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I had a deep philosophical debate with a friend of mine about this very subject. It occured to us that people at university repeatedly confronted us with aggressive greetings ranging from the basic, abstract "Merry Christmas" to advanced, specific ones such as "Merry Xmas with little stress. I hope Santa brings you something fine this year. All the best to you and your family". It should be noted that we are Jewish, which made me ponder about the most adequate response to such verbal attacks.
I could be politically correct and avoiding any conflict by simply saying "thanks! to you too!"
I might go even further and fake Christian identity by responding "yeah, finally its coming, about time after all those stressful weeks. I expect high benefits from the good ol' fatty this year, too. Benn a good child!"
Or I could coldly say "Sorry, I'm Jewish, try again."
It gets even more complicated because many Christians here are unaware that Jews are NOT celebrating this holiday (which seems funny cause this is more or less the ONE big thing that seperates us). Which means that I would have to go on and carefully explain why we do not do so. Which I did last week. Which ended up in a shocking partly-naive-partly-intolerant-but-mainly-dumb answer: "But you live in Austria, Europe. Why don't you celebrate like everybody? It's nice to buy gifts for your loved ones, I dont understand you!".
I didn't know religion is geographically defined. And if the exchange of presents is the main stimulator, why don't you guys do it just-for-fun throughout the year?
Anyway, the most ironic thing about this whole affair is that the very greeting that sparked the whole debate was said to me by a girl, which I found out later, was Jewish as well, obviously not aware of my Jewish heritage, either.
And as if that was not enough of irony for you: Upon asking her how she would react when people wished her merry x-mas, she looked at me, all bewildered and asked: "What? You don't celebrate? Our family does, despite everything. It's a nice tradition."
Having said all that, I capitulate and wish the whole forum, regardless of religion, ethnicity etc....
Merry Fucking X-mas (yes, Im too late), Happy Hanuka (yes, Im too late) and a Happy New Year 2005!
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"Those are my principles, if you don't like them... well, I have others.”
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