Next month is gonna be rough

Maven (famous)@lemmy.zip to Programmer Humor@programming.dev – 152 points –

This is a real issue

45

Christmas is no longer a holiday that honors the Christian god, it's a holiday that honors the god of capitalism, money.

Cool, so it's still worth eschewing /s

I would like to note though that xmas is a very sore time of year for a lot of people (mostly queer, but others too) who do not have a good relationship with their family

That's why I think it's important that we bring Christmas back to its true religious roots: Fertility, hunting, and maybe a cult of the dead.

Well, that and I just kind of want to piss off all of my pearl clutching relatives.

But seriously, thank you for the reminder that this can be a particularly hard season.

I hope your solstice is marked by good times with real friends and chosen family.

And spawned an even longer shit fit.

Some people just want to be offended and we should simply let them.

Wait, did I read that correctly and they replaced the hat with a snowflake?? Hahahaha

And yes, people often forget that generally offense is taken. When it's intentionally given, it's pretty clear.

I'm from Australia and snowflakes during December is hemispherist and offensive to us down under.

Yeah? Well I see your use of kangaroo shapes as elitist and many other -isms. Even the taste of marmite is discriminating! Etc. *spits in the general direction of Australia*

I laughed at that too - they knew what they were doing, right?

Jesus Christ what is wrong with people... Microsoft giving in to a clear troll, surprised they didn't just lock and ignore that shit and move on.

Nice. Honestly, pretty well corralled, I would say.

Incidentally, I'm amused that one of the more popular responses includes the classic phrase

"Why can't we all just get along"

Which I tend to notice after having had it explained well to me once by someone with more empathy than my own.

I won't belabor it, but they pointed out to me that being tempted to say "Why can't we all just get along" is usually a sign that we haven't actually listened effectively.

So now when I hear or read "Why can't we all just get along", I see that [X] and hear the buzz from "Family Feud", and hear one of the Family Feud host kindly say "No points. Let's try again."

Christmas is religion yes, but Santa doesn't really have anything to do with religion other than being on Christmas right?

Yea, Santa is the more secular icon. There are even Christians that take issue with the Santa character (which is a combination of "Pagan" and Christian mythos). I put Pagan in quotes, as that's a Christian term for certain non-Christian beliefs.

Santa is a stand-in for Jesus... for children. They're both magical beings that can perform miracles and have similar methods: Both Santa and Jesus have naughty lists and forms of punishment that come later; much later (both are equivalent lengths of time to a child though 🤣). Both bring "gifts". Both have traditional appearances. Both have followers that wear silly hats and strange clothes. But most importantly...

Both are imaginary.

If you believe in Santa as an adult you're ridiculed. If you believe in Jesus as an adult you're just labeled, "Christian". Yet the fact that nearly every child eventually finds out Santa isn't real is quite disturbing to a lot of Christians. After all, if they could stop believing in Santa--who is so similar to Jesus in every way--then they could stop believing in Jesus.

You have to start off believing the little lies like the Hogfather before you can believe in the big lies like justice

Besides both being fairy tales, I would say it's even anti religious, since religious Christmas clashes with it, yet he doesn't bring gifts to baby Jesus. He brings commercial toys to all the other children.

What religious symbol? Saint Nicholas had nothing to do with the fat guy dressed in red that coca cola made up. The hat is fine goddammit

This is nothing new, people expect religion not to be part of the "professional" environment. Dunno if VS code applies.

At the office (big corp) they don't call it the "Christmas Party", it's "the holiday party". They put lights and stuff up but no more Christmas trees/stars etc.. not everyone celebrates christmas so that's fine by me. If Microsoft wants to put a little santa hat on their product that's fine by me too. If I was using some service based in Mexico and they put a little hat on a product for cinco de mayo i wouldn't care. Christmas has other implications so it might be different, dunno

Back in the mid-80s, when I got an email from HR about the Christmas Party at the local office, I sent a reply to the district HR manager complaining that not everyone in the company celebrated Christmas. Later that day, another email came out announcing the Holiday Party. So glad I had a hand in educating HR.

Company's used email to that extent in the 80s? I get that tech jobs, unis, and research groups used it, but there was a company using it widely enough that HR used it?

Guess loosing his project didn't deter him from using vscode.

The article they share in the issue to explain why Christmas is so offensive is absolutely wild. To quote:

Imagine that between 1933-45, the Nazi regime celebrated Adolf Hitler’s birthday – April 20 – as a holiday. Imagine that they named the day, “Hitlerday,” and observed the day with feasting, drunkenness, gift-giving, and various pagan practices.

https://www.sefaria.org/sheets/51928?lang=bi

That analogy seems a better fit for a lot of Jewish holidays then Christmas. Passover is about the mass death of innocent Egyptian children. Chanukah is about a revolt against Greek rule where:

The Maccabees destroyed Greek altars in the villages, forcibly circumcised boys, burnt villages, and drove Hellenized Jews off their land.

Christmas is just about some baby being born ( on probably a different day)

The "real meaning" of Christmas was getting the pagans on board with Christianity, don't let anyone lie to you otherwise lol.