Texas Passes Law Allowing Christmas At Schools

To me, Christmas is about joy and hope, about goodness and good things happening. The sparkle in any child's eye during the season is the poster image for what it can be.

Anyone who tries to legislate or categorize what Christmas is or isn't, what it should or shouldn't be, well, I think they've completely missed the point.

 

"Punishment" might be a relative term, I don't think anyone is getting suspended for saying it, but they're being told not to say it.

I think society in general is really guilty of overthinking things. I get not having kids singing "O' Holy Night" or some of the more obvious religious songs, but I miss the days of 6-year-olds singing "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth" or "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" or "Rudolph"

The school that my nieces go to sang Sandler's Hannukah song last year and it got the biggest ovation of the night.

Don't overthink it and have fun.

 

That's worse than the "Guinness, him strong" poster we had up in my fraternity house. Even in the early 1990s we would laugh our asses off at how un-PC it was.

 

I'd love to know what Hanukkah songs were allowed and what Christmas songs were allowed and prohibited.

This issue isn't very complicated to me -- a public school should not endorse a religion. Period. No nativity scenes, no menorahs, no singing of Silent night.

 

Ah, you'd probably like it here. Righty crazy, lefty crazy, it's still crazy.

As regards the "fear of punishment" bit. There were some tales -- apocryphal, likely as not -- regarding kids getting in hot water over handing out candy canes. Some PTAs warned against the wearing of red or green at school holiday parties. Same old "WAR AGAINST CHRISTMAS!!!!!" s**t. Drives me crazy.

This drives me crazy, too. There's nothing in this law that allows for those sorts of things. It simply says that individuals -- INDIVIDUALS!!!! -- can't be prevented from benign expressions of goodwill that relate to their faith's holiday.

 

My kids' school last year sang "Dreidel, Dreidel" some some about Kwaanza, some songs about holidays around the world, Let it Snow and some other song that none of us had ever heard before about snowmen. After the concert, the music teacher told some parent, "I just do what I'm told..."

 

If I never hear the Dreidel song again, it will be too soon, but it is hard to argue that it isn't at least a quasi- religious song.

 

I remember singing "Dreidel, Dreidel" and other Hanukkah songs when I was in Catholic grade school in the 80s. They may even have been performed in the school's Christmas program. I still have no idea what that was all about.

 

The most painful part of a Christmas program in Chicago is that hard "a" sound that makes every song sound like a convention of Da Superfans.

 

I despise school Christmas programs.

The only thing worse is "graduation" ceremonies for kids who aren't graduating high school.

 

Apparently you haven't been at graduation ceremonies for pre-school, 4K, Kindergarten etc...

My wife and I both have graduate degrees and our 6 and 7 year olds have been in a cap and gown more than we have.

 

Graduation ceremonies are definitely getting to be overkill these days.

As far as Christmas programs, I have no problem with mixing things up a little bit, such as doing a "Christmas around the world" theme. While I don't want to ban "Jingle Bells" from the schools, just trotting the kids out to sing that song, year after year, gets repetitive, even if you let them do "Batman smells" after they're done just to crack everyone up.