# Religious/Secular holidays in America (mostly Christmas, split from the Columbus Day thread) **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 5, 2021, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-secular-holidays-in-america-mostly-christmas-split-from-the-columbus-day-thread/954138 "2021-11-05T20:10:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 53
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2021, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-secular-holidays-in-america-mostly-christmas-split-from-the-columbus-day-thread/954138/53 "2021-11-10T07:57:29Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Yes, there is a valid rationale for non-Christians objecting to Christmas on the grounds of its religious roots. There’s _a_ rationale, but I don’t consider it valid: “Christmas, as the majority of society celebrates it, is **now entirely secular** ”. Given that stance, I don’t consider objecting to the _roots_ of it as a _valid_ objection to its existence as a holiday _now_. > [@Kimstu](#): > > Traditional Christian symbols can and do connote Christian religious significance, and the cultural normalization of Christianity, even when their display is not part of an overtly religious act. Cultural normalization, sure. Religious significance? Naah. Unless, by including “overtly” in there, you’re saying that this is actually _covert_ religious practice. Which is, quite frankly, conspiracy theory territory, so I _don’t_ think that’s what you’re saying. If it’s _not_ religious practice (overt or covert) then it’s _not_ religiously significant. > [@Kimstu](#): > > Even if they’re not being used for actual worship, such symbols are continuing to normalize the assumption of Christianity as the universal shared cultural context. Your view seems to be that they reinforce a _Christian-only_ cultural context. My view is that they indicate that Christianity is _a part of_ the shared cultural context, which, yes, it is. And sure, that’s “normalization” - so what? No-one’s required to celebrate these holidays, so it’s not like anyone’s religious freedom is being touched by the normalization of now-secularized symbols. So it looks to me your objection is to any whiff of a hint of a suggestion that Christianity _is_ part of the shared cultural context, which is, in my non-Christian-raised theological noncognitivist view, just ridiculously extreme. “Christian-culture bias”? What _is_ that, exactly, other than a description of the mere pervasiveness of Christian symbolism? Are you of the view that seeing these symbols is forcing you to engage in involuntary religious worship? Or that the normalization of these symbols prevents you from displaying Jewish ones? I _agree_ that Western society is steeped in Christianity, that its symbols and iconography are everywhere around us. I’m also quite emphatically non-religious. And yet I still fail to see the actual problem of modern secularized Christmas existing just because it retains non-practice Christian trappings. Not being forced on anyone, but just existing. > [@Kimstu](#): > > Like most people who grew up in Christian communities Again with this bullshit, that I’ve explicitly said is _not_ the case. I do not come from a “Christian community”, I come from a very mixed-religion community, in fact more Muslim than not. My high school stopped for Friday prayers, FFS. > [@Kimstu](#): > > you can point out how Max\_S is wrong in expecting Black Americans to treat the iconography of the white Founding Fathers as a neutral de-racialized element of shared cultural identity That’s not what I was saying. I said _when_ they _don’t_ do that, he’s wrong to call them not part of the same nation. I’m not talking about some _perceived_ aspect, I’m talking about _actual practice_. You know, like how the _actual practice_ of Christmas _is_ largely secular. > [@Kimstu](#): > > To paraphrase your own words: “You don’t see how that doesn’t necessarily map onto how American non-Blacks see these things as being? That while you see them as ‘too “slavey”’, most see them as background, not racial oppression.” The difference, of course, being that the non-Blacks are wrong here, but the religious non-Jews are not. Because slavery _was_ racial oppression, but Chrismas tree angels are in no way worship. Also, interesting that you map my “worship” onto your “racial oppression”. Mere worship is not _religious_ oppression, but it’s telling that you seem to think the mere presence of Christian worship in public is some form of oppression… There’s a world of difference between actual slavery and a tree trinket. In fact, the comparison is pretty damn odious. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/religious-secular-holidays-in-america-mostly-christmas-split-from-the-columbus-day-thread/954138)._