With the Christmas season come and gone, it’s back to normal in St. Paul and area, but for some of the politically correct, opposing Christmas continues year-round. Some call it a war on Christmas, and others perhaps just impolite, but the movement towards replacing the word Christmas brought out the teeth of proponents and opponents this year.
According to former St. Paul Journal reporter David Menzies, now a national writer and commentator, the war on Christmas ramped up again this year. In an article published online in the Huffington Post Canada, he points to a hardware store selling a “pre-lit tree” as opposed to a Christmas tree. Pointing to other examples of commercial weariness to use the word Christmas, Menzies urged readers to patronize only stores that used the word Christmas and not a substitute.
It would be unthinkable to rename Eid or Ramadan, two important Muslim holidays, or Hanukah, the Jewish holiday in December, with bland politically correct substitutes. Such suggestions would be rightly met with uproar, so it is no wonder many have expressed disappointment with trying to get rid of Christmas.
Ontario Conservative MP Scott Reid jumped into the fray after a school bus operator took down Christmas decorations put up by a driver and students. Reid called on the Tri-Board Student Transportation Services to lift its “ban on Christmas cheer,” in a press release before Christmas.
“The fact of the matter is that the world is full of different people with different traditions and different religious beliefs,” Reid said. “Attempting to create an atmosphere where everybody hides their traditions and beliefs when they’re in public is the least tolerant system I can think of.”
Reid is right. Christmas is a Canadian tradition that must be defended.
