Here's an interesting post by the incredibly prolific (I don't know if that's just another word for unemployed, or if he's got some sort of programming job that also involves no adult supervision) DovBear, in which he decries the War on Christmas, courtesy of, and I quote, "a man named Rosenberg". (I was a bit surprised, bexcause I actually know a man named Rosenberg, but it wasn't him. I guess it's a more common name than I had supposed.)
Let me begin with a pathetic political disclaimer: I am a pro-legal-abortion, radically-feminist death-penalty-opponent (with an obvious predilection for hyphens), and I gave up reading the nefarious Cross-Currents (nope, no link) blog lo these many moons ago, because I found its scribes' views to be rather dishonestly inconsistent, depending upon whether they were published as letters to the editor in Commentary (expansive and tolerant), or in the privacy of unzere velt (spite-filled and provincial). So my defense of one of their arguments should not be read as a defense of their general outlook or, even worse, tone.
And, to get to the matter at hand, I have no pronounced preference for any form of December-time greeting, although I still have nightmares of the time my former company's CEO ran through the cubicle maze in a Santa Suit wishing his paeons a hearty "Merry Christmas," which turned into a "Merry Holiday" (No, really. What a yutz that guy was.) when he belatedly espied my yarmahopper.
In defense of the Merry Christmas Yidden, though, I think that what appears to be nothing more than a sycophantic defense of a creed with which we ostensibly disagree even more than the much-maligned Reform movement (link to your own C-C post here too - most likely, one selected at random will do), actually has two reasonable defenses.
First, and I say this as a paraphrase in the name of a well-known and widely respected rabbi - there are two billion of them, and 14 million of us, calling into some question the sagacity of ticking them off more than necessary. (Yes, yes, of course, I'm a spineless ghetto Jew and all, but at the same time, if your insistence on Jewish pride threatens my kids, fairly or otherwise, I may still choose to err on the side of prudence. For much the same reason, I don't take Shabbos evening strolls in Harlem in my satin frock and furry hat. It may well be my right to do so, but fat lot of good that will do me in the moment.)
Second - I tend to agree with the good Dr. Huntington's diagnosis of the current global fooferaw as an honest-to-goodness clash between civilizations. Again, considering the limited number of civilizational canaries (id est Juden, or Jooden if you're Dutch) out there, perhaps there is something to be said for the utilitarian benefits of supporting and strengthening the cultural forces that represent the primary identity of, if not our friends, at least the enemies of our enemies. Otherwise, it's a bit of a battle between something - malignant, oppressive, and destructive, but something - and a benign, tolerant, and broad-minded nothing. Ideologically, of course, I tend to agree with the nothings, but I do doubt the potency of this philosophy, particularly up against the Islamist mob clamoring to kill the Jews and rape their cattle.
This is not to downplay the risks inherent in this strategy - we are, at best, a tiny rudder on a massive ship with a history of surging out of control and pogroming its rudders - but, like the Choose Your Own Ending books used to say, you've got to make it through the semi-finals to get to the World Series.
- Moishe Potemkin
Posted by MoisheP at December 20, 2005 09:39 PM | TrackBack