Jews Strive To Restore Christmas Trees At Seattle Airport

On 17-Dec-2006, (Arturo Magidin) wrote:

In article sOohh.2252$Jb6.35@trnddc03, wrote:

On 15-Dec-2006, (Arturo Magidin) wrote:

I know attributions are a bitch, but:

I wrote the first paragraph. markzoom wrote the single word
response. The message you are replying to is from "Sancho Panza".

No, I wrote what I wrote directly under markzoom's words on purpose.

Yes; but you later wrote just below Sancho Panza's words, talking
about "your explanation above"; that "you" was directed at Sancho, but
the "explanation above" you refered to was me, not Sancho.

Neither here nor there, mind you. And completely unimportant...

Except for me having a headache now, as well as feeling clumsy.
I certainly apologize, and thank you for trying to set things straight.

Susan

On 17-Dec-2006, "Sancho Panza" wrote:

Would a picture of a Turkey Buzzard violate the US copyright on the
Bald Eagle?

Irrelevant, childish builder of strawmen.
We are talking about menorahs.

Feeble deflection.

To say nothing of a clumsy liue.
If he wants to insist that a chanukiyah is the same as the Temple
menorah, then he has to accept that a Turkey Buzzard is an
acceptable substitute for the American Bald eagle.

The problem is Christmas trees.

And, more specifically, the bigots who insist on shoving them
down everyone's throats.

Susan

On 17-Dec-2006, "Anarcissie" wrote:

I already tolerate numerous public performances of one sort
of Christianity or another, as well as the pseudo-religions of
patriotism and civil pride. I could put up with Consumermas
as I put up with Christmas, although I'd certainly like to get
away from them and not be taxed to pay for them. I am
taxed for worse things, however.

The Hubby (tm) & I noted that the holiday "Kwaanzaa" scans
into everything "Xmas" does.
"All I Want For Kwanzaa is My Two Front Teeth".
I could get into that - Kwanzaa is cultural!

Susan

On 17-Dec-2006, "Sancho Panza" wrote:

"James A. Donald" wrote in message
...
:
I have suggested for a long time (okay, not online)
that we have Solstice on the 22nd,

People, however, want the distribution of presents to be
at the same date for everyone

Huh?

so it is impossible to
move the date.

IOW, because some XIans won't go for it....

Further, the children of people who decline to
participate in this general distribution of presents are
inevitably going to be upset

Yeah, kids will be FURIOUS to get presents 3 days EARLY.
Yeah, I believe that one....

, and people who *do*
participate are going to glam it up, generate a lot of
anticipation that Christmas day is coming, for example
by putting up big displays of Christmas trees - which is
what you mean when you complain that Christians are
"forcing" Christmas on everyone.

No, what I mean is exemplified in the following statement.

Here is my solution: Jews celebrate Christmas on
christmas day, and call it the day of the returning sun
instead of calling it Christmas.

This joker says everyone should march to his band. No one else's band
counts. An insular attitude that can't see more than 12 inches away.

And yet still pretends that everyonei s the bigot but he.

In article ,
PTravel wrote:

wrote in message news:KWohh.2258$Jb6.1189@trnddc03...

On 15-Dec-2006, "PTravel" wrote:

"Mike Hunt" postmaster@localhost wrote in message
. ..
Tchiowa wrote:

Not bigotry. Where talking about secular vs. religious. Do you
struggle
with that concept?


Did Congress make Christmas a national holiday because it had nothing
to

do with religion? I doubt it.

Congress made it a national holiday for the same reason that the Supreme
Court ruled that creches are not religious symbols -

Did they do that?
I thought they did that for the *trees*....

I believe that they did, i.e. "creches are holiday symbols of the winter
season and not religious." The reasoning is absolutely bizarre and
reflects, I think, the extent to which Christianity has attempted to
inculcate itself into government.. However, my recollection of those cases
said, essentially, you can't just display a creche, you must display it with
other "traditional" winter seasson paraphenalia, e.g. menorahs.

There were two separate cases. In Lynch v. Donnelly, in 1984, the
court did indeed rule that any benefit to religion from a creche was
"indirect, remote, and incidental."

However, in 1989, in Allegheny County v. Greater Pittsburgh ACLU, the
court struck down a creche display in a county courthouse (which bore
the words "Gloria in Excelsis Deo". In that same case, the Court
upheld the display of a tree-and-hanukiyah dipslay. They argued that
"the combined display[...] simply recognizes that both Christmas and
Hanukkah are part of the same winter-holiday season which has attained
a secular status in our society."

The decision was prety fragmented. Looking it up in findlaw (492
U.S. 573 (1989) ), Blackmun delivered the opinion of the court for
some parts, which struck down the creche with the angel's words.
Those parts were joined by Brennan, Thurgood Marshall, John Paul
Stevens, and O'Connor.

Blackmun was also joined by Stevens and O'Connor in discussing the
precedents and the reason why they disagreed with the dissenters on
this. But he was only joined by Stevens in arguing that the dissent in
Lynch v. Donnelly should now be the correct rule.

As far as the tree-and-hanukiyah display, Blackmun concluded it was
okay because of context, but nobody joined him. O'Connor concluded the
display was fine, because "the Christmas tree, whatever its origins,
is widely viewed today as a secular symbol of the Christmas
holiday. Although there may be certain secular aspects to Chanukah, it
is primarily a religious holiday[.]" But she argued the inclusion with
the tree and with a sign celebrating liberty made it a "message of
pluralism and freedom of belief during the holiday season", and
because the display was in a park, and so could not be reasonably
interpreted as an edorsement of judaism or christianity, or
disapproval of alternate beliefs. Brennan and Stevens joined her with
regards to striking down the creche display.

Brennan thought both displays unconstitutional; he was joined by
Marshall and Stevens. Stevens also wrote an opinion believing both
displays unconstitutional, also joined by both Marshall and Brennan.

Kennedy agreed with regards to the tree-and-hanukiyah, disagreed about
the creche (believing it to be constitutional following Lynch). He was
joined by Rehnquist, Scalia, and Byron White. They disagreed entirely
with the arguments of the others, though, even with regards to the
tree-and-hanukiyah display.

One of those opinions that don't really do much to clarify and
generally mostly just confuse.

But... in summary: the court has ruled that context is very
important. A creche, by itself, depending on location and context, may
be a religious symbol and then again, it may not (since it was once
ruled not to be, and once ruled to be).

But they did definitely rule christmas trees were not religious
symbols (anymore).


--
================================================== ====================
"It's not denial. I'm just very selective about
what I accept as reality."
--- Calvin ("Calvin and Hobbes" by Bill Watterson)
================================================== ====================

Arturo Magidin
magidin-at-member-ams-org

On 17-Dec-2006, Frank Mayhar wrote:

On Sun, 17 Dec 2006 02:10:03 +0000, flaviaR wrote:
Uh, what you're saying is that it's no more religious than any other
relgious holiday....

Christmas may have been a religious holiday, and to many it may still be a
religious holiday, but that just doesn't matter.

A few years ago I was in China on Christmas. The only decorations I saw
were in hotels catering to foreigners.

Precisely.

They've so thoroughly convinced themselves that it's
_their_ holiday that they feel personally threatened when they see
someone
else celebrating it differently.
That's how this particular thread started.
My beef is having their celebration forced on us as well.

Well, see, that's where we differ, you and I. Like those Chinese, I just
don't give a ****.

If you don't have "competing beliefs", as it were, I can see where it
wouldn't.

Susan

Yeah, it's annoying and yeah, I don't like having
religious crap forced on me, but as far as I'm concerned, those idiots
that scream and cry about saying "happy holidays" instead of "merry
Christmas" are, well, insignificant.

On 17-Dec-2006, Mike Hunt postmaster@localhost wrote:

wrote:

(But Macy's was only sending people to Gimbels if they
didn't have the actual merchanidse....)

Was that in all stores, or just the one on 34th Street, in 1947?

It started with Macy's & Gimbel's, and then I think supposedly
spread all over New York (in that movie).

Susan

On 16-Dec-2006, "Sancho Panza" wrote:

"Tchiowa" wrote in message
ps.com...
? Gee, should someone be calling you a liar now?

You bigots are trying to fight against a holiday because you don't like
the religion involved. Time to grow up.

So now it is a religious deal. Wow! Certainly keeps the head spinning.

I figure he's trying to bolster his lies about who the bigots are
by throwing out *some* truth about religion actually being involved....

Susan

On 17-Dec-2006, James A. Donald wrote:

On Thu, 14 Dec 2006 17:32:00 -0000, "brique"
wrote:
So, not going to answer the question then James? Who
was suing against what display of Xmas trees?

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/12/10/air...hristmas.trees
.ap/index.html
: : Rabbi Elazar Bogomilsky ... had hired a
: : lawyer and threatened to sue if the Port of
: : Seattle didn't add the menorah next to the
: : trees,

Thanks for admitting that the rabbi wasn't suing for the
removal of the trees, like we've all been saying.

Susan

On 17-Dec-2006, (Arturo Magidin) wrote:

Nobody disagrees that the hanukiyah is often called simply a
"menorah". And hamsters as often called "rats".

Or guine pigs.
And lots of people call their dogs or cats their "babies".
As cute s kittens and puppies may be, I sure wouldn't
want to see some woman give birth to one....

Susan

Alas, calling them
"rats" does not make them rats, and calling a hanukiyah "menorah" does
not mean that it is in fact one. The word is a hebrew word, and in
hebrew it means only the 7 branched candelabrum.