RICK’S BLOG: CHRISTMAS IS A LOAD OF CRAP-- HUMBUG INDEED

BY RICK GRANT rickgrant01@comcast.net Posted Dec 24, 2006

Call me Scrooge, or worse, but to me, Christmas has become a commercial load of crap–skillfully marketed to make every man, woman, and child in America feel guilty if they are not out spending like drunken sailors. Every year, the retailers depend on the Christmas season to make their financial goals. Hell, even President Bush is advising people to go out and spend to rescue the economy and raise more money in taxes to support the Iraq War that is sucking 4 billion dollars a month into the black hole that is national debt. Hey, just print more money and soon inflation will get so bad, it will cost four thousand dollars to buy a loaf of bread.

Yes, the sophisticated marketing of the holiday season begins in September. That Lexus commercial implies that if you don’t buy your wife a 60,000 dollar Lexus you are a cheap son of a bitch and she won’t love you anymore. Buy, buy, buy is the fiendish subliminal program that is designed to loosen the wallets of the most frugal person.

This year, I decided to boycott Christmas. I was doing well, when suddenly, the deeply repressed guilt hit me like a heart attack. I quickly sent my grown up daughter and my grandson E-mailed gift cards that only take an hour to reach them. They like to get gift cards to spend as they please. It was painless, but I was going to resist the urge to give anything to anybody. Ah yes, this guilt is deeply imbedded in my consciousness. I didn’t want my offspring to think I didn’t love them, so I gave in, and sent them gift cards. However, I didn’t buy a Christmas tree, or anything that resembled the traditional celebration of this phony-baloney holiday.

Black Friday–the day after Thanksgiving-- was an orgy of wild eyed spenders lined up all night to get "once-a-year" bargans. People fought over places in line, and then when the doors finally opened to Mecca–Wal-Mart–people went crazy and acted like Jihadists running into battle to die for Allah. CNN was there to chronicle the sorry spectacle of people rushing the door to get 40% off a flat screen TV or whatever. This is consumerism run amok.

Retailers plan all year for their Christmastime marketing strategy. They flash the latest gadgets, game consoles, and flat screen TVs in their ads, tripping the people’s preprogrammed switch to run up those credit card bills as everyone’s patriotic duty. Then the poor schmucks spend all year paying off their Christmas spending binge.

My campaign to boycott this fiendish conspiracy to relieve me of my money almost worked. Still, at least I resisted the subliminal urge to spend, and didn’t go hog wild. I only spent what I could afford. And, I think my offspring understand. If not, well what have they done for me lately–nothing. But we know that we love each other despite my attitude toward Christmas. They say, yeah, dad is eccentric and cheap, but he did buy us stuff when we grew up.
Hey I paid my dues, now screw it, Christmas is just a load of crap and that’s that. My wife vehemently disagrees and has renounced this blog. I may have to buy her a Lexus to get out of the dog house.