Season's Greetings: The Hidden Implications of Christmas

Christmas is a giant potwash of traditions that has always been celebrated strongly by my family. When your mother is a Stage IV cancer patient and Christmas is her favorite holiday, you're allowed to celebrate how and when you'd like.

Consequently, the following are staples of my holiday season:

• Beginning in mid-October, decorations go up. That's right, mid-October.
• Christmas music begins playing...well, it never stops, so I guess it doesn't really begin either. Incidentally, hearing the same 10 Christmas songs over and over again has failed to bother me. Now I just sing along.
• Regularly scheduled programming from the holidays (ie. Charlie Brown Christmas, How the Grinch Stole Christmas (THE ORIGINAL, NOT THAT JIM CARREY SCHMUCK), Rudolph, etc.) becomes non-stop from October through February.
• A Christmas wreath dangles from my mother's rear view mirror. Again, non-stop, this never goes away. (And makes it easy to single out her car in parking lots)
• Decorations go down around the end of February.

This means that roughly 1/3 of my year is devoted to the Christmas season, along with all of it's trappings. Well, to be more accurate, this is more dedicated to my mother, but as a result of upbringing, I'm used to being around Christmas to a point that I subconsciously go through the motions as a result of making it feel like home. (My small Christmas tree in my apartment might indeed stay up until March. Unless reclaimed by its original owners, but given that it's a small obstruction in the corner of my apartment, and is among the only decorations I have, I put my motivation at taking it down at about a 1.2. On a free day.)

To a certain point, Christmas is such a collective ensemblage of traditions that most of us blindly follow along, noticing the details only when they are absent from their usual placement. This familiarity with holiday tradition ranges from visiting your in-laws and family, having dinner on Christmas Eve, opening presents in the morning, caroling with your church, playing with wrapping paper and box forts (if you're five), spending six hours in the emergency room because you cut your thumb open MASSIVELY while opening your Jurassic Park Command Compound with a very sharp pair of scissors. (Again, if you're five. And me. Neither are exclusive from each other, BTW.) This extends to the media that we ingest repeatedly each year, program after program. Let's be fair, everyone watches at least one classic holiday Christmas special at one point during the holiday. (If you don't, you probably don't have a soul. Or, you know, follow one of the dozens of other religious traditions that don't necessarily celebrate Christmas. Although I have a deep feeling that "8 Crazy Nights" isn't mandatory Haunakah screening if you're Jewish.

Because of our familiarity with these traditions, we don't really pay attention to them as we would to normal films, TV shows, songs, etc. because there's no point to. We've all seen "It's a Wonderful Life" 15,000 times by now, and there's not really any point in examining the details. What's more important to us is that it's on TV, and that means gathering round with the family, cheering on George Bailey, and crying at the appropriate moments when the entire town of Bedford Falls bands together to save their loan officer.

(For those of you who have not seen "It's a Wonderful Life", here's an adequate summary that oughta bring you up to speed. You're welcome.)

We all understand. It's a feel good story, it's a holiday tradition, the ending is iconic, and the overall movie (which doesn't deal entirely with Christmas, just the last third) is a nostalgic tribute to small town America and the ability to overcome any problems. (The movie even sums up its message for you onscreen in Clarence the Angel's message to George in his copy of Tom Sawyer. Look it up.)

But have we noted the ethnic and racial stereotyping?

Aha, I didn't think so.

Consider the following when going back through this family staple of Christmas: (Yes, I'm keeping in mind that this was made back in 1945, before, you know, civil rights and political correctness, but bear with me while I make my point.)

1.     Bedford Falls has apparently one/two black people living in the entire town. The one who we see the most is Annie, who is the maid for George's family. (Yes, that's right, the family servant. This is a family that to all expressed knowledge has little money. The family business is struggling to stay afloat. Only one of the Bailey brothers is able to afford to go to college. Any money in the town is in the hands of Mr. Potter, the bank owner. So how does this poor family afford a servant in the first place?) Throughout the entire two hour movie, she is featured in approximately two scenes. The first is serving dinner to the family, where she gets some jokes in and kids with the brothers George and Harry. The second is in the climax, where she shows up with the rest of town to give money to George to get him out of dutch. And that's it. She doesn't feature otherwise, or have anything meaningful to add to the plot.

The only other black citizen of BedfordBedford Falls in the real world) is to show the wrongness of this world. How does that sound? The only way that we know that there is something wrong with the world is because a black man is playing piano in the corner of the bar. He doesn't even have any lines and we as viewers are predisposed to hate this gentleman.

"Psst, Clarence? I think there's a Negro in the corner."
"Oh, that's alright George. He's not really there."

2.  The Martini family that George helps out seems to be a giant mass of Italian kids lorded over by Mr. and Mrs. Martini, otherwise known as the two Italian stereotypes who might have lived down the street from you in the 30's. (Before people knew what "The Godfather" was.) You probably know them from any time there is an Italian character in a movie from before 1946: the obese, feisty Italian woman with a kid in each arm, and the skinny man with a large nose holding a baguette and a bottle of wine talking like Chico Marx. Every time that he is featured for anything, it is either to receive wine as a gift or to serve it at the bar or at a party. While he is credited as an established home owner who has paid off his debts to the Bailey Building and Loan, he is still talking with a fast Italian accent during the party, making a crack about storing money in his "a-sugah box-a!" that he is giving to George. Mary Bailey promptly asks him to return to his original purpose for being summoned to the party and to serve out wine to the rest of the party.

Wine, obese woman with a child, bread...they must be Italian!

I realize that these are decisive implications of early American stereotypes in film and are not surprising when a larger body of work from this time period is shown. In fact, compared with other works from the period, these are relatively harmless; Annie is clearly a respected, independent woman, and the Martini's are homeowners, successful and respected by their community. Yes, racism and ethnic stereotypes are a part of Hollywood culture. However, that was in 1945. This is 2011, and when we watch the movie, we either don't notice these instances of historical stereotyping or we gloss over them as relics from a nostalgic age. We then go right on celebrating the film's messages and cry when they sing Auld Lang Syne at the end. Again, I'm not saying that this is terrible, I just want to call attention to it.

Nor is this movie the exclusive owner of holiday political incorrectness. One of the main traditions of my family is that when we wake up on the 25th, we all come downstairs, turn the TV on to TBS, and watch their non-stop marathon of "A Christmas Story" all day long, particularly while we open presents. This is one of my favorite traditions, and a good example of a movie that never gets old. In fact, quoting along with the movie is celebrated, and one of those traditions that is carried out all year long. Let's be straight: the jokes in this movie are iconic. Anytime anyone I know is wearing anything that is both pink and garish, I call them "a Pink Nightmare." Whenever I see the word fragile. I rattle off that "it must be Italian!" And so on.

In terms of racial stereotypes, there's the famous scene at the end where they are served Chinese turkey. ( You know, "Fa ra ra ra ra") However, we all know that. It has to be explained why it's funny. People get it. Does that make it ok? No, it makes it a topic already discussed. (And thus, as far as I'm concerned, BORING.) My personal thoughts run a little deeper to some instances of 1940's culture that get a little more glossed over.

Take a look at the 0:05 second mark of this particular clip (and enjoy the rest of the moment too). The established context is that Flick has just been beated up by that notorious bully Scut Farkus, the humongous bully who torments Ralphie and Friends all throughout the movie. His teacher, Miss Shields, does something interesting here. Rather than rush over to him and offer assistance, as she did when Flick had his tongue frozen to a flag pole, she makes a distinctive glance at him and goes right back to teaching.

Given that this is a small school, she has to be aware that bullying is going on right outside of the door. However, she simply casts a blind eye to it, allowing this psychological torment to continue. Let me restate that: SHE KNOWS THAT HER STUDENTS ARE BEING BULLIED AND THAT SOMETHING IS GOING ON, BUT FAILS TO ACT ON THAT KNOWLEDGE. She doesn't contact her principal, she doesn't notify the parents, she doesn't confront Scut Farkus (in Miss Shield's defense, HE HAS YELLOW EYES.). Instead, she turns a blind eye to it.

In the 1940's, this is accepted behavior. When Penn State turns a blind eye to abuse, careers go down. (In a related subject, this shows exactly how out of touch Joe Paterno and, to a lesser extent Penn State officials, are with modern culture and the way things are done. But that's been talked to death EVERYWHERE ELSE.) But when we watch this movie, it's such a casual moment that we almost look the other way either. We know that Scut Farkus gets his comeuppance at the hands of Ralphie later in the movie. Therefore, we don't really have to notice that Miss Shields is letting her students be savagely beaten by schoolyard bullies.

(As a caveat to this, much of the movie is based around the idea of Jean Shepherd's memories of growing up in Northern Indiana. His personal editing of his memories include censoring his own swearing ("OOOHHHH FUDDDDGGGEEEEE") and eternally visualizing his kid brother as four years old (something made even more clear in the criminally underseen follow up "Ollie Hopnoodle's Haven of Bliss"). Therefore, this moment might in fact be Shepherd wishing to believe that Miss Shields was just turning a blind eye to obvious cases of bullying. In real life, there's a chance that she knew nothing. For the sake of this, however, let us assume that she is turning a blind eye to abuse, because that's what we're watching on TBS. 12 times a day.)

These moments in the movies that we regard as classics are small, and should in no way detract from their overall messages or family meanings. However, this doesn't mean that they should just be glossed over. Otherwise, we end up watching something with a blind loyalty, not exactly sure of what it is that we're looking at. Much of our traditional Christmas music follows that unfortunate decision. Let's look over some classic secular Christmas music and you'll see what I'm talking about. (I realize most carols are plainly devoted to baby Jesus, as they should be. Those have their own particular sense of timeless quality. I'm talking more about the kinds of things Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby would sing over a 1/5th of Scotch.)

Consider. When was the last time you:

• went dashing through the snow in a one horse open sleigh?
• put bells on a bob-tailed horse while singing a sleighing song?
• roasted Chesnuts on an open fire?
• sung Yuletide carols by an open fire?
• built a snowman in the meadow and pretended it was a parson so you could get married?
• decked the halls with actual boughs of holly?
• watched chesnuts pop by the fire while at the home of a nearby farmer?
• went over the river and through the woods to grandma's house? (Thanksgiving, yes, but really, when was the last time you did that?)

The list goes on and on.

Some of our best and most loved Christmas songs also come from the oddest of places. Consider "White Christmas" (the song, not the movie). Whenever we think of Christmas, we always want that our Christmases should "be white", as it is heard in this song. It's a radio staple, sung by many voices over the years. (And again, part of a great movie, but not the point here.

Now consider the composer, Irving Berlin. Mr. Berlin, one of the greatest of the Tin Pan Alley songwriters, might be writing about Christmas from a spot of childhood memory. However, given that he is actually the son of a poor Jewish family from the country of Belarus, grew up in a New York City tenemant slum, and continued to live there the rest of his life, I doubt that Mr. Berling was dreaming of any Christmas "just like the ones I used to know". (That's actually the best way that I can describe the song-writing factory that mass produced early 40's hits that was Tin Pan Alley: One of our most beloved Christmas songs was written by someone who never celebrated Christmas at all. He might have bene a fan of "8 Crazy Nights" though.)

So as we're wrapping up our Christmas season, let's look back on our holiday season with love and affection, be thankful if we have the chance to spend it with our loved ones, appreciate what we have in this world, and remember to think about the things that come out of our mouths and out of our TV screens, rather than just turning on the old familiars. I mean, if we just did that, we'd never really appreciate the message of acceptance and joy in differences that is being told through "Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer" or the idea to reject commercialism and take joy in the small moments of Christmas that is so central to "A Charlie Brown Christmas" and "How the Grinch Stole Christmas."

After all, Christmas is not the sum of all of these moments. It is neither the good, nor the bad scenes from "It's a Wonderful Life" and "A Christmas Story", or 100 year old songs that we sing without giving any thought to.

Maybe Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.

Merry Christmas everyone.

(Postscript #1: for my Jewish, atheist, agnostic, Muslim, Hindi, or secular friends, don't worry, I've thought of you too. That's why we have this. Happy holidays to you all!)

(Postscript #2: for my faithful readers, let it be known that I do appreciate you. Whoever is reading this from Russia, good on you as well! So far, I judge this blog to be a success, and have heard positive feedback from several different parties. It's also refreshing to know that if I need to, I can crank out 2,000 to 3,000 words in about one to two hours. This has also helped me to finally get a head start on some new projects, which I will be keeping everyone up on throughout. At the moment, the first is a fantasy novel that I've been meaning to get around to since I was in the eighth grade (I just found my notes and partial first draft cleaning out my room. A) Wow, I actually got 200 pages in. B) Wow, it was terrible.). The other project is a full length play based on Theodore Roosevelt's journey on the River of Doubt in Brazil, a project so pretentious I had to ask my friend Alex to partner with me in it's writing and development. Thus, I will keep progress notes in here from time to time regarding those projects, in addition to regularly scheduled blog entries every Tuesday. You're welcome, Earth.)

For the rest of us.