Why I hate the "holidays"
My point...in late 1999...is that people keep "doing" these holidays in a sheep-like manner. Of course, the dear capitalists help us along...putting endless items for sale...way ahead of time...like we could ever forget, huh? We sleepwalk through the year letting only the "sensational" disturb our trance-like obedience to the dictates of the calander. I think its safe to say that some of us have become numb to it all. For some of us any real meaning has long ago been lost. I suggest we call it all off...all of them...for at least a year or two or three.
Why would we want to do that...many may be asking? Being a sociologist...attuned to the patterns of social interaction...I believe that the quietism in this country about genuine problems and the need for fundamental change is linked, at least partially, to this endless cycle of "celebrating" and spending.
We're indoctrinated into the supposed importance of these events. pushed not only by the capitalist's interests, but by the Church. Our attention is kept focused on these holidays and as a group we dutifully comply. Yes, there ARE individuals who don't participate (or can't) in this or that day, but as a synergistic whole, we revel in our subservient submission. We play-act our way through them...even being "thank-ful" at Thanksgiving when most of us have little to be thankful for...or at least, less thankful than last year or the year(s) before that. Real spending income continues to diminish for more and more of us (see a couple of the articles in the Article Room). Fewer and fewer of us can afford to spend non-existent discretionary income for presents, gifts, special foods, and the like. But we keep on keeping on...like the fools on a ship dancing while the ship slowly sinks. In my estimation, except for some who think this all is a natural occuring reality, most of us could just as well do without the demand to be happy on cue.
When you add in the endless march of birthdays in each of our lives, no wonder there is little time to consider the really core questions of our society's existence. These holidays and birthdays...combined with the pro forma of political participation days every 2-4 years, keep us busy and our noses to the grindstone. The relatively few of us who "look up" from the "stone" are seen as spoilsports and worse. Those of us who dare to mention out loud the hypocrisy exhibited on these "special" days by millions upon millions going through the motions one more time...are said to have something wrong with us. Well, there's nothing wrong with me that a huge dose of change wouldn't cure. I hate the holidays. It's not because I don't think there is something in most of them worthy of attention...its that I'm tired of the play acting on them and then the return to "business as usual" in between. It's like the individual who goes to church each week...asking for (& supposedly getting it...just like that) forgiveness and then doing what he/she wants during the week. As the "Church Lady" on SNL says, isn't that special (or...isn't that convenient)!!!
This pretense exhibited...especially at Thanksgiving and Christmas...each year is sickening. Is it any wonder that suicides and overt depression increases at holidays and immediately afterwards? No matter how much hypocrisy is going on in individual homes during these two holidays in particular, countless millions who don't have families or people to care about them, who don't have a damn thing to be thankful for, who don't receive or give gifts, still feel left out...and sometimes act in consequence to their situations. What a mess!!
So as Halloween night approaches...Trick or Treat preparations being readied...I sit here wondering just how many more years we can do this. I have a family...a young daughter and a teenage daughter...who expect it all to happen. The bags of candy sit there, the costumes are in place, and I hate every single moment of it. Yes, my kids and countless others will look cute...yes, they'll say trick or treat in squeaky little voices that will make us smile and feel the "warm fuzzies." Meanwhile, the power elite of this society will resume their alienating practices tomorrow morning...as if everything is okay since we gave out all that sugar the night before. Countless others will have little or nothing to eat..will have no or simply inadequate roofs over their heads...will return to their exploitative jobs in the morning...will be just a bit more numb than yesterday. And...here's comes Thanksgiving and Christmas...what a joy!!
I hate the holidays...don't you?
Let's call them off for a year or two and rethink all this...how 'bout it...you willing and ready? I am.
