God and Christmas/Holiday

[_joi]

Makers of a game (FarmVille) on Facebook introduced "holiday trees" with "holiday presents" you could send to people for their trees. The use of "holiday" instead of "Christmas" has caused a big stir among players of the game. Some have said they just don't think Christ should be removed from things that celebrate a Christian holiday just to not

Comments

[tenebrax]

Y'know, to me "holiday tree" doesn't sound quite right. But Christmas trees are a custom borrowed from pagan Yule trees, so that does kind of muddle the issue.

But the whole "liberal war on Christmas" thing is a non-starter, as far as I'm concerned, unless you really wanna accuse Bing Crosby of being a soulless partisan of the Downfall Of American Values.

The winter solstice is a festival shared by almost every religion in the northern hemisphere, and a few that aren't. To claim that only Christians have a right to celebrate around that time is kinda fatuous, and to try to claim a Christian hammerlock on a borrowed custom just seems naive.

And the Pledge of Allegiance? Okay, I'm gonna go out on a limb and state that the Gawdly Necessity of including a witch-hunting aftermarket addition to the Pledge just won't fly with me.

[_joi]

I could go either way on the christmas trees. Personally, I think they should have said "Christmas trees", but understand why they went with "holiday trees", but my argument was that people shouldn't be all up in arms about this happening in a game, online, in Facebook.

The whole God/pledge thing is pretty clear cut to me. This country boasts "freedom of religion" and that's ANY religion, so forcing kids to say "in God we trust" violates that freedom. I could say it all day long and not really be bothered, but it's about the right to choose.

me too post

[_twilight_]

Anything I would've posted, you just did.

[stypica]

I think if people don't like it, they should write their own game for facebook :)

and there's a reason "under god" sounds out of place in the pledge - it wasn't in there in the first place.

[ego_likeness]

Seems to me that as "Christmas trees" were taken from a pagan tradition, that is just fine.

[femmdraven]

The word "god" was added to both the pledge AND our money after the fact.

As for using holiday tree or christmas tree, they could just as well have said "decorated pine tree" or "decorated spruce", etc.

The typical overboard christian will always look to pick a fight over this issue. They'll even claim our forefathers were christian and this is a christian country...they obviously haven't done their homework and choose to ignore the constitution.

[lunatic_saint]

I'm a Christian, but also a Libertarian. I see it as the choice of the creators of the game. Whatever they want to call it is fine, and making such a big fuss of it makes people seem like idiots.

Although, I think the best choice would have been to provide Christmas Trees, Yule Logs, Hannukah presents etc. for the various religions and cultures. But, like I said, their game, their decision.

[_joi]

I absolutely love your answer and I'm a little surprised someone else didn't mention that solution already.

[lunatic_saint]

I just tend to think that all religions are persecuted somewhere. If you live in the wrong town, work at the wrong job, you could be any of a number of religions and face descrimination. I hate to see it. As one of the former posters mentioned, this country was built on freedom of religion :).