For most people, holidays are special days where one can gather with their family and friends to celebrate, uhhh, Jesus? Or maybe they celebrate the institution of the family? To be frank, I have no fucking idea what people celebrate. My cluelessness is no doubt due to my contempt of holidays and me just being an asshole, but I do think people need to reevaluate what exactly it is they are celebrating on these “special” days.
Regardless of how you feel about holidays, they have been a tradition across many cultures for centuries (but let it be known my rant will stay specific to American’s treatment of holidays). The key word in this sentence is "tradition" and being the angsty liberal that I am, this word is quite filthy, to say the least.
I could be completely wrong, but to me, traditions are beliefs or things people do because they are long-standing, and if they are long-standing it must mean they are important or hold some value. So as someone who hates traditions, I need another reason to care about the holidays, so let’s see what else holidays have to offer. For this, I will use Christmas as my example.
Christmas, if I’m not mistaken, is a Christian holiday, so as an agnostic, I don’t really care about Jesus and all that jazz. Besides religion, family seems to be a big deal for the holidays, which makes sense given most religions support the family and procreation. But, if I’m asking myself if I like being around my family, in all honesty, I would have to say not really.
This doesn’t mean I hate my family per se, but I don’t see why I should automatically enjoy the company of my family. When I think about it, me and most of my relatives have nothing in common, and if we did, we would never know because every conversation we have seems forced or superficial. I understand that I am partially to blame for this lack of honest conversation, but I really don’t believe I would be able to find common interests between me and my relatives.
Does this make me a pretentious douchebag for assuming all my relatives are as boring as napkins? Sure, but regardless, I never can have a good time at these holidays and would rather just stay home and enjoy my time off.
Also, before I finish, the whole idea of buying presents is quite absurd. No one should have to buy anything for anyone unless they want, for it’s not like living is getting any cheaper. All this does is promote commercialism and capitalism while completely undermining any deeper value holidays like Christmas are supposed to have.
So overall, there is nothing I actually enjoy about Christmas—or any other holiday for that matter. I admit, I’m quite pessimistic and an introvert, so these traits don’t make it any easier for me to enjoy Christmas. However, I think if families want to get together in the spirit of some religion, they are more than welcome to do it on any other day of the year, just leave me out.