I knew years ago that the celebration of Christmas had taken a turn for the worst and was orbiting the drain in what little humility it had left.
Last year, my fears were confirmed and I was thrown into a fit of despair for what little dignity was left for the multitude of holidays celebrated during the winter season, when I first became witness to the Virgin Mobile’s “Chrismahanukwanzakah” celebration, in an effort to extort more money from American debt holders.
If you remember the commercial, which will always be with me, you were most likely benightedly red-faced by lyrics such as, “Whose faith is the right one/It’s anybody’s guess/What matters most is camera phones for $20 less.”
Apparently, our mission during the joyous holiday season, regardless of our beliefs, is to become the “special prison friend” of big business.
Obviously, Virgin mobile doesn’t give an airborne rodentia’s posterior what you celebrate or if there is any sanctity or dignity left in it. They just want to capitalize off it so that you’ll buy more completely unnecessary consumer electronics.
I was remorsefully close to giving up and giving the world the collective finger over this whole bit of nonsense, when I heard about the concept of Festivus, a holiday “for the rest of us.”
This holiday was popularized by the show, Seinfeld, created by a family member of one of the writers. A holiday to end all holidays, or at least throw them the collective holiday-inspired finger.
Instead of a tree, the central ornament of this holiday is a bare aluminum pole, with little or nothing adorning it.
Instead of presents, the family engages in an “airing of grievances” against each other, letting all of the disappointment out into the open in a rousing bout of family-directed catharsis, instead of what we’re used to: such as the tension and nervousness about who will first break the ice about Uncle Jack and Aunt Frank, Mother’s new “operation”, or the fact that your deadbeat half-brother is now semi-permanently affixed to the couch and mooching what little remains of your inheritance.
Frank Costanza, the character on the show, Seinfeld, who “created” the holiday, explains to Kramer that the idea came to him after getting into a fight in a department store over the last of a particular toy doll that “There must be a better way.”
Says Allen Salkin, author of “Festivus: A Holiday for the Rest of Us” describes in an e-mail interview, “There are thousands of people celebrating Festivus in every state.”
Says Allen, “I think what is happening is that Festivus is quietly winning a holiday cold war through taking a non-judgmental high ground, like a meditator on a mountaintop.”
Perhaps, in a rather disturbing way, this joke-turned-reality will be the “better way” for millions of Americans during one of the most stressful, over-commercialized, and inflated months of the Gregorian calendar.
When I discovered what a popular and well-celebrated holiday it had become, I began to achieve a rather evil grin, increasing in popularity amongst those of us sick and tired with the “Christmas TM” season.
It’s a sad state of affairs when a fake holiday, created primarily as a joke, becomes the “Anti-Christmas” to a large portion of the populace’s derision with more traditional, and infinitely more corporately twisted celebrations infecting what used to be our spiritually directed and joyous times.
And another thing, Festivus doesn’t seem subject to this war on the renaming of Christmas. It simply is, in perfect Zen-ness.
According to Allen, “…a high school principal in Rochester New York said when asked to defend why he forbade ‘Merry Christmas’ and ‘Happy Hanukkah’ signs in the hallways of his public school but allowed ‘Happy Festivus’ signs: ‘Festivus is nothing.’ To some of us, Festivus is becoming everything.
Here’s to hoping that Festivus, our new “Anti-Christmas,” isn’t targeted by the destructive corporate nature so prevalent in our American society.
Originally printed in the Daily O’Collegian, January 26th, 2005.
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