when it's the appropriate thing. What's depressing is how when a cashier or some other unknown person says it, you can no longer be sure they aren't trying to make a religio-political statement. What a lousy thing to do to what was formerly a sweet, well-wishing thing to say.

I'm trying to somehow incorporate gay marriage into my holiday greeting for a hat trick.

Just throw a wicked lisp into it.

Back when Jon linked to the story about the kids who attacked the people wishing them "Happy Hanukkah" on the subway, I was thinking the thugs were probably having a "War on Christmas"-fueled moment.

I'm with Bill-o on this -- "Happy Holidays" is weak sauce. That's why I've taken to using the following as my default Yuletide greeting: "Happy Solstice, brother! Hope to see you tonight at the baby burning in the clearing!"

I think he would approve.

Plus Jennings' post title is an Elvis Costello reference. So I love him more than all of you do-- because I met Elvis, after all. Can't remember if I've mentioned that before.

What a lousy thing to do to what was formerly a sweet, well-wishing thing to say.

No kidding. I just want people to be happy and merry.

Right on, TPS.

There's nothing that hasn't been conscripted into the culture wars. I hate that "Merry Christmas" is supposed to mean "fuck you"; and I hate that 9/11 has been turned into the Reischstag fire, the bad thing that happened to us that frees us from the chains of morality.

I feel like almost everything I believed in has been abused, degraded, and proven false in the past five plus years.

I guess that's a little far afield, but what can you do. I'll go eat some fried chicken and see if that fixes anything.

** Not all Spanish speakers are Mexican, some are actually United States citizens!

Plus, there's that whole Spain thing.

I'm trying to somehow incorporate gay marriage into my holiday greeting for a hat trick.

"Feliz Navidad to you and your life partner!" (or "... from me and my life partner!") should do it.

Ken Jennings is the coolest Mormon alive (and has said a couple nice things about me when I was posting to his forums). But the webcomicker behind "Schlock Mercenary" is a solid second, and, hey Donny O's pretty nice too. So how do we get Ken to run against Mitt Romney for Mormon President?

And as for an alternative to "Merry Christmas", I much prefer "Season's Greetings" to "Happy Holidays" for its subtle solstice suggestion. And I was saying "Happy Beethoven's Birthday", but that's past now. Here's a resource for finding alternate holidays. I'm leaning toward "Happy National Drunk and Drugged Driving Prevention Month", and if anybody complains, point out it's Presidentially Proclaimed (almost too many levels of irony to count).

I always say, "Hope you have a great holiday!" and if someone wants to take offense to my wishing them generically well...well, fuck 'em.

Here's the thing I don't get, (and I know I've said this before pretty recently): the same people that send me the "Don't shop at X, they don't say 'Merry Christmas'!" glurge are the same ones that follow up with some rant about the commercialization of Christmas. YOU CAN'T COMPLAIN ABOUT STORES THAT DON'T USE CHRISTMAS IN THEIR MARKETING AND THEN COMPLAIN ABOUT PEOPLE USING CHRISTMAS AS A MARKETING TOOL.

Seriously, if you want to keep the day special, holy and Christ-centered, then stop expecting non-adherents and the popular culture at large to celebrate along with you. Let the "Happy Holidays" people do their thing and have their doodads and whoozits and wuzzles and save "Merry Christmas" for those who are truly celebrating the birth of the savior.