Yes, humanity is a matter of physiques.
Drag him out and shoot him. I’ll swear out the warrant later.
For god’s sake, Dio, just back down on this one. I am a Jew, and I am not offended by this. The guy is a nut. I can deal with other people celebrating Christmas around me. I will happily accept (and even give!) gifts. Gifts are fun! I’m not that insecure. It can be a little overwhelming, yeah, when there’s this tidal wave of holiday stuff for a religion you don’t belong to, and I’ve been bitter about it in the past. But then I grew up.
Can’t we find something better to pit O’Reilly over? He’s such a fuckhead, I bet he’s done something actually obnoxious lately.
My son went to a local school, a charter type school. At the school program I attended, the kids finished the production with a group singing of Lennon’s “Imagine”. As a Reform Hippy, I am largely in agreement with the sentiments expressed therein. But it still kind of bothered me, I don’t much like the idea. I figure we can get around to discussing agnosticism and pantheism somewhere past where babies come from.
It doesn’t mean that much to kids, its a pretty story, Baby Jesus, Wise Men, all the animals can suddenly talk (but not the sheep…if they know whats good for them…). Now if a couple of kids start duking it out in the hallway over predestinarianism or infant damnation, maybe we can start worrying. But as long as we’re taking it more seriously than they are, I figure we can fight about something else. We only have so much time, so much ammo, and so much good will. And we need all of it.
So while I can see a strict avoidance of religious themes in schools, as a matter of principle, to carry that principle to such an extreme is intolerant and rigid. And any rigid and intolerant adherence to abstract principle is a mistake, it places our abstract principles above our common humanity. Bad idea. There are worse ideas, but not that many.
Besides, those shepherd costumes are cute as the dickens.
Just tell the kids the truth – this whole Christmas thing is originally a winter solstice Druid holiday, where we make atonements and sacrifices to the forces of winter in hopes the sun will come back up and start doing a good day’s job once again. It’s them Christians who hijacked the holiday with some foo-fah about it bein’ the birth of Jesus or somesuch, but that’s just a tacked-on excuse after the fact.
What, you think all that stuff about holly andmistletoe and trees came from the Christians? Next you’ll think those red dots were originally ornamental balls, too…
Another token Jew for the thread:
While I did find O’Reilly a bombastic idiot (what’s new, eh?)…
I did not find him to be a particulary religiously-offensive bombastic idiot.
Ignorant, dogmatic, obnoxious, foolish, wrong?
Yep.
But my spide… er, Jew Sense wasn’t tinglin’ at all.
Thanks for stickin’ up for the jew tang clan n’ all though.
Look, O’Reilly’s response was up to his usual obnoxious, self-impressed asshat standards, all right. Were I in his chair on that show (I’d insist in bringing my own chair, or at least liberally applying Lysol to the one in the studio) I would have told the caller:
“Yes, if you are in a Chrisitian-majority culture you will be surrounded by it and it will be so taken for granted that people won’t notice your discomfort at some of their customs and practices. I’m sorry it’s that way, but really, a majority of the people are not acting out of deliberate proselytizing, they are just doing what they normally do. To them a gift exchange is just a gift exchange, a song is just a song. That is their sincere feeling, accept it. Now, if someone comes right up to you to actively preach, you should not feel any hesitation to just tell them to go blow themselves and then slam the door or turn your back and walk away. But you can’t expect the general public to just take their Christian-based customs and just render them invisible so you can’t run into them. Not in our lifetimes.”
But then again, that’s why I don’t have a highly rated show of my own…
However…
As to the debate on the looniness or not of the caller, it has multiple components to it:
A) whether proselytizing, to whatever degree, is per se wrongful;
B) whether ANY socially or officially sanctioned exposure to the practices of a religion, or to the customs of a culture dominated by that religion (even if not directly canonical), IS a form of active proselytizing,
C) whether if a person who believes both A and B, has a legitimate grievance, or just needs to get over it; and whether that depends on the TRUTH of both A and B, or of just either one, or just the sincerity of his belief.
That is a subject for a GD thread and, using my amazing powers of prescience, I would forecast that it would end up with NO consensus as to a reolution to any of the components.
IMO the caller was not quite “loony” but rather was seen by Bill “Happy Fun Buttplug” O’Reilly as an annoying “poor me, help, I’m being oppressed” whiner, so of course Mr. Smugface felt set up for a display of his dickheaded blowhard prowess.
We have a new column from Buttplug Bill this morning to mock. Scary item of the day: we’re becoming more like Canada, and Canada is almost as bad as Holland. OH NO!
Holland isn’t, afaik, even a country, Bill. It’s a region of a nation called the Netherlands.
I rather suspect he did, Lib. Although given the picture he linked to, I think he made a pretty good case that her’s is the better national holiday candidate. Fred wouldn’t have liked the Government imposing holidays on the private sector anyways. 
That column makes me want to move to Canada! Pot! Free heroin! Sex with 14 year olds! Gay marriage if I ever decide to switch teams! What’s not to love?
Damn, now I want a falafel. And Tim Hortons coffee.
Some companies give a personal holiday whenever you elect. By the by, today is the anniversary of Adolf Eichman being sentenced to death. It couldnt have happened to a (not) nicer guy.