Hi all, writing after long long time. Christmas just passed by yesterday and now I am saying you all Happy Holidays . . . well did i wished correctly? Yes, Happy Holidays, its what my manager Jeff wished me on last Thursday before we go for 4 days long holiday. Holidays??? because its christmas on Sunday. If you are thinking he should have said Merry Christmas instead, well its a debate.

I came to US three weeks back and for the first time I heard people saying Happy Holidays on christmas, well I could not get the idea why so, so i tried out to find out, checked up few journals here and talked to people. Few years back nobody cared if your are wishing them 'Merry Christmas' or 'Happy Holidays', because both meant the same, to enjoy and celeberate the month of december which brings in festivals which celeberated by the largest chunk of population in world. Be it Thanksgiving Day or Christmas or New Years Day.

Back then, “Merry Christmas” was the odds-on favorite just because more people celebrated Christmas than any other holiday. This is still true, but the difference is, back then, it didn’t matter if you said “Merry Christmas” to someone who didn’t celebrate Christmas, because you didn’t really mean they should be merry about Jesus. You just meant they should have a festive month of December. For all intents and purposes, “Merry Christmas” was the “shalom” of holiday greetings. People used it the same way they used “hello” and “goodbye.”

“Happy Holidays” was exactly the same, except slightly different. It didn’t mean you should enjoy every holiday in December whether you liked it or not; it just meant you should enjoy whichever ones you celebrated. For some people, this meant Christmas. For others, it meant Chanukah. And for others, it meant Hanukah. It would’ve meant Kwanzaa, too, if Kwanzaa existed back then. But the point is, no one ever accused you of bowing at the altar of diversity if you said “Happy Holidays.” No one ever said that the phrase was “just another example of political correctness run amok.”

Now everything’s all screwed up.

There is a War on Christmas going on in this USA. And because of this war, “Merry Christmas” and “Happy Holidays” are politically loaded phrases. In fact, they’ve come to be known as natural rivals. Whichever greeting you choose, it says something about where you stand ideologically now. If you say “Merry Christmas,” you lean to the Right. And if you say “Happy Holidays,” you lean to the Left.

Christmas is not just any old holiday. Christmas celebrates the birth of Christ, and the teachings of good will and kindness towards one another that Christ brought to this world. We celebrate his birth not only to honor Him, but to remind ourselves of how we strive to live our lives of faith. So the conservatives feels 'Happy Holidays' acts as enemy to christianity. You’re not supposed to say “Happy Holidays” anymore, because “Happy Holidays” is no longer an innocent seasonal greeting. It’s an insidious weapon, designed to “take Christ out of Christmas.”

The other group feels you should be wished as 'Happy Holidays' because by that you relate to a greats set of people, all those people who do not celeberate Christmas instead they celebrate Ramadan or something else. Whatever be the case. As i said earlier it is just the month we are celeberating which is full of festivals and holidays.

There is a war going on. I am not taking any side, I you guys can debate on that you can. And dont ask if holiday people are calling 'christmas tree' a 'holiday tree' and singinh holiday songs instead of Christmas carols because ideally jesus was not born under a a pine tree nor he is son of Santa Claus but at the other end Christmas is about to merry about Christ-Mass (which is known as Christmas now).

Signing off, Wish you a 'Merry Christmas' and 'Happy Holidays'. Dont take that in order, I  beg you.

Peeyush

PS. I took reference from Nathan Tabor's article and Johnathan David Morris's article