Was a time...long ago, when the season was one of joy and warmth. Now we all get stressed and spend a couple months recovering both financially and mentally from the stresses it creates in family and pocketbook. Funny how this was never an issue until the season was coopted.
So? It's the lesser of two evils. Overall it's better that foreigners have sweatshops, than no source of income at all. Hypothetically, if 'no one' bought goods produced overseas, then the people who have jobs would have no income, and would be living like primitive savages in the jungle, and dying in mass famine, disease, etc - it'd be even worse for them than it is now. So this is just an emotional diatribe with no substance (like something you'd see in a Michael Moore film). There seems to be some myth that these people "were living just fine and dandy before the big bad factories came in", but that's not true - their conditions were always what they were, if not worse, because the countries never respected workers' rights - not because "the factories" somehow lowered their standard of living. - - - Updated - - - How does buying gifts for loved ones as an act of generosity 'create stress'? If a person isn't budgeting their income, that's their problem - if they're going to 'blame Christmas' because they're too lazy to balance their pocketbook (or are under the impression that anyone's holding a gun to their head and 'forcing' them to buy a gift), then that's on them.
Yeah, enjoy your secular humanist 'Winter Celebration' fueled by Godless greed and conspicuous over-consumption (gluttony).
I suppose you have not family, do not need to see to the happiness of a child, and never have to prepare dinner, decorate the house, or somehow manage to be at work while managing these things in order to afford them. All the while doing so for a holiday you really do not care very much for. Then have the wonderful experience of heading out into a stampede of people you do not want to be around, so you can spend money just like they are to celebrate a birthday at the wrong time of year for a guy you couldn't care less about because if you don't certain people will say you are evil. Yeah....the most wonderful time of the year.
If a person finds that 'stressful' then they shouldn't have had a family. Not to mention the gifts don't 'have' to be expensive just meaningful - if someone's ungrateful to you that you didn't buy them a brand new PS4, then they aren't worth the dust off one's boots. If my kid had the gall to 'complain' that I wasn't able to buy them a $800 Christmas present, the only 'present' they'd be getting is a lump of coal for the next 10 years, lol (but if I raised my kids right, they'd know better than to be such an ingrateful brat to begin with, so it wouldn't be an issue) No one's forcing you to do that, I don't give the time of day to relatives I don't want to be around - I celebrate Christmas with who I choose. If you're making yourself do it, then blame yourself for being too weak to say 'no' - not 'the holiday for forcing you to celebrate it with people you dislike' - get real Or if you're talking about shopping, no one's forcing you to even get off your butt if (gasp) buying presents for loved ones is that stressful - use Amazon.com Then if you're celebrating it just to 'please people' knowing you don't believe in it - that makes you a puzzy who's afraid to be honest to others or yourself. But believe it or not plenty of atheists have no problem celebrating Christmas even if they don't literally believe it was "Jesus' Birthday" It's an awesome time of year - and Merry Christmas to you
You assume too much. I will have no part of any Christmas or other winter celebration. Since I get paid days off for the 24th and 25th, I will spend them volunteering at the homeless shelter. I am a good person who shows my love for my friends and family 365 days a year. I don't need an excuse to show it 1 day a year.
Just because most parents buy presents for their kid on their Birthday doesn't mean "they aren't doing it the rest of the year". So you could just as well 'argue against' holding birthday parties for one's kid Silly assumption.
Last time I checked, it was the business community that pushed greed, over-consumption, and the commercialization of Christmas. Until the present crowd of crazies took over the repubs, the business community supported guess who (hint - it wasn't the Democrats). Of course, the repubs have also done a lot to discredit religion in general and, through their likes about a WAR ON CHRISTMAS, the entire season. You're welcome to keep your mega-church $avior.
None of which things are wrong - if anything they make Christmas more interesting. Plus more consumption = more jobs, aka more income for the working poor - so the more the merrier Christmas is about giving - whether it's something from the Dollar Store or a Lamborghini, if a person is buying something for a loved one then they're fulfilling the true spirit of Christmas by giving out of the goodness of their heart, and it's none of your concern. Sorry about your envy BTW, Merry Christmas Revelation 21:21 And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass.
Bless you... I'm writing my representatives and Washington and pleading with them to institute the TRIAD program to drop food in the Philippines. People are suffering and dying and it need not happen. http://www.wattenburg.us/foodforrefugees.html
What I don't understand about some one the left is why they "have a problem with some people having money" just because "some people somewhere in the world" go hungry ...because if Donald Trump drove a Kia instead of a Lamborghini (or Michael Moore lived in an apartment instead of a mansion), that'd somehow make starving children in Africa "any less hungry"... yeah sure
Well...It takes almost nothing to bug your representatives about the TRIAD program. I challenge them to put their liberalism where their mouths are. Send an email....People are dying and there is no excuse for it. http://www.wattenburg.us/foodforrefugees.html
