Christmas Music. Sincerely Thread. Evil, or Not Evil ? When is too soon ? Are you the 3rd category of people everyone else thinks is annoying ?

Tropical Wilds · Nov 28, 2023

tobelieveinHim said:
I worked retail. I still love it more than most. It's modern, and mainstream that I can't stand. The only thing I will do is still shop in retail. I love the music they play, it's apart of the appeal and the draw for me there.
I prefer Christmas music to any other contemporary thing that is out there.

Where I work, I campaigned to have them not do Christmas music until the week of Christmas and in 2024, that’s the plan. And we are sticking to seasonal, not religious, pop, not the choirs and what not.

tobelieveinHim said:
I don't understand Taylor Swift, or most modern women these days. And I'm a woman. Sure, it might be cute, but I don't understand my generation at all.
Been rejected a many times for my traditionalism, as well.

I’m not sure what’s not to understand about her. She’s pretty straightforward, middle-of-the-road pop. I’m not a Taylor Swift person, but I can admit that she’s a very talented person.

My Taylor Swift is Lady Gaga. I’m a huge Gaga fan. She has some good Christmas songs. She did “Baby It’s Cold Outside” and I didn’t hate that, which is basically the highest compliment I have for most Christmas songs. The Cher one is the first one I’ve been able to say in I don’t know how long that I genuinely like.

Terri Dactyl · Nov 28, 2023

Chesterton said:
I hear you. My grandma actually got run over by a reindeer, and to this day...I can't, I just can't.

oh please. You are mocking a trauma I still feel. Is there an ignore button here? (I found it)
Make fun all you want now, Bippy. I stayed logged in all the time, so I wont be able to see it :clap:

Chesterton · Nov 28, 2023

Terri Dactyl said:
oh please. You are mocking a trauma I still feel. Is there an ignore button here? (I found it)
Make fun all you want now, Bippy. I stayed logged in all the time, so I wont be able to see it

No, you're wrong. I was not mocking your trauma, I was mocking a lame song. Some years ago, all my immediate family whom I dearly loved died in the space of 22 months. I'm very sorry to hear about your weatherman, but at some point you have to move on.

Michie · Nov 28, 2023

Chesterton said:
I hear you. My grandma actually got run over by a reindeer, and to this day...I can't, I just can't.

Tropical Wilds · Nov 28, 2023

Well this took a weird turn.

Terri Dactyl · Nov 28, 2023

Chesterton said:
No, you're wrong. I was not mocking your trauma, I was mocking a lame song. Some years ago, all my immediate family whom I dearly loved died in the space of 22 months. I'm very sorry to hear about your weatherman, but at some point you have to move on.

Note the above post reply by Michie, post #24 who posted a big grin and tell me you weren't making fun. I dont believe what you wrote, either. That kind of response that Michie gave is what you were soliciting. I have moved on, but sometimes things have happened in our past and a song could bring back those memories. Im almost 72. I don't need someone makes who makes fun of someone's feelings and tries to backpedal so they wont look like a donkey try to tell me how to live. Tells me alot about Michie as well.

Tropical Wilds · Nov 28, 2023

Terri Dactyl said:
Note the above post reply by Michie, post #24 who posted a big grin and tell me you weren't making fun. That kind of response is what you were soliciting. I have moved on, but sometimes things have happened in our past and a song could bring back those memories. Im almost 72. I don't need someone makes who makes fun of someone's feelings and tries to backpedal so they wont look like a donkey try to tell me how to live. Tells me alot about Michie as well.

Dude. He was quoting the Christmas classic “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer,” not insulting you. He was making a joke using a Christmas song to lighten the mood when it took a weird left turn.

Man, this is as awkward as the time I caught my mom trying to get Santa to do the deed with her. I saw them full on making out one year and let me tell you, that’s a vision no kid needs.

But I’ll throw out there that this is some weird trauma shopping going on here… You think his grandmother actually got run over by a reindeer, but want us all to know that the death of your weather man was just as or more traumatizing. It’s a weird flex, man.

keith99 · Nov 28, 2023

I wonder how many stations play this one.

ViaCrucis · Nov 29, 2023

tobelieveinHim said:
So, I'm not quite sure this belongs here, But I felt like it collaborated with the Halloween thread, the thread about Halloween. Christmas Music!
There are some people who think Christmas music is evil, and then there are some people who think Christmas music is evil. If you are the third category of people that everyone else thinks is annoying? Ok, But seriously now.

Alright, So is Christmas music comforting to you, Or do you not like it ? I think I have given a hint as to what I think about it, But what do you think about it. ? If you are the third category of people that everyone else thinks is annoying, Then that also applies.
When is too soon to start hearing and playing Christmas music ?

I forget how much I like it because I didn't grow up hearing it very often. It is incredibly relaxing to me.

I am a believer of Christmas during Christmas. I find it annoying to see Christmas stuff months before Christmas. This year I started seeing Christmas displays in stores before the month of August was over. I find that incredibly annoying.

I love Christmas music, but I like Christmas music during Christmas. Before December 1st is too early for Christmas music to be played.

Ideally I'd like to hear Christmas music during Christmas time itself, as the season of Christmas on the Christian calendar is from December 25th until January 5th--the "Twelve Days of Christmas" from the well-known song. I like to focus on the season of Advent during Advent, and Christmas during Christmas. But I recognize that there is a distinction between the Christian Feast and Season of Christmas, which celebrates the Nativity of Jesus Christ; and the cultural celebration of "Christmas" which is more about cheer and time with family. And those two bleed into each other for many people in diverse and often complex ways.

As for genuine critique, I am far more bothered by the way that many self-professing Christians often tend to encourage, promote, or otherwise participate in the de-sacralizing of Christmas by making it be about capitalistic and corporate greed; and by profaning it by making it part of an artificial "culture war".

-CryptoLutheran

Chesterton · Nov 29, 2023

Tropical Wilds said:
Man, this is as awkward as the time I caught my mom trying to get Santa to do the deed with her.

Okay, look, I am not passing any judgment on your mom, but please let's not make this thread any weirder than it already is. We all know there is a Mrs. Claus, so let's just leave the adultery out of Christmas.

Chesterton · Nov 29, 2023

ViaCrucis said:
I am a believer of Christmas during Christmas. I find it annoying to see Christmas stuff months before Christmas. This year I started seeing Christmas displays in stores before the month of August was over. I find that incredibly annoying.

I love Christmas music, but I like Christmas music during Christmas. Before December 1st is too early for Christmas music to be played.

I agree. I've passed by houses that had Christmas lights on November 6th. So the lights are going to lose their special-ness before it's even December. My favorite food is pizza, I love pizza, but I don't eat it 7 days a week because it will become normal and boring.

ViaCrucis · Nov 29, 2023

Chesterton said:
I agree. I've passed by houses that had Christmas lights on November 6th. So the lights are going to lose their special-ness before it's even December. My favorite food is pizza, I love pizza, but I don't eat it 7 days a week because it will become normal and boring.

I think that could be part of it; but I don't know that this is really what bugs me. After all, I don't think ubiquity by necessity diminishes special-ness. A wife telling their husband that she loves him, or vice versa, isn't lessened because it occurs frequently. Which is an argument by analogy I often make when I hear people protest against frequent celebration of the Lord's Supper in church; that if we celebrate too often it loses its "special-ness" (a position I emphatically reject).

What bugs me is that dragging "Christmas" earlier into the year is largely a matter of them dolla dolla bills, rather than regarding the time as sacred. On the one hand, as far as the secular is concerned, I'm not terribly bothered; I don't expect non-Christians to regard Christmas as sacred. It's sacred for Christians, because it's our sacred season. Secularly, it's just a festive time of the year. So it is more the ways that, as Christians, we fail to regard our own sacred time as sacred that troubles me.

Perhaps this could be a chicken and egg situation; but I am curious to what end correlation and causation could be looked at in how Christmas is commercialized in retail settings and how that becomes a kind of cultural indicator for it being "Christmas time". I say it could be chicken and egg, because do we respond to seeing signs of Christmastime in commercial settings as an indicator for us to prepare for Christmas--thus setting up decorations earlier ourselves; or is it the other way around? Or is it a self-reinforcing feedback loop? That each feeds into each other amplifying it?

I also acknowledge that I'm doing a terrible job being more clear and specific here. I'm struggling to pin-point precisely what bothers me, perhaps it's just something very subtle. But there is a part of me that feels that Christian corroboration and complacency in corporate consumerist Christmas, and a general disregard for its ecclesisological and liturgical significance in popular religion is an act of profanation. "Jesus is the reason for the season" comes across more as a sales-pitch, a bumpersticker, or just culture-war jargon rather than it is a lived experience or grounded confession. It's hard to say "Jesus is the reason for the season" when it is Christians taking Jesus out of Christmas and making Christmas something else than it is.

-CryptoLutheran

Chesterton · Nov 29, 2023

ViaCrucis said:
I think that could be part of it; but I don't know that this is really what bugs me. After all, I don't think ubiquity by necessity diminishes special-ness. A wife telling their husband that she loves him, or vice versa, isn't lessened because it occurs frequently. Which is an argument by analogy I often make when I hear people protest against frequent celebration of the Lord's Supper in church; that if we celebrate too often it loses its "special-ness" (a position I emphatically reject).

I thought of what you're saying before I posted, because I recall many years ago I was debating a Protestant in the General Theology forum who asked me something like "Your liturgy is the same every Sunday. Doesn't that get old?" I'm not going to derail this too much by giving my response to that, except to say that we traditional Christians (which includes you I suppose) recognize a liturgical year, in which there is a time for this, and a time for that. And you shouldn't just sloppily blend unrelated things together. BTW, I'll also mention that in my neighborhood there's a house which still has a 15 foot tall skeleton in their yard from Halloween.

I have nothing in particular against skeletons, but when things are done at the wrong time, they can lose their meaning.

There's a really good Jonathan Pageau video where he tries to explain Old Testament Mosaic laws which seem weird to us, like keeping certain linen materials separate. But it's just about that - keeping separation.

ViaCrucis said:
What bugs me is that dragging "Christmas" earlier into the year is largely a matter of them dolla dolla bills, rather than regarding the time as sacred. On the one hand, as far as the secular is concerned, I'm not terribly bothered; I don't expect non-Christians to regard Christmas as sacred. It's sacred for Christians, because it's our sacred season. Secularly, it's just a festive time of the year. So it is more the ways that, as Christians, we fail to regard our own sacred time as sacred that troubles me.

Perhaps this could be a chicken and egg situation; but I am curious to what end correlation and causation could be looked at in how Christmas is commercialized in retail settings and how that becomes a kind of cultural indicator for it being "Christmas time". I say it could be chicken and egg, because do we respond to seeing signs of Christmastime in commercial settings as an indicator for us to prepare for Christmas--thus setting up decorations earlier ourselves; or is it the other way around? Or is it a self-reinforcing feedback loop? That each feeds into each other amplifying it?

One thing America was really good at, was turning everything into a business. Valentine's Day- St. Valentine had nothing to do with romantic love. Easter has nothing to do with chocolate bunnies. Mother's Day, Father's Day - practically invented by the retail industry.

ViaCrucis said:
I also acknowledge that I'm doing a terrible job being more clear and specific here. I'm struggling to pin-point precisely what bothers me, perhaps it's just something very subtle. But there is a part of me that feels that Christian corroboration and complacency in corporate consumerist Christmas, and a general disregard for its ecclesisological and liturgical significance in popular religion is an act of profanation. "Jesus is the reason for the season" comes across more as a sales-pitch, a bumpersticker, or just culture-war jargon rather than it is a lived experience or grounded confession. It's hard to say "Jesus is the reason for the season" when it is Christians taking Jesus out of Christmas and making Christmas something else than it is.

-CryptoLutheran

Well I'm an Orthodox American, and as such, a very tiny percentage of the culture. I don't get much bothered by what other Christians do, or what secularists do in regard to holidays. I just do what I do and ignore it, although I do still enjoy the Christmas carols I grew up with.

Tuur · Nov 29, 2023

The older I get, the shorter the time between Christmases seems. As a result, the same secular songs get tiresome. Not just same arrangement by the same performer, but the same songs, period. Even dogs barking Jingle Bells gets old. It's not even December and I might have to break out the Twisted Sister Christmas album.

I prefer Christmas music after Thanksgiving, in growing increments until that's the only music on the radio on December 25. Alas, locally it's all or nothing beginning the week of Thanksgiving and continuing to Christmas.

Tropical Wilds · Nov 29, 2023

Chesterton said:
Okay, look, I am not passing any judgment on your mom, but please let's not make this thread any weirder than it already is. We all know there is a Mrs. Claus, so let's just leave the adultery out of Christmas.

What if I told you…

Tropical Wilds · Nov 29, 2023

Chesterton said:
I agree. I've passed by houses that had Christmas lights on November 6th. So the lights are going to lose their special-ness before it's even December. My favorite food is pizza, I love pizza, but I don't eat it 7 days a week because it will become normal and boring.

To be fair, I put up my lights the first week of November, but I did it to spite my neighbor. I won’t tire of my spite lights. They’ll look just as beautiful Nov 1 as they will March 1 when I take them down again.

Brihaha · Nov 30, 2023

I believe Willie Nelson's Christmas CD may have saved my life. I was really depressed a few years back and I kept playing it over and over for comfort. I soon winnowed it down to just track 11, Christians Blues. Simply a pleasant, acoustic guitar track without lyrics. I listened to it on repeat for hours to find comfort and hope.

I love music. For pleasure as well as therapy. At Christmas I prefer the classic singers and tunes. I have an awesome Rat Pack CD with Sammy Davis Jr, Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra. Mannheim Steamroller and Trans Siberian Orchestra are enjoyable CDs in my collection. Amy Grant and Brad Paisley add depth to my Christmas music enjoyment too. I have hummed Christmas tunes whenever I'm inspired, spring, summer or fall. I love the feeling and am reminded that it doesn't need to be Christmas time to get into the spirit of giving. Music often brings loved ones to mind whom I don't see very much.

Chesterton · Nov 30, 2023

Brihaha said:
I have hummed Christmas tunes whenever I'm inspired, spring, summer or fall.

There's an ice cream truck that I sometimes hear in a nearby neighborhood in the summer. Maybe the guy is a little lazy, or cheap, or just doesn't care, but his truck blasts out some Christmas tunes. No big deal, but it's a little odd to hear about Rudolph and "dashing through the snow" when it's 105 degrees F on the Fourth of July.

Brihaha · Nov 30, 2023

Chesterton said:
There's an ice cream truck that I sometimes hear in a nearby neighborhood in the summer. Maybe the guy is a little lazy, or cheap, or just doesn't care, but his truck blasts out some Christmas tunes. No big deal, but it's a little odd to hear about Rudolph and "dashing through the snow" when it's 105 degrees F on the Fourth of July.

Anything to bring the kids running with ice cream money. I heard an ice cream truck a couple months ago and nearly took off running myself haha. I can wait till December before listening to the children's tunes like Rudolph tho.

tobelieveinHim · Nov 30, 2023

Alright, So a lot of it can be annoying, but I do like some of the artists Brihaha mentioned. I hear a lot of country music around here, so it kind of fits.
Good Convo, it's the contemporary pop stuff I can't stand anymore. I used to listen to what some might call, a derogatory term, and I once had a note on my car from church for having a spikey license plate frame on my black car with the spoiler on the back.
I have gone through a lot of mental illness, and mental health,

And thought, that the 'Christian' thing to do is to turn to pop. That death metal, and black was the evil thing. Loll. That's kind of what I meant when I said, is it evil.
You can play the metal station and be totally innocent,

And then you can turn on the contemporary pop station, or Christmas music, and it's like, I did not really know what was evil until this ! Loll.
That's all I meant. I do hear a lot of country around here, a lot. Nothing wrong with Brad Paisley. Too much of anything in repeat,
But, Brad Paisley is more my speed, I think, now.
Good chat, Glad it didn't get too out of hand.

Christmas Music. Sincerely Thread. Evil, or Not Evil ? When is too soon ? Are you the 3rd category of people everyone else thinks is annoying ?

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