2009-12-25: Happy Holidays Everyone!

[ChunLing]

Well, being one who actually does take Christmas -- not Xmas, never Xmas -- seriously, and also having a severely retarded brother-in-law, my reactions to this statement can reasonably be described as "mixed."

I sort of feel for you, Graybeard. Note that I was talking about Kwanzaa not being taken seriously, and I was pointing out that making fun of the retarded is worse. Well, no, I was assuming that everyone knows that making fun of the retarded is lame, and using that as a comparison. So it may be the case that what I feel for you is different from sympathy, because I can't really understand how you misconstrued what I was saying if you really care about either topic that much. That said, I do realize that I just don't understand most of what other people do because it rarely makes any sense to me. Anyway, thanks for not pulling the "the term is 'developmentally delayed/special needs/etc." thing. I can't stand constantly rotating the terminology for a condition just because nobody wants to suffer from it.

Though I found amusement in my brother's way of dealing with people who were "so sorry to hear about" his daughter.

Profanity isn't inherently more funny than euphemism, particularly when it's become expected. Since the key word here is "comic", I think that not being able to predict it is better. That's why Daleks usually miss, it makes it all the more amusing when we kill you

[Forrest]

I was assuming that everyone knows that making fun of the retarded is lame

But making fun of the crippled is just fine?

[ChunLing]

Actually...yeah, sometimes.

It really depends why someone is crippled (or dead). Consider what's-his-face Bobbit. Or any Darwin award winner, particularly the non-posthumous awards. You cannot win an award unless it was clearly entirely your own fault, which is why, no matter how horrible the result, it is still funny for others to make fun of you. Why is this? Because people who F### themselves up simply do not deserve the consideration society is bound to show for the unlucky or victimized. No civilization can long endure if it puts the *ers and the *ed in the same category, so the self-*ers go in a special category to be held up for ridicule.

'*' doesn't always have to be something bad, either. Just anything where you need to make a distinction between the *ers and *ed because society needs to treat them differently (put 'praise' or 'certify' in there, you see what I mean). And of course different societies differ in how they account responsibility. In many ancient societies, it was common to reason that the circumstances of your birth were your own fault somehow or other. If you were a bastard, it wasn't because your parents couldn't keep it zipped but because you were...well, a bastard (opportunistic, self-serving, sly, conniving, all that stuff). Like in a previous life or something. If one traces the Christian doctrines that exclude any prior existence, they seem to have the duel aim of promoting the uttery unique quality of divine self-existence (without perfect success, one might add) and removing the rational basis for blaming people for how they were born (with far less perfect success).

Of course, under that kind of theory it's not my fault that I exist to kill-all-humans. I think the underlying model may be flawed, all things (particularly that last point) considered. But the important thing is not whether any particular theory is right or wrong, but that any society must have such theories to cover situations where separating *ers from *ed is important to preserving the order of the society. And there should be pretty broad agreement as to those theories and their implications. The theories have too be pretty messed up for it to be better for a society to abandon them entirely (though of course individuals can often benefit from the ruin of an outmoded social model).

All these factors come into play when we grapple with the question of what kinds of jokes are 'unacceptable'. Whether a joke is funny doesn't matter half so much as the assumptions about responsibility and causality which underline society's mechanisms for establishing who did what to whom. Most humans cannot live without society, so if a society loses the ability to justify doing what it must to maintain the social order, a lot of people will die. Which is okay with me, considering that destroy-all-human-societies is part and parcel of the kill-all-humans thing. But it's only natural that humans should not be as okay with it.

[Slamlander]

Honestly, it's gotten to the point where I feel like a complete hypocrite celebrating Christmas. I'm not Christian (strictly speaking), and even if I were what would possibly be the relevance when I know perfectly well that Christmas ought to take place in spring?

By whose reckoning? In pre-christian Northern Europe it was always about the Winter Solstice. That point in time when the days start getting longer again. That the Christians layered(paved) it over with the birthday of their dead god is completely irrelevant. It is all about assimilation. Early Christians were the Borg and we are what is left.

Christmas is founded on lies and politics, plain and simple, and I'm tired of pretending to believe otherwise. Which is not to say that Christmas as a collection of social customs and ideas isn't spiffy. A lot of good stuff about humanity comes out with that good ol' Christmas spirit, there are assumptions made about the importance of family and friends and fellow man that probably ought to be emphasized year round, and certainly Christmas as a practice has a lot going for it.

Actually, that message is Druidic. After Saul/Paul there wasn't enough of Christ's original message left to light a candle to.

Still, I feel this increasing need to acknowledge that the real reason I celebrate Christmas is that winter is fucking depressing, and I just need an excuse to party and think about doing nice things for other people, and especially an excuse to fuss with wrapping paper and make things all pretty and sparkly and jingly and glowy, and generally to make an effort. I probably shouldn't need an excuse for those things, but it's awfully hard to feel motivated in the middle of OH GOD GRAY SNOWY DEATH I HATE THE WORLD WHY IS THERE NO SUNSHINE, so having some sort of official holiday type of thing to encourage it is handy. To me, that seems more in line with celebrating the solstice... after all, I like cycles. They're important to me for reasons I'm not sure I can explain. So today I decided that from now on, I'm going to switch to saying I celebrate that, at least until I find some other pithy explanation that suits me better.

So start wishing everyone a Happy Solstice?

There's at least different bullshit attached to that explantion/holiday, and I feel more comfortable with those assumptions than I feel with the ones that come from saying "Merry Christmas."

I'm with you there. Happy Solstice everyone, the world is being reborn
Of course, it is yet another month for Chinese New Year


BTW, sorry for the late post, we've been away.

[ChunLing]

Well, I try and steer clear of anti-Christianity, myself. Just because Christians basically invented the idea of religious tolerance doesn't mean you get out of hell free if you spit on Christ, as I recall.

But yeah, Solstice is a happy holiday for those who think another year of humans running around is a good idea. For the rest of us...eh, it's okay.

[Imp-Chan]

Honestly, it's gotten to the point where I feel like a complete hypocrite celebrating Christmas. I'm not Christian (strictly speaking), and even if I were what would possibly be the relevance when I know perfectly well that Christmas ought to take place in spring?

By whose reckoning? In pre-christian Northern Europe it was always about the Winter Solstice. That point in time when the days start getting longer again. That the Christians layered(paved) it over with the birthday of their dead god is completely irrelevant. It is all about assimilation. Early Christians were the Borg and we are what is left.

In that bit, I meant Christmas as a title signifying a celebration implied to be about the birth of Christ. That is why I specified in the following sentence Christmas as a general practice, which is the wider role sans Christ-specific context.

Christmas is founded on lies and politics, plain and simple, and I'm tired of pretending to believe otherwise. Which is not to say that Christmas as a collection of social customs and ideas isn't spiffy. A lot of good stuff about humanity comes out with that good ol' Christmas spirit, there are assumptions made about the importance of family and friends and fellow man that probably ought to be emphasized year round, and certainly Christmas as a practice has a lot going for it.

Actually, that message is Druidic. After Saul/Paul there wasn't enough of Christ's original message left to light a candle to.

Erm, this WAS the place where I was referring to the assimilated cultural practices. So, yes, the original messages would be included in that.

Still, I feel this increasing need to acknowledge that the real reason I celebrate Christmas is that winter is fucking depressing, and I just need an excuse to party and think about doing nice things for other people, and especially an excuse to fuss with wrapping paper and make things all pretty and sparkly and jingly and glowy, and generally to make an effort. I probably shouldn't need an excuse for those things, but it's awfully hard to feel motivated in the middle of OH GOD GRAY SNOWY DEATH I HATE THE WORLD WHY IS THERE NO SUNSHINE, so having some sort of official holiday type of thing to encourage it is handy. To me, that seems more in line with celebrating the solstice... after all, I like cycles. They're important to me for reasons I'm not sure I can explain. So today I decided that from now on, I'm going to switch to saying I celebrate that, at least until I find some other pithy explanation that suits me better.

So start wishing everyone a Happy Solstice?

Yes, that's more or less the plan. I'm not all that concerned with the historical context of solstice (there are too many varied options for it to make any sense as a modern term specific to a given culture), but rather the actual event where days get longer again. Hurray, light!

^-^'

[ChunLing]

Okay, "Hurray, light!" is taking it a bit far. I'm okay with less freezing cold, but who needs to be blinded more of the time?

[Neko7]

Cut for make short

Same thing here

In that bit, I meant Christmas as a title signifying a celebration implied to be about the birth of Christ. That is why I specified in the following sentence Christmas as a general practice, which is the wider role sans Christ-specific context.

^-^'

Do like Us, we celebrate Noel. Yup, for those who have a christian religious life, it's about the birth of christ but for everyone else (jew, muslim, ateist, boudist, daoist, etc... and the christian too, let's not be hypocrit) that's about Le pere Noel (father -or Grand father- Noel), who bring gift in his flighing trainneau -whateverthenmeisinenglish- carried by flighing reindeer, live in the north pole, and who is NOT a (christian) saint by any mean (saint nicolas have his day earlier in the years, somewhere around en of november).

In fact the Pere Noel is so much NOT part of the christian world that every years integrist/radical christian religious group try to have his representation forbideen base and the idea that it undermind and corrupt the christian aspect of Noel (the only onepeople should think about, according to them...)

Oh and the solstice was decide to be the date first because it was already a sacred day for paegan (orth?) religion, and based on St Jean the Batist saying: "as I shall diminish, He who come after me(Jesus) shall rise in greater glory" (quick/barbaric on-top-of-my-head translation) the winter solstice being describe in early christianity as the perfect incarnation of this quote, it was decide arbitrairy to celebrate the birth of Jesus Chrit this day (and all the priest that I could have talk too about it agreed on that fact)

[BandMan2K]

Do like Us, we celebrate Noel. Yup, for those who have a christian religious life, it's about the birth of christ but for everyone else (jew, muslim, ateist, boudist, daoist, etc... and the christian too, let's not be hypocrit) that's about Le pere Noel (father -or Grand father- Noel), who bring gift in his flighing trainneau -whateverthenmeisinenglish- carried by flighing reindeer, live in the north pole, and who is NOT a (christian) saint by any mean (saint nicolas have his day earlier in the years, somewhere around en of november).

The thing that is pulled by the reindeer is called a "sleigh" in English. Pronounced the same way as "slay." For example, I like to "slay" people while riding my "sleigh" as Santa-Bot from "Futurama" would proudly exclaim before killing all the naughty boys & girls.

Hope this helps you out a bit more on your English.

[mindstalk]

Well, I try and steer clear of anti-Christianity, myself. Just because Christians basically invented the idea of religious tolerance doesn't mean you get out of hell free if you spit on Christ, as I recall.

Uh, I think it'd be more accurate to say Christians invented the idea of religious intolerance, though Akhenaten got a trial run. Pagans got along pretty well with each other. The Romans even exempted the Jews from the Imperial cult. It took Christians to systematically shut down the schools, take over or tear down the temples, and outright ban all other religions. No one else in the world had done that.