Why I Am Almost Indifferent To Christmas

I really don’t hate it.

a man with a santa hat and covered in tinsel sits at a dinner table looking bored, realistic digital art — by DALL·E

Nothing is harder not to adore publicly than Christmas in the West. I cannot think of anything else toward which I struggle so much to defend my indifferent stance. Most of the time, when we don’t particularly like something, people leave us alone. Not with Christmas: we must have a family trauma or be Grinch in disguise. ‘Why would you hate Christmas?’ I find myself staring perplexed at this question more often than I care to count. I don’t hate it. Yet, I don’t love it. Is that alright?

Indeed, I am mostly unimpressed and underwhelmed by the shenanigans of Christmas. I do not understand why someone would feel the sudden urge to do good, be kind and generally act like they should for the rest of the year. Admittedly, it could be my disinclination toward religion that clouds my sight, but I cannot help seeing these seasonal acts of goodwill as the purchasing of a VIP pass that allows us to be pricks for the other eleven months without fear of the consequences. It reminds me of that old Catholic practice of accumulating a sort of ‘good-deed credit’ one could then expend to commit sins.

Moreover, even those who don’t buy into the narrative cannot escape it. There is much we do during Christmas that we wouldn’t otherwise: events we attend, company we keep and other poppycock we entertain…