Pioneer Day

I just discovered that Pioneer Day is a paid holiday at my work. To say that I am happy would be an understatement.

Valentine's Day Tradition

Sometimes it's fascinating how traditions emerge. This weekend Laura and I engaged in our annual Valentine's Day celebration. That includes going to Doc's Pizza Buffet in Provo, followed by attending a movie at the dollar theater.

Initially, this tradition started as a kind of parody of the holiday. A few years ago, while we were still dating, we felt like we should go do something to celebrate. However, neither of us were actually very big fans of the holiday (for the usual reasons: commercial, arbitrary, etc.). So, we decided to do the most unromantic thing we knew. We went to Doc's, which is an extremely cheap family buffet which has mediocre pizza at best, and then went and saw The Departed (an excellent, but fairly violent and wholly unromantic gangster flick).

The next year we did the same thing (I can't remember what movie we saw), thinking that it was a good way to do something together while simultaneously making fun of a pointless "holiday." In fact, we've done the same thing every year since then. It has become our tradition.

This year, as Valentine's Day approached, I was really looking forward to cheap pizza and a cheap movie. I was not, however, thinking about how our activities would satirize consumerism or artificial holidays. Basically, the original point of our "celebration" had been lost and I was just looking forward to doing something fun.

I still look down on Valentine's Day, but apparently Laura and I now have a real tradition that is a lot less ironic than I ever imagined it would be. If I'm being honest, it's probably one of my favorite holiday traditions of the year. I'm not sure what that means, other than serving as evidence that if I do something long enough, it will take on sentimental significance even if the original purpose was to satirize it.

Kill Christmas!

Ever since the holiday season began I’ve been looking forward to writing a blog about why Christmas is inferior to other holidays. However, I think I basically made my case in my Thanksgiving post (and to a lesser extent my Halloween post), so here I’m going to explain why the best way to celebrate Christmas would be to kill its so-called “spirit.”

The spirit of Christmas, as I understand it, is tied to the life of Jesus Christ. It involves being charitable, loving, and (most importantly) dwelling on the things that He provided for us. As a Christian/Mormon, I obviously think all that stuff is great. However, it’s no surprise that the way we celebrate Christmas so often has little to do with actual Christianity; we buy stuff, stress out about family gatherings, put up lights, decorate sugar cookies, etc. Of course, most of our modern Christmas traditions are actually pagan activities (Christmas trees, for example, which have nothing to do with Jesus despite Christians' attempts at appropriation).

However setting that issue aside, few Christmas activities actually promote reflection on Christian doctrine. In fact the holiday is really wrapped up in the consumerist, pop cultural side of the event. When I think of Christmas I don’t think of the gore-fest that was Jesus’ life, I think of Norman Rockwell paintings and wrapping paper. I think of How the Grinch Stole Christmas or Frosty The Snowman. I think of the pride I got as a teenager from vanquishing our neighbors in an unofficial Christmas light war. In other words, the things that I associate with Christmas are fun, happy, and (most importantly) secular.

For what it’s worth, I prefer it that way. As grateful as I am for them, I don’t really want to think of Jesus’ horrific experiences at Christmastime. I prefer to simply enjoy the pleasantness of spending time with friends and family and save the religious meditation for later. When I’m watching Christmas commercials or looking at lights, I feel a little of the holiday excitement that is supposed to accompany the season. When I think about someone being tortured to death on a cross, I just get kind of sad.

Given the origins of the word “Christmas,” it seems likely that at one point the holiday was actually a somber religious affair. However, for better or worse, that really isn’t what it’s all about anymore. We can shake our fists at the superficiality of the holiday, or we can accept it and enjoy all the secular movies, foods, activities, etc. If we wanted, we could even set aside a different day for contemplating the life of Jesus. We could spend our time thinking about Jesus’ entire life, from how awful it would be to give birth in a filthy stable to the awesome idea of resurrection, and then continue to have a sweet secular celebration on December 25th.

Whether we set aside a different day or not, it’s unlikely that Christmas will become less secular. Instead and as a result of our spending habits, it’ll probably continue to move away from the “Christmas spirit.” Fighting that fact will just constitute slapping a religious veneer on a technically pagan and effectively secular celebration. On the other hand, sweeping away that veneer would allow us to guiltlessly enjoy the simple pleasures of the season (like, say, the deliciousness of eggnog or the smell of evergreen), without extra preoccupation about sins and hell. Ultimately, it’d allow us to embrace the kitschy aesthetic of the season and open the door to a more meaningful religious holiday.

Thanksgiving: The Best Holiday of the Year

Thanksgiving is unequivocally the best holiday of the year. Though it consistently ranks below Christmas on many people’s personal holiday rankings, it deserves more credit.

 

Of course, the most obvious reason to praise Thanksgiving is the way it is celebrated. Thanksgiving is practically synonymous with food and feasts. Admittedly, if you aren’t a fan of turkey, pies, mashed potatoes, etc. (and I know many people aren’t) Thanksgiving will probably hold significantly less appeal. On the other hand, Thanksgiving food is fairly varied and most people don’t hate all the traditional dishes. More importantly, perhaps, a Thanksgiving feast provides an opportunity for creativity. This year, for example, my family and I had the typical pies but Laura and I also made banana cake. Last year someone brought sautéed mushrooms. Though these kinds of food definitely weren’t on the Pilgrims menu, they are delicious and any holiday that provides an excuse to eat good food has a lot going for it. Ultimately then, even if you don’t love Thanksgiving food, you can still use the day as an excuse to make and eat a lot of other delicious things.

 

While food is certainly a big part of Thanksgiving, I would argue that is isn’t the most important part. Instead, the most significant part of Thanksgiving is being able to spend time with family or friends. Again, I know that not everyone enjoys this part of the holiday. I also know that there are many people who can’t get together with their families. However, the fact that the Wednesday before Thanksgiving is the biggest travel day of the year suggests that celebrating with loved ones is a typical or at least common thing to do. What’s more, whether you get along with your family or not, Thanksgiving is among the least stressful ways to get together. You don’t to worry about things like presents, and the attention is never on one person as it might be during a wedding, birthday celebration, graduation, etc. 

 

There are a number of other reasons to appreciate Thanksgiving. It takes place in the fall, for example, so it’s not as cold as Christmas but it’s not as hot as the Fourth of July. It also means a day off from work for most people and two days for many (and three for students and teachers). The list could go on and on, but the point is that Thanksgiving genuinely has more to offer than most holidays.

 

Of course, Thanksgiving is also good because of the ways that it isn’t celebrated. As I mentioned above, there are no presents as there is with Christmas. Obviously if you love getting (or giving) things that might seem like a negative thing, but realistically presents raise stress. You have to find just the right thing for everyone, worry about whether they’ll like it, and then act surprised/impressed/excited about what they gave you no matter how you actually feel. Sometimes none of those things are a big deal, but other times they cause serious tensions. At very least Christmas requires everyone to put on a show and by comparison Thanksgiving comes off as a much more sincere holiday.

 

Thanksgiving also isn’t commercialized the way that Christmas or Halloween are. To be honest, the commercial aspect of Christmas is really the only part of the holiday that makes me feel the seasonal “spirit”; I can’t, for example, get into Christmas unless I’ve seen tons of Christmas commercials. However, Thanksgiving’s charm is that you don’t have to “get into” the holiday in the first place. There is relatively little buildup and, consequently, no let down when the day actually comes. As an adult I can’t stress this point enough. Though I loved Christmas as a child it is inevitably disappointing as an adult when I know that there is no magical, Santa-related ending and that the best thing that will happen is that I’ll get to sleep in. Those things are great, but hardly worthy of weeks and weeks of anticipation. Thanksgiving, by contrast, includes the best parts about Christmas without the huge anticipation and subsequent let down.

 

I could go on and on about how much better Thanksgiving is than all other holidays (in the U.S.). Instead, however, suffice it to say that in these first days of December I’m reminded of how much more thankful I am for Thanksgiving than all other holidays.

Guy Fawkes’ Day

Why do people keep celebrating Guy Fawkes Day?

 

Like most Americans I had forgotten that the fifth of November is a day to celebrate a 17^th century Roman Catholic British rebel who tried to blow up parliament. Surprisingly, however, a fair number of my friends on Facebook reminded me of that fact, posting all sorts of different Fawkes-related status updates. Though many of my friends are in college and need only the slightest excuse to throw a mid-autumn bonfire, the periennial resurgence of Fawkes’ name made me wonder why people keep returning to him.

 

In the United States Guy Fawkes went mainstream as a result of the film V for Vendetta, which tells the story of a Fawkes impersonator living in the near future who tries to destroy a dystopian British government. Though a few British history buffs probably knew about him before the movie, the majority of this year’s November fifth celebrations date back only to 2006 when the movie came out. A select few may date back to the 1980s when Alan Moore’s graphic novel on which the movie was based came out, but that’s hardly any closer to the 17^th century. (If you’re one of the handful of Americans that knew about Fawkes before V for Vendetta pat yourself on the back for your erudition, but realize that that’s not evidence of Fawkes’ pre-1980s popularity.)

 

V for Vendetta is a great film (I haven’t read the graphic novel yet, but I hear it’s also good), but just because it’s well made doesn’t necessarily mean that watching it gives people any legitimate connection to Guy Fawkes. For all the typical viewer knows, Guy Fawkes could simply have been another fictional plot device. In other words, though Guy Fawkes happens to be real, he might as well have not been because almost no one (in the U.S.) knows anything about him beyond the movie.

 

Of course, the fact that most Americans who celebrate Guy Fawkes Day are doing so because of a movie isn’t a bad thing, but it is fairly rare. How many people do you know that watch a piece of media and suddenly initiate a holiday around that media? The closest phenomenon I can think of is Fesitvus, the made-up holiday popularized by Seinfeld. However, even Festivus celebrations are pretty rare these days and only happen among diehard fans, and then probably only because Seinfeld continues to air in syndication for several hours everyday. Accordingly, it’s surprising that three years after V for Vendetta—which was a hit but not an overwhelming one—it’s all-but-fictional holiday continues to receive recognition.

 

The robustness of Guy Fawkes celebrations suggests that there is something about the commemoration itself that fulfills people’s needs. If most American’s (at least initial) understanding of the day is based on V for Vendetta, then the day has rousing revolutionary origins. It’s about people overthrowing their oppressors and those celebrations that I’ve been to have played this aspect up to varying degrees. However, significantly, no one has ever actually begun a revolution after one of these celebrations. As far as I know, the movie also didn’t prompt much revolutionary action, despite the fact that it was considered a biting political allegory. (After watching the movie I felt ready to go fight a revolution myself, but within a few minutes that feeling had subsided. I had apparently got that feeling out of my system.)

 

My conclusion is that the revolutionary aspect of Guy Fawkes appeals to people because they are in some way dissatisfied with their (political) social structure, and that Guy Fawkes celebrations provide and outlet to vent such frustrations. Admittedly, a lot of people simply want to have a bonfire and burn an effigy, but it would be negligent to deny the connection between the celebration’s enactment and its historical connotation. (Whether historical in the sense of the original Guy Fawkes or V for Vendetta.) More insidiously, however, these celebrations also empower those very elements with which people are dissatisfied; much like watching the movie riled viewers up but also exorcised their need for revolution, so do Guy Fawkes celebrations.

 

It should be obvious where I’m going with this: subversion and containment. There is perhaps no other phenomenon that is a better illustration of subversive behavior being contained than Guy Fawkes Night activities. If Halloween illustrates this theory playing out with regard to people’s moral values, Guy Fawkes events are more socio-political, which is actually closer to Stephen Greenblatt’s original description of subversion and containment (in Elizabethan England).

 

Ultimately, these celebrations in the United States will probably disappear as people forget about V for Vendetta. However, their presence (along with that of the graphic novel and movie versions) reveals that there is indeed a revolutionary thread running through society. However, as long as people “remember, remember the fifth of November” that thread will likely continue to be contained. 

Halloween: The Worst Holiday of the Year

Halloween was last week and while that probably made candy hungry children happy, the fact is that Halloween is actually the lamest holiday of the year.

 

The biggest reason that Halloween ranks near the bottom of my holiday list (in a distant last place after April fool’s day) is because of the dressing up. Now, many of my Facebook friends have recently posted status updates criticizing people’s tendency to use Halloween to look like sluts. Specifically, these friends have pointed out how many women use the holiday to look like sexy nurses, sexy witches, sexy maids, or other variations of sexiness. To this I would also add guys who choose virtually nothing on Halloween (albeit not always in a “sexy” way).

I concede that sexy/scanty costumes can unfortunately objectify the wearer, but I would also say that I’m not terribly bothered by them. If you want to look like a slut and objectify yourself, that’s your choice. What I do think is silly is the need for a holiday to do so. Why not just dress like that all the time? Or why not do so in conjunction with other holidays wear dressing up isn’t an end in itself. (What better to celebrate the fourth of July than with sexy nurses and guys in loincloths?)

 

Slightly more seriously, the persistence of dressing up seems to suggest that many people have latent or repressed desires that they express on Halloween. The prominence of sexual costumes indicates that many of those repressed desires are sexual, though other Halloween staples like zombies or robots equally represent social insecurities simmering beneath the surface of people’s psyche. It’s possible to look at Halloween in this context through the lens of Stephen Greenblatt’s theory of subversion and containment; people subvert social norms through their Halloween behavior, but such momentary subversion allows them to continue participating in those norms the rest of the time (a rough, inadequate summary of the theory, I admit). Still, it seems like it might be better to try to reconcile desire with belief. For example, instead of condemning sex or allowing technology to pervade our lives (while simultaneously expression trepidation about those issues through costume), we could figure out a lifestyle that would balance our values with our desires.

 

There are other reasons that Halloween doesn’t make sense as well. Take for instance, its complete detachment from its harvest origins. Since few people participate in harvests, or have any connection to agriculture, it makes little sense to celebrate a harvest holiday. In light of the kinds of costumes that people tend to wear, we could at least move it to a warmer month. (August is hot and doesn’t have an abundance of holidays.) In reality, however, the point is that the meaninglessness of Halloween actually detracts from the pleasure it brings. In Guy Debord’s book The Society of the Spectacle he includes a chapter called “Spectacular Time” in which he introduces a concept called pseudo-cyclical time. Basically he makes the point that society has moved to an industrialize, arbitrary, and falsely seasonal concept of time. Though he doesn’t get into Halloween, the celebration of such a holiday clearly contributes to the thesis that society may merely be a parody, and consequently less fulfilling, than it once was.

 

The reasons that Halloween is both outdated and inadequate could go on and on.  Hopefully, however, the notion of “holidays” like Halloween—where we get to take a break from our labor, standard behavior, and the values predicated on these things—will eventually become unnecessary.