Our View: Love it or hate it, Christmas endures in good times and bad
Every year hundreds of thousands of words are published in the run up to December 25 on Christmas vs everything.
It’s too secularist and materialistic, Bing Crosby’s White Christmas is racist and not really about snow. The latest on Monday from a UK museum was “Santa is too white”. And when UK supermarkets sell “Evergreen Trees” or “Iced Fruit Cake”, the ensuing clickbait is guaranteed to fuel the online outrage machine.
On the extreme end, there are those who believe Christmas should be cancelled altogether because not everyone can “do” or “have” a Christmas. This is true but to carry it to its logical conclusion, no one on earth should own an iPhone, a car or a home unless everyone does.
The world is not fair but we’re not evolved enough to fix it and cancel culture is not the solution.
The arguments often lead to claims of a “woke war on Christmas”. Yes, there are sporadic and isolated attacks by the new Puritans every year but it’s not yet a war the like of which was endured in the 1600s when the original joyless Puritan Protestants of Oliver Cromwell’s England imposed a 16-year ban on Christmas. People refused to comply.
Why was Christmas worth fighting for? It wasn’t because of commercialisation by giant corporations. Were people more religious? Probably. Beyond both, however, and grinches aside, there is an inherent recognition that goodwill, charity, family gatherings, cheery kitsch and gift-giving are net positives in a troubled world if only for a moment in time.
Nothing embodies this more than the temporary 1914 Christmas truce in the trenches of the Western Front during WW1 when some British and German units independently ceased hostilities, shook hands, exchanged small gifts and shared drinks.
If this short respite in a world war did not resonate at some level, it would not be still talked about 111 years later though unfortunately never taken on board as a lesson in all that time by world governments, including our own.
Cyprus had its own violent Christmas 62 years ago when intercommunal troubles broke out on December 21, 1963. UN figures indicate that around 136 Turkish Cypriots and 30 Greek Cypriots were killed by January 1, 1964, hundreds more by August 1964. A significant number are still listed as missing.
Last Sunday, the leaders of both communities made statements to mark this anniversary. Interestingly, new Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman, unlike his predecessor, did not subject us to a lengthy history lesson or sling any mud. He merely said: “The goal must be to ensure that the pain of the past is not repeated and that no child is left without a future”.
President Nikos Christodoulides rolled with the history lesson, calling it “the beginning of the Turkish invasion and the Turkish plans for Cyprus that were fulfilled ten years later”.
Technically and historically, he is probably accurate but with a change of leadership in the north, and his own stated hopes for new talks, just for once, the rhetoric could possibly, maybe have been dialled back a little… in the spirit of goodwill.
Merry Christmas.