Friday, December 23, 2011

The Jews Who Love Christmas: A Nevin Barich Blog Experience

I think this is going to become a yearly rant.

You know what really annoys me during the holidays? A fellow Jew who tells me some variation of the following:

Why are you talking about Christmas? You're Jewish!

And to these fellow Jews, I say the following:

F*** YOU!!!

Let me explain Christmas from a Jewish perspective. All Jews love Christmas. Every single one. Even the real orthodox "why are you talking about Christmas blah blah blah" Jews love Christmas. What's not to love? Christmas is about family, friends, presents, snow, trees, vacation and pretty lights. It's a universal holiday and everyone believes in Santa to one degree or another.

Christmas can be a little weird for Jews, however. See, technically it's a holiday for everyone but us. Christmas is technically off limits for Jews. It focuses on a religion that isn't ours, on a tradition that isn't ours, and everyone always throws the "but you have Chanukah" argument in our face.

By the way, let me address the Chanukah argument. Chanukah is nice and all, but it ain't Christmas. We don't get a tree, we don't get lights and you know that whole eight-days-of-presents thing? All the presents are crap.

So it's easy for us to feel a little left out during the Christmas season. So many of us over the years, like myself, have said "to hell with it" and have decided to celebrate Christmas like everyone else. I, for example, have a tree in my house and lights outside.

And here's the funny thing: People who have celebrated Christmas their whole lives have welcomed us Jews with open arms into their traditions. They're cool with us. They get it. They understand that Christmas is, and should be, for everyone. They give us no flack whatsoever.

It's other Jews, however, that make us feel bad about it. It's other Jews who make the snide comments about Jews who celebrate Christmas. It's other Jews who make us feel bad about having a Christmas tree. It's other Jews who act like we're turning our back on them.

And to those Jews, I say this: It's Christmas. And in the spirit of Christmas, embrace the spirit the Christmas and stop making your anti-Christmas comments during Christmas.

Christmas.

Christmas. Christmas. Christmas.

:-)

And now for this week's:

SIGN OF THE APOCALYPSE

A personal SOTA this week (no pictures or links unfortunately). Recently, some friends of mine have been dressing up their cats and dogs in bows and dresses for the holiday season.

One friend of mine even said: "I'm dressing up my kitty so he'll be ready to meet his grandparents!!!"

Which are her parents, in case you were wondering.

These people are freaks.

Freaks. Freaks. Freaks.

:-)

5 comments:

Ian said...

got to relax with the blanket statements against Chanukah... it looks bad...
no insult ment to you on my post, just needed to say it...

Nev said...

No insult taken :-)

Ian said...

Dude, we have had this talk before...
One... you are Jewish not Christian...
Two... the only reason you got crappy gifts as a kid is because your parent's decided that was what they wanted to give you; that fact that you don't give your wif...e nice Chanukah presents is on you, not the holiday...
Three... Chanukah is the celebration of a group of Jews who defied the convention of the day, the government, and all the nay-sayers to continue practicing Judaism as is should be practiced...
Four... Chanukah predates Christmas by a few hundred years, so maybe it's time they stopped copying up...
Five... I know for a fact that most Orthodox Jews don't like Christmas...
Six... Happy Hanukah my friend... enjoy the remaining 5 days of lights

Nev said...

I'm just saying that Christmas has become a universal holiday and I don't like feeling that I can't celebrate it. You say "I'm Jewish, not Christian" but do you mean to tell me that if you're not Christian, you can't celebrate Christmas? There are lots of folks neither Christians nor Jews who celebrate Christmas. Is that wrong? I don't think so.

Nev said...

Also, Ramona and I celebrate both Chanukah and Christmas.