Oh, Good Grief!
The post's title was too easy, but I had to go there. I just saw the Charlie Brown Christmas Special and I had forgotten how much I had liked it, especially its straightforward message about the creeping (well, not so much creeping anymore) commercialism of current Christmas practices and how celebrants should remember and be celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ (historical and political arguments, aside) instead.
But broadcasting it on Nov. 28 is a tad too early, isn't it?
5 comments:
Also, broadcasting the movie on November 28th is not too early. With less than a month to go to Christmas day, we are firmly within the Christmas season.
(Of course, if you subscribe to the non-secular, remember Christ version of Christmas, yes its probably a little early, which actually ironically undermines the principle message of Charlie Brown, since part of the reason for playing it so early is to extend the holiday season, which primarily means an extension of the shopping season).
However, consider all of the other Christmas movies that have to be shown:
1. All I Want for Christmas
2. The Grinch who stole Christmas
3. Its a Wonderful Life
4. One Magic Christmas
5. Rudolph
6. Christmas Vacation
And those are just the classic ones I can think of off the top of my head. I'm sure there are ones I have forgotten, plus all of the more recent Christmas movies such as The Santa Claus, Love Actually etc.
If a network only showed one per week, Sunday night say, there wouldn't be nearly enough time before Christmas to show them all; and they can't all be crammed into the last week because people are busy. Plus, they'll probably play some of the big ones twice for the people who missed them the first time around.
I had written another comment first, but I messed something up and it wasn't published. Here is the re-written abbreviated version:
Christmas is about commercialism. Seriously. At least it is about "the spirit of giving" another one of the fabulous inventions of modern pluralist liberal-capitalist society.
Everyone needs collective celebrations but public expressions of religion are fundamentally anti-modern and don't appeal to many people today. So, national holidays and major sporting events generally fit the bill. However, Christmas is still the best. And modern society has evolved the meaning of Christmas to be about buying gifts, giving them to your loved ones, and then sharing a meal with those people.
People continually invent meaning in their lives in whatever way they see fit. Our society has evolved the meaning of Christmas.
It doesn't mean Christians can't continue to celebrate the birth of Jesus, but I'm not going to let them tell me that I have somehow "lost the true meaning of Christmas" by not caring about Jesus myself.
Public admonishments to "keep Christ in Christmas" are attempts to impose religion on the public sphere. Christians have to realize that their beliefs have had a good run but that their dogma is no longer hegemonic.
I'll celebrate Christmas but I'll do it on my own terms.
Excuse me, I have to celebrate the spirit of giving now and go buy something.
I was referring to the non-secular version of Christmas, particularly because of the message of that particular show.
You forgot about "Frosty the Snowman" but I can't seem to recall ever seeing "All I want for Christmas" for some reason.
I also don't know if you can say "firmly within the Christmas season". Is there a set criteria for when Christmas season begins? Is it after Black Friday? Online Monday? 30 days before Christmas Day? 31 since December has 31 days. It would seem if anything can give you a 'firm' date to the start of the Christmas season, it would be Dec. 1, since in a secular Christmas, the beginning of advent no longer applies. And if it IS Dec. 1, then playing "A Charlie Brown's Christmas" on Dec. 1 is early.
Of course I would forget the "Miracle on 34th Street". And now that "The Polar Express" is now a movie...
It's true that defining the start of the Christmas season is tougher in Canada than the U.S. In the U.S the season starts definitively after Thanksgiving.
In Canada, the retail season starts November 1st, but that is a tad early, even for me. I say that the season starts at slightly different times based on regional difference, like many things in Canada.
The defining line is the local Santa Clause parade. The day of your town's Santa Clause parade is the start of the season I think.
As to the Christianity/secularism of Christmas, my comments weren't specifically directed toward you, they were just my comments generally prompted by your post.
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