When I teach my students to defend their opinions, I often use the prompt, "What's your favorite holiday?" It requires no research or citations, and thus far, all of my students celebrate at least one holiday (though if I ever have a student who is a Jehovah's Witness, I will have to rethink.) The accessibility of the prompt allows us to bypass the distractions of quoting and formatting and get to the nitty-gritty: specificity. See, my students can all tell you that Christmas or Halloween or Valentines Day is their favorite holiday because they like it, but it's very difficult for them to explain why they like it.
Specificity is, unfortunately, all too often lacking in adult arguments as well. This is how I have felt for years whenever people complain about the use of "happy holidays." No one ever seems to offer a reason for it, other than it's "bad" ("bad" is not an acceptable reason in my classroom.) In contrast, growing up, I saw lots of good reasons for using it. Sure, I celebrated Christmas, but it didn't hurt to awknowledge that not everyone did. Furthermore, Christmas isn't the only winter holiday. And I'm not just talking about Chanukah and Yule. Even people who celebrate Christmas have additional holidays they might honor, such as Kwanza in African-American communities and St. Nick's feast day among Catholics. There's also Twelfth Night, which falls shortly after another popular winter holiday--the new year. And none of that's to mention that students and teachers all have a holiday from school. Provided this, I felt like everybody just needed to chill their shit.
And then it happened. A couple of months ago, my book club at work was making plans about what to do for December. It's a short month for teachers, so maybe we should read something short, like J.R.R. Tolkein's Letters from Father Christmas. Or maybe we should skip the book all together, but still have a Christmas party. Later, as I was conversing with our fearless leader, she remembered I was converting to Judaism. Maybe we should read a different book, she suggested, and have a "holiday party." The world holiday rolled off her tongue with all the vague lack of specificity as "bad" or "I like it." I found myself rapidly backpedaling out of a situation I hadn't even pedaled into. I really don't mind reading a Christmas book, I said. In fact, I can recommend some. Have you read The Christmas Hirelings? That one's pretty short. Or December Boys? I own the film adaptation. We could have a movie night! And really, you shouldn't worry about Chanukah. It's a minor holiday. It's really just Sukkot 2.0, and we already built a Sukkah at the school, so we're covered! Suddenly, I got it.
But before you say, "ah-hah! I told you so!" you need to know that not hours before writing this, someone else wished me "happy holidays," and it felt perfectly normal. Considering it's not even Thanksgiving yet, I'm guessing that he takes the broader view of "the holiday season" that my brother once argued extended from Halloween to the 4th of July. Okay, maybe not that broad, but certainly Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, and everything in between (Chanukah included).
Given all of this, and also given that I am one of a very small number of people I know willing to offer a specific reason for why "Happy Holidays" is (sometimes) "bad," I have reached the following conclusion about all of this phraseology: people need to chill their shit.
First off, to my Christian friends who suddenly feel the need to turn their Christmas events into generic "holiday" events only for the sake of "including" me, please don't. I know what a Christmas party looks like, and I know what a Chanukah party looks like, and unless you're willing to commit to a true "Christmakah" party (and I've been to one or two), I'd rather you just be specific, so I can imagine in all its proper glory. I will gladly attend your Christmas parties, Christmas book clubs, and Christmas movie nights. I might even have a few suggestions of my own (anyone who thinks Die Hard is the best Christmas movie has never seen Hogfather.) That being said, I might also wear my "menorasaurus" shirt, but this isn't because I feel excluded. I just think it's funny. After all, I used to wear a Halloween shirt to every Christmas party I went to. The only way you're going to exclude me is by not inviting me at all.
And now to the Jews. Look, I get that the whole Christmas thing is literally everywhere. And maybe hearing "Merry Christmas" all the time feels like being single on Valentines Day. But have these conversations with the people you care about and please stop getting your knickers in a twist over the Walmart cashier who has no reason to know you're Jewish. Also stop getting your knickers in a twist if the cashier sees you in your menorasaurus sweatshirt and deigns to wish you a Happy Chanukah. And if a non-Jew wishes you Happy Chanukah late, you can tell them it's over, but you appreciate the sentiment (you should--they're trying to be nice.) And if a non-Jew tells you Happy Chanukah early, imagine they did it on purpose, the way someone might wish you a happy early birthday if they're not going to see you on the day. And above all, remember this: if you first get upset about people telling you Merry Christmas, and then turn around and get upset about people telling Happy Chanukah, you are the cause of the Happy Holidays problem.
As for me, I'm still fine with "Happy Holidays," especially as a generic wintry greeting that encompasses the end of November to the beginning of January. And I personally view Christians and Jews wishing holiday greetings to one another as akin to the end of The Nightmare Before Christmas, in which Santa Claus and Jack Skellington honor and validate each other's holidays by doing the same. But I think this year, I'll try one last option to skirt around the controversy: Merry Midwinter. It's generic enough not to be associated with any specific religion, but somehow feels specific enough to invoke an image that a word like "holiday" can't conjure. But if this still doesn't satisfy, you already know what I'm going to say: chill your shit.
