That is the question. Whether ‘tis nobler…
Prince Hamlet’s thinking leaned more existential than a choice between appropriate verbiage for a non-secular holiday salutation in the 21st century. Still, it’s a question we modern-day philistines are faced with. And there’s an element of nobility and gallantry behind deciding how to answer the question posed in my essay header.
I’ll get to the quick: while I’m not anal about it, I prefer “Happy Holidays.” You conservatives might say it’s because I’m a leftist liberal. There’s a grain of truth to that (although I’m not as leftist as some of you might think). I would say a more appropriate reason is that I often employ the same brain machinations in non-political as political ways. Hey, I am what I am.
When I was a kid I threw around “Merry Christmas” all the time (or in print, the lazier “Merry Xmas”). I didn’t know anything about religion. Hell, I barely knew how babies were made.
I’m older and somewhat wiser now. I now realize that Christmas is a commercial religious celebration (or at least it started out religious), but that a lot of my fellow Earthlings actually are not Christians. Eureka! We’ve got Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Taoists, paganists, agnostics, and atheists galore here in Uncle Sam land. (Maybe not in North Dakota…but you know what I mean.) Lots of smaller cults, too.
I’ll still say “Merry Christmas” in return if I’m greeted that way, because I know the person greeting me is okay with it. But if I’m doing the initial greeting, and I’m ignorant of the religious or non-religious affiliation of the person, I always say “Happy Holidays.” Like Mutual of Omaha, it’s an all-encompassing insurance policy. It covers New Year’s Day, Hanukkah, and I think it usually satisfies atheists and garden-variety, Christian-tinged agnostics like me.
(I shouldn’t forget Kwanzaa, a black cultural celebration occurring just after Christmas. Kwanzaa’s popularity has evidently declined since its peak in the 1990s, to the undoubted dismay of Hallmark.)
***
So to those fist-pounding militants who want to “Put Christ back in Christmas,” like the guy around the corner with all the crazy yard signs, I say “knock yourselves out.” Just don’t foist it on me. Nothing against Christ—who, by the way, preached humility and tolerance—but I’ll celebrate Christmas in my own way, thank you.
It’s all about politeness. Or gallantry and nobility. You know, “’Tis nobler.” Unfortunately, and as we’ve seen with people who are adamant about their “individual rights” and defying “government intrusion” by refusing to wear facemasks in public—masks intended to protect themselves and others—politeness is in absentia in certain dark corners of the country right now.
But in the Christmas spirit, I’ll offer a “Happy Holidays” to even these people. And throw in a “Be Safe” for good measure.
longitudes 
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