My Very non-PC Chanuka Rant
First off, Happy Chanuka, y'all! :)
Okay, now for my apparently Zionist Chanuka rant about another reason why I'm happy to be living in Israel, as opposed to say... the US. Ahem.
I hate the "holiday season" in America. First of all, I hate Christmas, because it's everywhere and makes me feel all uncomfortable because it makes me feel like an outsider to it all. But even more than that, now with PC everything all the time, we no longer have people wishing us a "Merry Christmas", but rather "Happy Holidays" or "Seasons Greetings" with little magen davids and "Hanuka menorahs" in the background along with the Christmas trees. Granted, this rant may seem a little baseless, being as how the last time I was in the US for the "Holiday Season" was seven years ago. (Wow! That's a long time ago...) Things were PC then, and I'm assuming they're even more PC now.
But what bothers me is... OK, fine a few things bother me. For one I hate that Chanuka is associated with or compared to Christmas at all. Chanuka is not the Jewish version of Christmas. I actually think this entire thing is a smack in Chistmas's face. Christmas is the biggest, most major Christian holiday there is. It is also a legal holiday in the US. America, on the whole, is a Christian country and it's totally legit for it to celebrate Christmas on a national level. Chanuka, on the other hand, is a dinky Jewish holiday (not to knock Chanuka, but it is quite a minor holiday. אין מה לעשות) and gets blown WAYYYY out of proportion in an attempt to make Jews feel better about themselves and not left out of the "Holiday Season". Know what? Jewish Americans SHOULD feel left out of the "Holiday Season". Jews, as long as they are living outside of Israel, SHOULD always feel a bit uncomfortable and awkward. Jewish Americans are guests in America. And when you are a guest, you have to accept that as comfortable as you are, you will always be an outsider and you shouldn't expect your host country to downplay and PC-ize its own traditions to make you feel better about yourself. The "Holiday Season" in America is neither fair to Christmas nor to Chanuka (I don't know enough about Kwanzaa to make a judgement call on that one) as these holidays have nothing to do with each other aside from both being in the winter. I (if I lived in the US) personally would rather have my TV and newspapers telling me to have a Merry Christmas than Seasons Greetings or Happy Holidays, and have them leave the "stars of David" and "Hanuka menorahs" out of it all.
Another thing about the "Holiday Season" in America that makes me upset - perhaps the thing that bothers me about it the most is, okay... what's the reason we even celebrate Chanuka to begin with? Yes, the Chanuka miracle. Very good. What's the miracle of Chanuka? An itty bitty bit of oil lasting 8 days. Uh huh... yeah... and? Cuz, boys and girls, there were TWO big miracles of Chanuka. Can anyone remember the other one? Oh yeah... The Jews fighting off the Greeks and the Wannabe-Greek Jews, who for all intents and purposes were worse than the Greeks themselves. The big miracle of Chanuka is that the Maccabim, the teeny tiny Jewish army, were able to fight off Greek rule which was trying its best to steal our identity away from us. Because of this, we were able to remain Jewish and continue to do our thing in the Beit HaMikdash, etc. This whole concept in no way jives with the Jewish-American-PC version of Chanuka. At all. Once you have a "Holiday party" and celebrate Christmas and Chanuka together or even put Christmas and Chanuka symbols on the same signs/newspapers/hallways/etc (let alone having the [insert adjective here] chutzpah to intermarry and raise your children celebrating both Chanuka and Christmas or Christmuka), you might as well not celebrate Chanuka at all, because there's no point anymore. You yourself have become a מתיוון and by "celebrating" Chanuka at all, you are smacking it in the face with such insane levels of hypocracy that you should be embarrassed to show your face in any Jewish circle ever again.
That said, I'm very happy I live in Israel, where Chanuka is given the appropriate significance it deserves and can be celebrated in its own right without serving PC purposes or rivaling with another religion's holiday.
I'm sorry if I've offended anyone, but this is my LJ and its purpose is to say what's on my mind.
Okay, now for my apparently Zionist Chanuka rant about another reason why I'm happy to be living in Israel, as opposed to say... the US. Ahem.
I hate the "holiday season" in America. First of all, I hate Christmas, because it's everywhere and makes me feel all uncomfortable because it makes me feel like an outsider to it all. But even more than that, now with PC everything all the time, we no longer have people wishing us a "Merry Christmas", but rather "Happy Holidays" or "Seasons Greetings" with little magen davids and "Hanuka menorahs" in the background along with the Christmas trees. Granted, this rant may seem a little baseless, being as how the last time I was in the US for the "Holiday Season" was seven years ago. (Wow! That's a long time ago...) Things were PC then, and I'm assuming they're even more PC now.
But what bothers me is... OK, fine a few things bother me. For one I hate that Chanuka is associated with or compared to Christmas at all. Chanuka is not the Jewish version of Christmas. I actually think this entire thing is a smack in Chistmas's face. Christmas is the biggest, most major Christian holiday there is. It is also a legal holiday in the US. America, on the whole, is a Christian country and it's totally legit for it to celebrate Christmas on a national level. Chanuka, on the other hand, is a dinky Jewish holiday (not to knock Chanuka, but it is quite a minor holiday. אין מה לעשות) and gets blown WAYYYY out of proportion in an attempt to make Jews feel better about themselves and not left out of the "Holiday Season". Know what? Jewish Americans SHOULD feel left out of the "Holiday Season". Jews, as long as they are living outside of Israel, SHOULD always feel a bit uncomfortable and awkward. Jewish Americans are guests in America. And when you are a guest, you have to accept that as comfortable as you are, you will always be an outsider and you shouldn't expect your host country to downplay and PC-ize its own traditions to make you feel better about yourself. The "Holiday Season" in America is neither fair to Christmas nor to Chanuka (I don't know enough about Kwanzaa to make a judgement call on that one) as these holidays have nothing to do with each other aside from both being in the winter. I (if I lived in the US) personally would rather have my TV and newspapers telling me to have a Merry Christmas than Seasons Greetings or Happy Holidays, and have them leave the "stars of David" and "Hanuka menorahs" out of it all.
Another thing about the "Holiday Season" in America that makes me upset - perhaps the thing that bothers me about it the most is, okay... what's the reason we even celebrate Chanuka to begin with? Yes, the Chanuka miracle. Very good. What's the miracle of Chanuka? An itty bitty bit of oil lasting 8 days. Uh huh... yeah... and? Cuz, boys and girls, there were TWO big miracles of Chanuka. Can anyone remember the other one? Oh yeah... The Jews fighting off the Greeks and the Wannabe-Greek Jews, who for all intents and purposes were worse than the Greeks themselves. The big miracle of Chanuka is that the Maccabim, the teeny tiny Jewish army, were able to fight off Greek rule which was trying its best to steal our identity away from us. Because of this, we were able to remain Jewish and continue to do our thing in the Beit HaMikdash, etc. This whole concept in no way jives with the Jewish-American-PC version of Chanuka. At all. Once you have a "Holiday party" and celebrate Christmas and Chanuka together or even put Christmas and Chanuka symbols on the same signs/newspapers/hallways/etc (let alone having the [insert adjective here] chutzpah to intermarry and raise your children celebrating both Chanuka and Christmas or Christmuka), you might as well not celebrate Chanuka at all, because there's no point anymore. You yourself have become a מתיוון and by "celebrating" Chanuka at all, you are smacking it in the face with such insane levels of hypocracy that you should be embarrassed to show your face in any Jewish circle ever again.
That said, I'm very happy I live in Israel, where Chanuka is given the appropriate significance it deserves and can be celebrated in its own right without serving PC purposes or rivaling with another religion's holiday.
I'm sorry if I've offended anyone, but this is my LJ and its purpose is to say what's on my mind.