What's your take on Christmas?

[melpomene]

Time off from work, and away from school
these are the things that make Christmas cool

[Stricken]

What is the point in Christmas, to celebrate the birth of some person who wasn't born in the year 0 as the calander is off by several year (6 I think) I celebrate, eat, drink but mainly this is a time for me to sleep

[GateGipsy]

I love Christmas, in that it is so nice to have a happy day, eat lots of great food, enjoy family and friends, watch the Eastenders-sob-fest, the Queens Speech, a good movie.

But my favourite days are boxing day and the day after boxing day. I put out al the left overs so people can feed themselves when they want to. Hubs makes a big pile of mashed pototoes to go with the cold meats. I have my 'christmas' books. I plant myself on the comfy armchair and just read and eat read and eat read and eat...bliss

This year will be different as it will be Baby G's first christmas. Mind he's a bit young to really appreciate it. I thought I'd try and find something special, maybe a really nice children's book, to give him. Then in years to come it can be a reminder of his first christmas.

[Madeleine]

For those of you that hate the commercialism of Christmas, why don't you take a look at http://www.tear.org.au/giftcatalogue/index.shtml and buy a practical gift that will change many lives in the world? What happens is you buy a practical item for a third world country and you receive a card with a photo of the gift you bought. So you give that card to your family as a present. It's a strange concept but take a look at the site and hopefully it can explain better than I can. I know several people that have bought from the catalogue and they say it is an amazing thing.

Nice one. Also, http://www.oxfamunwrapped.com is doing the same sort of thing for those of us in the land of Pounds Sterling.

[Erised]

For those of you that hate the commercialism of Christmas, why don't you take a look at http://www.tear.org.au/giftcatalogue/index.shtml and buy a practical gift that will change many lives in the world? What happens is you buy a practical item for a third world country and you receive a card with a photo of the gift you bought. So you give that card to your family as a present. It's a strange concept but take a look at the site and hopefully it can explain better than I can. I know several people that have bought from the catalogue and they say it is an amazing thing.

oh that's a totally different story from the usual advertisements of toys for your already spoiled children and jewelry for your girlfriends.

[immhotep]

i celebrate x-mas, im not religious so i think the x, for me represents the end of the year or just the spirit of that time of year...i like that time of year, cept the cold, having to find gift for people you really cant think ofa anything to get them .
christmas for me is family time, nothing more, its when all of my family and i have a large family come together besides weddings. i like it, and so its worth the effort. i just never get religous becuase i just dont care for the relgious aspect, kinda ignore it.

[TrustNo1]

Oxfam are an amazing organisation, really gets the job done.

For those that don't want to buy into commercialism at Christmas and don't want to waste money on someone you don't know overseas, why not get loved ones gifts that develop their gifts or something that will benefit them? Do they really NEED that xbox? PS3? Harry Potter book? Buy them some seeds so they can learn gardening, a self help book, an inspirational piece of writing, a handmade card? My friend year after year got basically the same presents, then one year he decided enough was enough, he bought a cheap practical gift and his mum was the happiest than any other Christmas. You would be amazed at what a gift of lesser monetory value is worth to someone.

[CatGoddess]

Christmas has become very over-commercialized. It has become less and less about commemorating the birth of Jesus (who I know wasn't necessarily born on Dec. 25, but that's the day Christians celebrate his birth), and more and more about finding The Perfect Gift For Everyone On Your List. Many retailers don't even turn a profit until the Christmas shopping season begins - that's why the day after Thanksgiving is called Black Friday in the US.

I look on Christmas as a good day to spend with your family and stuff yourself with good food and drink. We do exchange gifts, but we tend to give each person one nice well-thought-out gift (like a piece of jewelry, or an electronic gadget, etc.) and maybe a couple of what my mother calls "chutputs", or cute little gifts like a nice picture in a frame, or cute dish towels, etc. These gifts are generally bought well in advance of the shopping season, so that we don't have to brave the malls between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Honestly, it doesn't bother me when people say "Merry Christmas" to me. They can't tell I'm not Christian by looking at me. I usually just reply "Merry Christmas to you." Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa, Season's Greetings, Happy Holidays... whatever floats your boat, just enjoy.

[Stricken]

This is probably the most profound thing that I will say this year:

Christmas means different things to different people, some embrace it, others hate it, we are all intitled to our own opinion which is embraced here on GateWorld.
For me its means that I can make funny pictures and signatures which aren't the best in the world but it keeps me happy

[Seshat]

I'm atheist, but have a lot of friends who are both atheists and christians.
For me personally.. the whole xmas thing is showing the people you care about that you do actually care about them, even if its just taking the time to write an xmas card or find a cheesey gift and its nice in theory to have a whole day where everyone is in good spirits and aren't concered with everyday stressy life

That's how I look at it pretty much, too. I'll celebrate any holiday that has at it's heart the idea that we should take some time out of our lives to just love one another. I don't think it matters what religion you are (or aren't, as I am an atheist as well ), just making an effort to get along with each other and being grateful for what you DO have is a wonderful reason to celebrate.

[Arative]

Christmas is commercialized, its a driving force behind the US economy. Its not a religious holiday, its a commercial holiday, pretty much just like every other holiday that we have. Just on the day after Thanksgiving, the so called black friday, people spent $27.4 billion dollars. Thats a huge day for retailors. Of course the retailors have also dubbed the monday after black friday as cyber monday, a day when people make online purchases but I haven't seen any numbers for that day.

To me, Christmas season is a time for giving a little more than I do the rest of the year. Sometimes people really p*ss me off though. I had a friend that died Tuesday in a car accident, she used sit right next to me at work, we were fairly close, hung out after work, talked all the time.

So at work we were doing a secret santa, we had picked the names on monday. The limit was $20. So I know my friends family doesn't have a lot money, so I sent an email out to our group that was doing the secret santa that I'd prefer who ever my secret santa was to donate the money to her family. And then a bunch of other people started replying to the email that they wanted the same thing, which is cool. But then a few people got angry, the person that organized it was muttering why did I even bother to organize it, if we were just going to give the money away. And a few others got mad cause people were jumping on the bandwagon.

Hell all I wanted to do was do something nice for a family who is going through a lot right now and they could use $20 more than what ever gift someone was getting me but appearantly I started a lot of drama. And silly me, here I thought the holidays were a time of giving, not recieving.

[Seshat]

To me, Christmas season is a time for giving a little more than I do the rest of the year. Sometimes people really p*ss me off though. I had a friend that died Tuesday in a car accident, she used sit right next to me at work, we were fairly close, hung out after work, talked all the time.

So at work we were doing a secret santa, we had picked the names on monday. The limit was $20. So I know my friends family doesn't have a lot money, so I sent an email out to our group that was doing the secret santa that I'd prefer who ever my secret santa was to donate the money to her family. And then a bunch of other people started replying to the email that they wanted the same thing, which is cool. But then a few people got angry, the person that organized it was muttering why did I even bother to organize it, if we were just going to give the money away. And a few others got mad cause people were jumping on the bandwagon.

Hell all I wanted to do was do something nice for a family who is going through a lot right now and they could use $20 more than what ever gift someone was getting me but appearantly I started a lot of drama. And silly me, here I thought the holidays were a time of giving, not recieving.

Your motives and your idea of giving away your gift were excellent because you were following your heart. You didn't ask anyone to do the same, but the fact is by your actions you changed the rules of an already established event in a way that not everyone agreed with. It might have been better to approach the whole group at once and ask for a change in plans for the secret santa, or just start a separate collection for the family yourself amongst your co-workers. The second is what I would have chosen to do.

Although you did not ask people to do the same as you, you did unintentionally create a problem with the way you went about it. Perhaps some of your work crew was really looking forward to the secret santa gift exchange, or had already bought their intended gifts. Thus a situation was created where they might have to spend even more money in ways they perhaps would not have chosen.

Making money judgements for other people is always a bad move. It is always better to keep in mind that not everyone has or makes the same as everyone else, that not everyone is as generous as you.

[Paladin61585]

im christian, but not mormon, or jehova witness. but i know for a fact jesus christ wasnt born on christmas day hense forth i do not celebrate christmas on dec 25th infact i celebrate his birth during the feast of harvest (tabernacles) or the hebrew month of tishri

cause shepards dont go out in the fields where it is chilly out but when the air is still warm. late sept early october is perfect harvest season for crops in judea

sept 15th - oct15th

[ciel]

For those of you that hate the commercialism of Christmas, why don't you take a look at http://www.tear.org.au/giftcatalogue/index.shtml and buy a practical gift that will change many lives in the world? What happens is you buy a practical item for a third world country and you receive a card with a photo of the gift you bought. So you give that card to your family as a present. It's a strange concept but take a look at the site and hopefully it can explain better than I can. I know several people that have bought from the catalogue and they say it is an amazing thing.

Don't boycott Christmas because you hate how people want useless items, instead you should embrace the true meaning of Christmas and give to those that are needy. How much does an X-Box 360 cost? $300? $400? You can buy 6-8 goats with that, that's 8 families that will have milk/meat/whatever else they use goats for.

So have a think about it. TEAR is an Australian organisation so I don't know if it takes international orders but I'm sure you could check out similar organisations in your country or contact TEAR to find out if they do handle overseas payments.

this is a really wonderful site - do you know about collectivegood.com?