Peter Jackson, editor, The Northland Age
Merry Christmas
The extraordinary lengths to which some would have us go to avoid hurting the feelings of people of other persuasions has now officially graduated from mildly amusing to intensely annoying. The straw that broke this camel's back came from Race Relations Commissioner Dame Susan Devoy who has suggested, only suggested mind, that we eschew the greeting 'Merry Christmas' in favour of a less thoughtless option such as 'Happy Holidays' or 'Season's Greetings'. The latter would seem to be flirting with danger, though. What season might we be talking about? Given that we can't mention Christmas, the potential for confusion is obvious.
To be fair to Dame Susan, this wasn't her idea. Busy defending the finer feelings of the ethnic and religious minorities that now abound in this country, and maintaining the principle established by her predecessors that Caucasian Christians cannot be insulted however hard one might try, she has given credit for this latest paving stone on the path to universal sensitivity to the Auckland Regional Migrants' Services Trust.
The point, apparently, is that while some of us are gaily wishing everyone a Merry Christmas we are inadvertently making non-Christians feel excluded.
Apart from the fact that Merry Christmas is hardly the sole preserve of churchgoing Christians, this begs a number of questions, the prime one being why it is that those who do not observe Christian festivals, and have no desire to observe them, whether that be because they are without faith or of another religious persuasion, seemingly have no difficulty taking the statutory holidays that accompany them.
Years ago, a kindergarten teacher in Wellington added her nail to the coffin of common sense when she banned hot cross buns from her centre, in case non-Christian children were offended. It's hard to believe that any teacher worthy of the name would expect children to turn their noses up at a spicy bun whatever the religious or cultural connotations, although this was before the days when thousands of parents decided that sending their kids to school starving was a socially acceptable thing to do. Anyway, this so-called teacher wasn't entirely inflexible. She was prepared to let her young charges tuck into hot crossless buns.
This newspaper asked at the time if this woman was going to take Good Friday and Easter Monday off, assuming that the answer would be no. After all, what were the children of non-Christian parents going to do? Why should they lose a couple of days of instruction because of a religious festival that they did not acknowledge?
The answer wasn't no. In fact there was no answer at all, but it's dollars to hot cross buns that she took her statutories, as she was legally if not morally entitled to do.
It might have started in Wellington but stupidity is contagious, and eventually it even reached the Far North. Patently petrified that a child from a non-Christian family would be traumatised as they headed for the sandpit, a Kaitaia kindergarten teacher was told to cease and desist from painting Easter Bunny footprints on the floor, as she had been doing for years. There is no record of any civil unrest or religious persecution arising from that practice.
We've all heard the stories about idiots in other countries, like Oxford, England, which reportedly banned the erection of Christmas trees in public places lest non-Christians be offended. There's a school in America somewhere, possibly many schools now, that banned references to Mother's Day, because some of the kids didn't have mothers.
A tea towel featuring the visages of the Prince and Princess of Wales and their infant son William offended some people in England because it reeked of prejudice against all sorts of people, including homosexuals and childless couples. Not to mention the great unwashed, of course, who are never likely to see their faces smiling back at them as they dry the dishes.
The real discrimination here, of course, is against those of faiths other than Christianity who are not allowed to work on Christmas Day or Good Friday. Are we not impinging upon their rights as New Zealanders by telling them they have to go to the beach, albeit on full pay, rather than baking bread or teaching children as they do every other day? What right do we have to say they shalt not work on a day that means nothing to them, and might even offend them?
Dame Susan, meanwhile, has denied that she has plans (or the power) to ban Christmas, which is a good thing. Nor was she setting out to tell anyone how they should celebrate it. What she was saying was that it was up to "everyday New Zealanders," whoever they are, to decide how to celebrate it. As long as they didn't run around willy nilly wishing everyone a Merry Christmas, one assumes.
The Anglican Bishop of Auckland, Ross Bay, makes the eminently sensible point that expunging the word Christmas from migrants' vocabulary risks reducing said migrants' opportunity to adapt to the culture of their new home, and the process of establishing their own cultural identity within it. He was more interested in New Zealanders addressing their "fear of difference". Dame Susan might well agree with that, albeit via a different route. She says the Migrants' Services Trust prefers to use secular language when inviting communities to some of its events because it doesn't want non-Christians to think they aren't invited.
What she seems to be missing is that for the great bulk of New Zealanders Christmas is not actually a religious festival. It's about exchanging gifts, over-eating, getting drunk and holidays at the beach. For many it has absolutely nothing to do with the birth of Christ. Mind you, just to be on the safe side, she suggests we might exchange Christmas dinner for a festive lunch on the seasonal day. What season would that be?
She might better devote some of her obvious excess spare time to pondering how New Zealanders who emigrate to other countries can expect to get on. Any chance of the world's Muslims or Hindus abandoning their religious festivals because Christians might feel excluded? Not on your nelly.
Immigrants who arrive in this country intent on making whatever contribution they can to our way of life, including the addition of their culture to ours, should always be welcome. They should never feel the need to abandon their own cultural or religious ways, assuming those ways conform with the basic standards of behaviour required within a civil society, but nor should they expect everyone else to conform to their cultural or religious ways. We should respect them, and they should respect us. If someone wishes a Hindu a Merry Christmas there is absolutely no need to take offence, just as a Christian should not be offended by a Muslim's wish for a happy Ramadan.
There are much more important things to think about than non-existent signs of religious domination. Anyone who wishes to sit down to Christmas dinner should do exactly that, without worrying about any subtle signal they might be sending to the Hindu family down the road. And any non-Hindus who wish to enjoy the sights, sounds and tastes of Diwali should feel free to do that too. Their Hindu neighbours won't be offended. Even Dame Susan will probably offer her blessing. It's only Christmas that she sees as dividing us.