Ze Verd Christmas is now hereby forbidden!

Ok. It is December and retailers and businesses want our money again. However these same retailers have again fallen for the myth that the majority of their customers are offended by the word Christmas but not by the more generic word Holiday. Or perhaps they feel safer lumping all of the big holidays into the word "Holiday" so when you do your Kwaanza and Hannakah shopping you will shop at their store. The irony is that 90% of their potential customers, even the athiests, are buying stuff to give as gifts on Christmas!

Every year it gets worse but this year I am seeing the effort to avoid mentioning the word Christmas at all cost, actually to a point where it doesn't make sense.

Here are some examples:

• I got something in the mail from St. Mary's Bank. If I open an account with them I will get a "free holiday DVD". However ALL of the DVDs I can choose from are Christmas DVDs! So St. Mary's Bank is calling a stack of Christmas DVDs, "holiday DVDs", so as to entice me to give them my business.
• I heard an eBay radio ad the other day in which Santa bellows "Happy Holidays America". OK, well what other holiday does Santa Clause come on besides Christmas? Has he ever been associated with Kwaanza or Hannakah? It's kind of like George Steinbrenner cheering "go organized teams!" from his owners booth so as not to offend fans of other teams or other sports.
• In a UPS ad, the driver talks about the job 'driver helper' as a way to "make extra cash for the holiday". He talks about the joy of bringing people their packages and how happy they are to see him. However, at the end of the spiel but he says "when December 25th hits... you did a good job and I'll see you next year." I guess saying "when holiday hits..." would sound kind of weird so I imagine the spinless marketeers at UPS probably said "well just say 'December 25th' since holiday doesn't fit so well."
  

Anyway, more observations may come but in honor of thought police around the world I say Merry December 25th and a Happy January 1st!