A bit of harmless fun

I'm so, so, so sick of people just poo-pooing everything, anything that's fun.

C'mon people. Halloween is just a bit of fun. My previous Halloween post, was linked to by this guy - who says:

Secondly, Halloween is a hijacked American tradition of blasphemous commercialism. Even though there are traces to Druid and Celtic culture, there is now no real relevance to the United Kingdom except to sell products. Though many would disagree with this opinion!

And today on Nashville is Talking, Brittney (Happy Birthday, BTW) linked to a post about a school that's cancelled their traditional Halloween celebrations because a few parents were offended.

And soon we move into the holiday season of banned Christmas trees and so forth.

Now, I know that I come from a tradition of Halloween trick-or-treating, and Christmas trees and carolling and Easter eggs and the 4th of July... and I'm awful fond of those traditions. And I get a little upset when people try to tear them down when they aren't really hurting anyone. I'm all for separation of church and state, but there's a big difference between school prayer and a little yule time pine.

But you know, I don't really stop with just the festivals of my own culture, I like Cinco de Mayo and Chanuka and Texas Independence Day and Mardi Gras, Guy Fawkes night and I'll put out a flag for St George's Day in England - all things I didn't grow up celebrating, but are a good excuse for some fun. People who are offended by any of these should just avert their eyes.

If you've got a fun holiday that involves beer or nice food, I'm all over that. And even if I'm not invited to participate, I don't want to stop you from having fun*. Put up your decorations, put them up in the office, I love glitz. Bring in some food for Eid - I'll eat it and say "Happy Eid". It all adds to the color.

I will say that I'm not so much into the holidays that involve fasting or scourging. But don't let me stop you.


*I've got to draw the line a little bit at Diwali - when I lived in a predominately Hindu area it was fireworks every night til very late for around a month. That gets old. I like Diwali decorations and I'm up for a few nights of firecrackers, but not a month of disturbed sleep and terrified cats.