Every year around this time, there's a debate raging between secularists and holier-than-thou Christian fundamentalist extremist paranoids who believe that Hollywood is trying to steal Christmas from them. That is whether one should greet someone with the commercialized "Merry Christmas" or the Jesus-denying "Happy Holidays." (Of course, in New York, where I am, this isn't a problem because the appropriate holiday greeting here is a "Stop staring at the fucking holiday tree and move your ass, tourist!" accompanied by an outstretched middle finger.) But in the Wal-Martized parts of the country, this is an important topic, lest you raise some mild, neurotic offense during this season of goodwill towards men, who, for the most part, don't deserve it.

We can see I'm really in the holiday spirit today.

Anyway, I ran into this problem myself when I was writing out my Christmas/generic winter holiday cards. Not that I think any of my friends would be particularly offended, cause they've got pretty open minds, but I'm just not the sort of person who'd take that risk in the first place.

Which is really frustrating. I mean, people: regardless of whether someone says "Merry Christmas" or "Happy Holidays" or "Seasons Greetings" or "Happy Kwanzaa," they're just trying to be nice and bestow good wishes on you. (Unless, of course, if they're saying it ironically, like I was with that "Happy Kwanzaa" thing.) They don't have to be nice to you; they could be total Grinches like me. The least you could do in return is not bitch that they weren't nice to you in the exact form that you'd prefer.