'War on Christmas' Controversies Spread

This week, Tommy and Caleb are starting a new series called "Twelve Days of the War on Christmas." Today will be Caleb's overview. Tomorrow, Tommy's.

On the first day of the War on Christmas, Obama gave to me, a reindeer and a hate spree.

Last week, Mark Impomeni wrote about a heinous and offensive attack on all people of faith which was posted at the Washington state capitol building under the guise of equal time in Christmas displays. The absurdity of calling such a grotesque mockery an exercise in equality is no doubt shades of fairness doctrines to come. The incident is easily the most egregious example of someone using the pretense of fairness to attack religion at large, but it is sadly not the only incident. There has arisen in our collective political and cultural lexicon a phrase which sounded at first absurd, perhaps, but which increasingly has become the only truly accurate description of events: The War on Christmas.

Naysayers try to mock this term with straw man arguments routinely, particularly in extreme left venues such as MSNBC programs or on The Daily Show. They select minor occurrences and paint those as the norm in order to belittle the idea of a war on Christmas, glossing over and, by the way, tacitly endorsing tactics like the Washington state attack. They make wisecracks about how it's just O'Reilly's slow news week and a few whiners. They try to paint a picture that there's a mere argument for "inclusion" and that blowhards are blowing it up. A few years ago, I also thought the phrase "War on Christmas" was over the top, and I said as much in a blog entry about Bill O'Reilly. I've come to see, however, that the term is increasingly accurate, despite being sensational. Besides which, it's now the generalized term for the kinds of controversies I'm about to cover.

Take, for example, North Carolina. Deep south and Bible belt territory, you'd think North Carolina would be immune to such controversy. You'd be wrong. In Wilmington, an elementary school banned Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer from a school performance because one parent decided the word Santa was an endorsement of Christianity. Seriously.

Also in North Carolina, UNC Chapel Hill required a commission to determine whether racist graffiti should be removed, but empowered the provost of libraries to remove all Christmas trees with no such panel. So racism is nuanced, but Christmas trees are bad on their face? Eventually the elementary school was overruled by saner heads, but the University's decision stands.

This is merely the tip of the candy cane, unfortunately.

In October, Christmas tensions flared up early when fire code changes in Wisconsin banned trees in churches. Much of the press reporting suggested that this was the result of a fluke fire code change about vegetation in public places, however the fact is that the fire code specifically named Christmas trees in churches. One fire chief warned all the local religious institutions that 2008 was the last year in which he would not enforce the ban and that, starting in 2009, churches would no longer be permitted to have Christmas trees.

Since that time, state lawmakers have set the standard that fire chiefs may use their own judgment on tree situations going forward. So they reduced it from a ban, but did not restore the rights of the churches. A minor reversal I'd say. The interesting aspect is that Christmas trees in churches were specifically prohibited. The government made a law, you see, prohibiting the free exercise of religion. For such a major violation of the first amendment you'd think there'd have been a bigger hullabaloo wouldn't you? Where was the ACLU? Oh ... right. Too busy bur ... err, banning crosses.

These are the words engraved on a placard at the state capitol.
Photo here.

Still, nothing beats the sign in the Washington state rotunda. As Tommy Christopher noted, the sign was stolen last week. It has since been recovered and put back where it was, next to the nativity scene. Dan Barker is co-founder of Freedom From Religion foundation, the group who placed and then replaced the placard. When interviewed by CNN about the theft, Barker said that "most people think December is for Christians and view our signs as an intrusion, when actually it's the other way around. People have been celebrating the winter solstice long before Christmas. We see Christianity as the intruder, trying to steal the holiday from all of us humans." On the challenge that the sign, which accuses religion of being a superstitious tool of enslavement, is hateful, Barker said that "we respond that we kind of feel that the Christian message is the hate message. On that Nativity scene, there is this threat of internal violence if we don't submit to that master. Hate speech goes both ways."

This is a blatant admission that he is not putting up a holiday display. He is putting up a protest of Christianity. "It's not that we are trying to coerce anyone; in a way our sign is a signal of protest," he says. This is a direct contradiction of the reasoning most war on Christmas apologists use to justify their actions in the first place. By his own words Barker is not looking for some sort of equal time for a holiday display. He's actively attacking both Christmas and Christianity via a vicious protest sign. Imagine the uproar if the state were forcing rotunda visitors to be subjected to a sign on Ramadan which stated that Islam was a superstitious tool of enslavement. So why is it so acceptable in this case?

The answer is simple. For a large and still growing portion of the American left, there is only one form of evil: western culture. In universities and Moveon.org meetings, the only oppressor, the only representative of evil, is western culture. It's a culture which celebrates Christmas as well as Christianity, and it's a culture with traditions and observances like any other. People like Dan Barker, Bill Ayers, and Ward Churchill aren't interested in fairness or equal time, as some claim, but in the abolishment of the values, traditions, and culture of the west at large, and America in particular. It's a hostility born of sixties counter-culture and psychological baggage. In short, the war on Christmas is just a symptom of the greater culture war. Instances like I've mentioned here should only be expected to increase, as the Barker's of the world are certainly going to be emboldened by having "their' candidate in office.

It's not a joke, and it's not a mere catch-phrase. It's a real threat to the integrity of our national character and the spirit of America. People like Dan Barker are enemies of American culture and tradition, largely by their own admission. They are proponents of a particular brand of hatred who get away with their crimes against their fellow man under the intolerable auspices of political correctness. And they do it during the height of a season which used to bring people together under the common values of peace, understanding, faith, family and, above all, love.

What is the war on Christmas? It's a symptom of a war on American values by hateful left-wing activists who despise this country and all that it is, has been, and will ever be. It's not about inclusion, it's about excision. The removal of Christianity and anything associate with Christianity from these shores. It's time to choose your side: Dan Barker and the radical left? Or Santa Claus and the Constitution. Choose wisely. There is a list, and it's being checked twice.