A Very PC Christmas

[jonnybaxy]

So we're getting to that time again where families and friends spend time together and share gifts, my memories of Christmas are going to different places and seeing Father Christmas (Santa) and sitting on his knee and he'd ask me what I want,  if I'd been good and the rest of the cheerful spirited questions.

Then I found out last night that here in England (not sure about US) children are no longer allowed to sit on his knee... They put a seat next to him to talk instead!

It May seem like a petty thing to start a thread about but it really annoyed me, my fondest memories are sitting on Santas knee, THAT'S CHRISTMAS!!

Honestly it won't be long till we end up like that south park episode where they do the Christmas play without anythingthat offends anyone and it ends up being a strange modern interpretative dance that has nothing to do with Christmas.

 

[hefdaddy42]

AFAIK, here in the U.S. kids still sit on Santa's lap.

[Nick]

I'm sure in 10 years it will seem completely normal and no one will care. And you'll have a few people going, "in my day, we sat ON Santa's lap!" We still do it here in my area, but really can't imagine it being a big deal.

[ariich]

Then I found out last night that here in England (not sure about US) children are no longer allowed to sit on his knee... They put a seat next to him to talk instead!

Is this actally a law? Do you have any evidence for this?

I'm guessing one or two places have done this and terrible news sources like the Sun and the Daily Mail are blowing it out of proportion. The same thing happened a few years ago where apparently it was illegal to celebrate "Christmas" and everyone had to celebrate "Winterval" or something like that. All absolute nonsense.

[Nick]

Then I found out last night that here in England (not sure about US) children are no longer allowed to sit on his knee... They put a seat next to him to talk instead!

Is this actally a law? Do you have any evidence for this?

I'm guessing one or two places have done this and terrible news sources like the Sun and the Daily Mail are blowing it out of proportion. The same thing happened a few years ago where apparently it was illegal to celebrate "Christmas" and everyone had to celebrate "Winterval" or something like that. All absolute nonsense.

Here in 'Merica it seems every year quite a few people feel it's illegal to celebrate Christmas, or act as if they are persecuted for doing so.

[orcus116]

People that do that only perpetuate to themselves the "War on Christmas" nonsense. They're so obsessed with the notion of society attacking their beliefs which, at least to me, appears to fill some kind of need to be rebellious. I get this feeling that despite all of the outrage these people deep down secretly love to have something to be bitter about. This materialized, what, a few years ago and has snowballed into something noticeable despite it being completely asinine.

[El Barto]

This isn't a war on Christmas issue. This is an "everybody wants to fuck my child" matter. It's a continuation of stranger-danger paranoia. 

[Lucien]

This isn't a war on Christmas issue. This is an "everybody wants to fuck my child" matter. It's a continuation of stranger-danger paranoia.

Yes, and it's rather nonsensical in this case when you consider how many people are watching, taking pictures, etc.. Even if Santa is a pedophile, he won't get away with anything considering how many people are watching 

[Aythesryche]

I don't know... I don't see an issue with any of the examples with kids sitting on the knee or off to the side. The whole point is they get to be in Santas presence:

[sneakyblueberry]

^ do not want.

I blame the Billy Bob in 'Bad Santa'. 

I can get why people don't want their kids sitting on a strangers lap, totally.  I think Santa's a jerk anyway and is also a typo away from being Satan, but that's just me. 

[The King in Crimson]

All of those Santas are horrifying. I wouldn't want to sit on Santa's lap if I was exposed to one of the above at an early age. Might as well bring in Pennywise for my birthday and see how I react to clowns afterwards.

I'll also agree that the 'Stranger-Danger' aspect is the more likely culprit here. Honestly, it doesn't really bother me. There's more to Christmas than sitting on a drunk hobo's knee.

[jonnybaxy]

"Child protection activist Hetty Johnson has called for shopping malls update their protection policies so that children stand next to 'Santa' and not on his lap"

I'm not sure whether it's law or not.

But the problem is, yeah understand the fight agaist child sex abuse but look in the places that actually matter first!

[rumborak]

Wow. Those guys put the Satan back into Santa.

[ariich]

"Child protection activist Hetty Johnson has called for shopping malls update their protection policies so that children stand next to 'Santa' and not on his lap"

I'm not sure whether it's law or not.

It's not.

It's one activist calling for this to happen, as reported in the Daily Mail.

You're hugely overreacting. Which is basically what the Daily Mail wants its readers to do.

[jonnybaxy]

It's still rather ridiculous, it's a starting point, if anything like this ever happens then it's only an uphill battle.

[ariich]

I've heard activists call for far more ridiculous things. It's just one person expressing a view publicly, I don't see why anyone would care or take that seriously. If it were to become more, like a genuine government consultation, that would be different, but this is pretty much nothing at all.