Some woman said this to me. It sounds bizarre. Not happy , but ‘safe’.
I know that our western society has gone safety crazy over the last decade or so. A guy wrote a book about it. We are living in the safest ever society in history, but everyone is obsessed with the dangers.
Parents are driving their kids home rather than leting them walk home. Kindergardens are surrounded by barbed-wire because…why are they surrounded by barbed wire again?
I left my union because they are obsessed with safety. I work in a office. It is the safest known job in the universe of time and space. The union spends all its time and resources trying to make it safer. I asked them could they stop doing that and actually get us a pay increase. No, they replied. They have ‘safety’ as a higher priority.
I imagine she met “Don’t get plastered and plow into a family of six on the way home from grandma’s house.” Or “Don’t get plastered, strip naked, hang a candy cane from your penis and plow into a family of six on the way home from grandma’s house.”
Right. Which is I think the OPs point. The implication is offensive – you don’t seriously tell your mailman “Please, please think of your co-workers families!” every time you see him or her, do you? The likelihood of a particular person doing something unsafe like that are astronomically low unless you have a reason to believe they are likely to do it. If somebody said “I wish you happy, pleasant and safe holidays” that is wonderful, but I’ve heard “Have a safe Christmas”! Seriously, that’s rude! Just don’t say anything at all if you can’t wish me a merry fucking christmas. Even “I wish you a safe Christmas” would be a million times better, because it’s at least wishing something good and not an imperative to be vigilant.
How would these people like if I told them to “Have a syphilis-free Christmas!” and winked?
The fact that we are living in a coddling, over-litigated, creampuff guardianship society really isn’t in dispute on this board, or really among any sane-minded group of rational people with the slightest preference toward free will. The concept comes up in GD and the Pit all the time, whenever there’s a topic on some person or group attempting to impose their viewpoint on a society. We get protected from ourselves like infants, and like infants, too many people don’t seem to object.
My favorite Christmas “safety” tripe is the yearly lists of the most unsafe toys. And this year, the most dangerous toys of all time. Admittedly, most of the “most dangerous” have been responsible for deaths, and clearly have significant design flaws. But the yearly lists often include toys that might cause minor scrapes as life-threatening injuries.
Hey, at least she actually said the word “Christmas!” I think here it would have been “Have safe holiday.” You wouldn’t want to offend anyone after all.
Okay, I’ve never wished someone a safe Christmas (Merry Christmas is my standard), but I do tend to do the “have a safe trip” thing. I often say it if someone says they are headed on vacation or something. I don’t know why I don’t just say “have a good time.” Then again, sometimes I say it if someone’s just has a long drive for a doctor’s appointment or something. Then obviously “have a good time” doesn’t work. And now, thanks to this thread, I’m going to obsess over it because someone might think I’m rude for wishing them safe travel. I just can’t win.
My mom’s bridge partner’s entire family (including the bridge partner) perished in a Christmas Eve fire that started with the tree. I think a gentle reminder to not overload circuits, burn wrapping paper or drive drunk is a nice sentiment.
I find your example kind of ironic, given the point I came to relate.
About 10 years ago, my cousins-in-law (a family of six) were hit by a snow plow over their christmas vacation. You could say they were plowed into. IIRC, they were on their way home from grandmas house. Two of the kids died.
The point being - when “Have a safe Christmas” or the like is bandied about by my relatives, they means “I hope you & your family stay safe”, not “Don’t be a menace to society.”
I think it is just another flavour of PC. Just as some people avoid saying “christmas”, this lady felt willing enough to push her religious agenda by saying christmas but is not so secure about her mental health and uses safe to “include” the happy, the miserable, the depressed, the indifferent and the rest.
Because of the large number of deaths related to falling down stairs and drowning in swimming pools, I’ve replaced ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye’ in my vocabulary with ‘Please use a handrail’ and ‘For the love of God, stay away from the water!’