Bah, Humbug!

Posted by $ MikeMarotta 7 years, 3 months ago to Humor
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You really need to stand up if you want to celebrate the Virtue of Selfishness at Christmas time.

Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol (1843) is widely misunderstood in at least one fundamental detail. Ebenezer Scrooge does not celebrate Christmas not because he is a mean old man, but because he is religiously conservative. Christmas is a pagan holiday; it is not for Puritans. Dickens was arguing not just for kindness and compassion but for Currier and Ives. The Christmas card was invented in 1843 by Sir Henry Cole. J. C. Horsley was the commissioned artist. (Wikipedia here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christm...

And all of that can be OK, too. Objectivists love any celebration that includes opulence as a recognition of the ability to create wealth. That does mean, though, that someone has to work on Christmas day ... Do you stop to thank the clerk in the drive-through window? Christmas, New Year's, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving... Some people enjoy paid holidays while other people earn wages making that possible. Ebenezer Scrooge kept the shop open while the slacker Bob Cratchit left early to be with his family.

(When Disney artist Carl Barks created Donald Duck's uncle Scrooge McDuck, he started with a mean old critter, but quickly found the capitalist virtues in the adventurer from Glasgow.)

At least one writer defended "It's a Wonderful Life" on grounds of romantic realism. (See "Christmas Movie List" on ObjectivistLiving here: http://www.objectivistliving.com/foru... ) Mostly, it sappy, altruistic, and anti-capitalist with Lionel Barrymore as the cackling banker, Mr. Potter, who openly steals money that was carried by the half-wit Billy Bailey. Note, also, that the banker could have had any name, but "Potter's Field" is where the poor are buried.

It is pretty easy to accept Santa Claus getting all those gifts delivered, but, it is also true that along with Saint Dismas, Saint Nicholas is a patron for (repentant) thieves. He does come creeping into your house... And in English slang, when you steal something you "nick" it. So, maybe Mr. Potter was celebrating the true spirit of Christmas after all...

I work in a military office. We have a "spirit board" of passing humor. I put up Washington Crossing the Delaware: "Celebrate the true meaning of Christmas. -- Bombard a Hessian barracks on December 25." Again, just to underscore the theme here, it was not a holiday for the Puritans. The Hessians were caught slacking off like Bob Cratchit.


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  • Posted by $ CBJ 7 years, 3 months ago
    As portrayed in the book, Scrooge was a wimp who readily abandoned his previous beliefs and behavior out of fear of ghosts and the afterlife. He never challenged his former partner's judgment of his behavior or Marley's newfound conversion to altruism. As in this sample:

    "But you were always a good man of business, Jacob," faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself.
    "Business!" cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. "Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were, all, my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!"
    It held up its chain at arm's length, as if that were the cause of all its unavailing grief, and flung it heavily upon the ground again.
    "At this time of the rolling year," the spectre said "I suffer most. Why did I walk through crowds of fellow-beings with my eyes turned down, and never raise them to that blessed Star which led the Wise Men to a poor abode! Were there no poor homes to which its light would have conducted me!"
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  • Posted by mminnick 7 years, 3 months ago
    Mike, If Scrooge was/is a religious conservative of the Christian persuation, it is true he would not celebrate Christmas but he would assist the poor something he refused to do early on in the text.
    He would apply the "Golden Rule" to his actions on a daily basis. Again, not something he did.
    As usual, a thought provoking post. +1
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