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Attention ALL Atheists: I need your help...

tommyz

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Has anyone here noticed how Mr. Randi deftly avoided using the term "Happy Holidays" in his commentaries the past few weeks?

Personally, I celebrate Christmas myself, but could care less what other people think of it. And as a multi-cultured, respectable and "polically correct" (for a lack of a better term) individual, I'm very considerate of other people's beliefs and realize that not everyone celebrates Christmas like I do. This is why I ALWAY use the term "Happy Holidays" around this time of year, as a generic salutation in which people of ALL faiths would find both welcoming and non-offensive (unless of course I know for a FACT that the person I'm greeting DOES celebrate Christmas --then I'd say "Merry Christmas" or is Jewish, in which case I'd wish them a "Happy Hannukah").

How, then, would I greet an atheist at this time of year? If you're an antheist and you're reading this (and I know we've got plenty of them on this board!) do you ever get offended if someone wishes you "Happy Holidays"? If so, what would you then suggest to be a more appropriate euphemism for people of your belief system?
 
Since when did Christmas become Lord Voldemort? Wish me "Merry Christmas", I won't be offended. I might not be a believer anymore but I still go home, give and get presents around a Christmas tree, and eat turkey and meat pies at 1AM. Wish me a Happy Hannukah, Krazy Kwanzaa, whatever else, I won't mind either though I don't celebrate those. I find "Happy Holidays" more offending just because of its PCness.

PS: The expression is "coudn't care less".
 
HI, I'm a hardcore atheist, with some agnostic view thrown in. But I am a sucker for traditions, and christmas is a quite nice tradition: You eat good food, you give presents to others, and you are usually free from work.

So, born in a christian country, I prefer "Merry Christmas" or "God Jul" as we put it in Swedish. The religious meaning of christmas is totally irrelevant to me.

/Anders
 
First of all, I do not get offended because someone wishes me well within his own limited belief system. "Merry Christmas" is as good as anything to me. I also think that because atheists do not deposit their reason for existence in a religion, we are probably not so thin-skinned as the religious types.

Besides, I consider Christmas to be a heathen festival, that has unsuccessfully been usurped by the Christians. I say "unsuccessfully", because it is really a feast of consumerism, and in my country, Denmark, you will be hard pressed to find any religious symbols at all. Even Santa Claus is just called the Christmas Man, and the Danish word for Christmas does not contain "Christ" in it anyway. Which reminds me that "Happy holiday" is also a bit awkward because it contains the word "holy", which is a bit difficult to grasp for an atheist!

In any case, I am also not subscribing to ancient heathen practices, so the fact that Christmas is originally a heathen solstice festival is not really something that should appeal to me, but it is useful to rub in the nose of the Christians.

Happy *insert whatever that appeals to you*!
 
I'm not sure why people get so hung up on this.

I'm an Atheist yet I wish people Happy Christmas and send people Christmas cards (sometimes even with mangers!).

It's not like December 25th has anything particularly to do with Christ anyway (being a pagan midwinter festival hijacked wholesale to be turned into a Christian festival).

It is an ancient festival based around winter, family, celebration, happiness, food, gifts, and general nice things.

I personally like these things so if Christians can celebrate at this time of year that has no real historical significance for them so can the rest of us.
And if it acts as a yearly focus for their belief system well that's all fine and dandy (although I'd have thought Easter would make more sense...)

If anyone finds any holiday trapping or greeting offensive the problem is almost certainly with them.

Example - in England there have been a few attempts to ban certain Christmas trappings in certain places so as not to be offensive to other religions or beliefs.
These attempts have not been made by the people who will alegedly be offended but by misguided middle-class white Christians who tend to see offense just about everywhere.
Indeed the Muslim Council for England have publicly declared that they have no problem with any aspect of Christmas as this is a basically Christian country so we celebrate as such.
You'd think this would be obvious really, but the super PC brigade won't listen to the average man on the street, only those who they are 'defending'.

Like there aren't better things for them to put their energies into.:rolleyes:

But overall, almost everyone in Britain would say Merry Christmas without thinking twice about it.
 
The Universal Language Translator embedded in my brain changes all holiday greetings to "Happy Solstice", which does not offend me.
 
I wonder if anyone actually does get offended if you wish them a "Merry Christmas" even if they aren’t Christian?

Thinking it through, the term Christmas is a label that in common usage refers to this time of the year, not a particular Christian Mass so who could be offended by being wished "Have a Merry "this time of year"?

If someone is offended by the use of "Christmas" to refer to this time of the year I wonder if they also object to the names of the days of the week? After all most of the English words for the days have ancient religious significance.
 
Offense is where you choose to take it. I don't mind if people wish me Merry Ramadan, Happy Solstice, or Joyful Walrus. If they wished me Unhappy Christmas or Miserable Hannukah, I might have cause for upset. (Although actually, I would be tickled, and respond with "And a Damnable Cthulhu-tide to you as well!")

If people want to wish you well, it's stupid to expect them to quiz you on your cultural, ethnic, and religious background first to check for suitability.
 
tommyz said:
How, then, would I greet an atheist at this time of year?
Click to expand...

I prefer a hearty "Heil Hitler!" People tend to get out of your way after that.
 
I think this is an interesting point by Darat:
Thinking it through, the term Christmas is a label that in common usage refers to this time of the year, not a particular Christian Mass so who could be offended by being wished "Have a Merry "this time of year"?

If someone is offended by the use of "Christmas" to refer to this time of the year I wonder if they also object to the names of the days of the week? After all most of the English words for the days have ancient religious significance.
Click to expand...
It's the same as wishing someone a nice weekend.
And I'm not going to worry about offending shift workers.:)
 
Have a merry Christmas, a happy Hannukah, a kwazy Kwanzaa, a tip-top Tet, a super Saturnalia, and a very solemn and dignified Ramadan.

May Great Cthulhu devour you in peace.
 
Ashles said:

Example - in England there have been a few attempts to ban certain Christmas trappings in certain places so as not to be offensive to other religions or beliefs.
These attempts have not been made by the people who will alegedly be offended but by misguided middle-class white Christians who tend to see offense just about everywhere.
Click to expand...
Cite, please.
AFAIK, this is a UL. What happened is that the Mail, or some similar rag, found out that Red Cross charity shops don't display manger scenes, or anything else that smacks of Christianity. This is because the Red Cross charter specifically states that they must not show any religious bias. (They still put up decorations, though, and don't forbid staff from saying "happy Christmas".)
But of course, the Mail, in typical fashion, decided this was middle-class PC liberals pandering to Muslim sensitivities (getting two DM bogies in one go) , and it's the UL version of events that has stuck in peoples' minds ever since.

ETS: c4ts, Ramadan was last October and as it's a fast, it's not exactly something that anyone would celebrate anyway - try "Happy Eid" instead (although you'd be nearly 2 months late).
 
Well here's one cite
I have read other examples in various papers, but it's hard to know which if any you will accept.

At the last place I worked I wasn't allowed to put christmas decorations up for this very reason.

It may be a tiny minority, but let's not pretend it doesn't happen.
 
Perhaps it's due to the recent release of the Seinfeld DVD's, but I have noticed an increased reference to "Happy Festivus (for the rest of us)" in many jokes and greetings this year. Who knows, maybe it will eventually be absorbed into the world's consciousness and become the major PC greeting!!
 
Since the winter solstice marks the beginning of summer, I'll be happy if you wish me "Happy Summer". Actually you can keep wishing "Happy Summer" to me all year round and I'll never be offended.
 
Ashles said:
Well here's one cite
Click to expand...
That's a very weak one. So some schools didn't put on Nativity Plays - so what? As the comments below the report illustrate, there could be a variety of reasons for it - teachers not having enough time, for a start.
An awful lot of people are using this whole "not allowed to celebrate Christmas" storm-in-a-manger fuss to air their racist prejudices, viz "We have Diwali and Ramadaneverywhere for the ethnics, but us indigenous people can't celebrate our own religion!"
Sheesh, nobody's stopping anyone from following their own faith here. If these people really want a display of ickle baby Jeezuz and his Mum at Christmas that much, they'd stick up a Nativity scene in their front garden and invite the neighbours to a Nativity play in their front room!
 
It sounds like you are airing prejudices of your own here.

I never said this was widespread, I was merely using the very few cases where it has happened as an illustration that the problem is with the people who are complaining.

Or are you saying it doesn't happen, period?
 
Thanks for the very interesting and lively replies, folks!



Now does anyone know if James Randi's employees, interns and other staff members get any days off for Christmas and/or Hanukah? How about for Good Friday? And other religious holidays? Just because one is atheist doesn't necessarily mean that he/she has to "force" his beliefs on his employees who may not necessarily agree with him...

Look at it this way: An atheist friend of mine from high school always referred to Good Friday as being "good" because he always got the day off. :D Me? I was always grateful to Jewish people because without them, I wouldn't have THEIR days off. Yup, those were the good 'ol days of high school. But in the business world where I work now, we only get the secular holidays off; the only one being Christmas.

Maybe we could all get a petition going requesting ALL businesses be closed for ALL religious holidays, no? :D
 
Personally I have never met, or heard of an atheist that refused to celebrate Christmas because of his non-belief. I'm an atheist and I believe my mother, father and brother are too, but we celebrate Christmas, and we even sing Christmas songs about Jesus, while dancing around the tree. It's a great tradition, and one doesn't have to believe in God, just like one doesn't have to believe in Santa, to celebrate it.

It seems, to me, that you have some prejudice about atheists being more fanatical than they actually are, correct me if I'm wrong.

Also, drop that PC silliness. If people choose to become oftended because of your usage of the word Christmas it's their problem, not yours.
 
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