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The trick is to figure out what you want your holidays to look like, and then just do that.
We've got a weird tradition of going to the beach every Christmas Eve, wandering along the freezing cold pier, getting cheesy chips, then heading home where my husband pours himself a glass of something luxurious and watches Zulu while I generally get in a spot of knitting or gaming or something.
This year, his mam is trying to organise a big family party on Christmas Eve. Whole family will be there...except us. We've got our tradition and we like it. No stress.
Nothing is stopping you from not giving a shit about official holidays.
My immediate family just gets together random weekends. There's never stress or conflicting schedules. So it makes it better for us, even if there's still inlaw shit on actual holidays.
It's an incredibly easy thing to do, literally nothing is stopping your family from doing the same.
Well, Christmas is one of the most fake holidays there is. Mostly due to it's timing during the year. It's the easiest and most important time to sell things. So 99% of what you are "supposed to feel" is just a commercial trying to get you to buy that feeling.
Christmas can be that whole relaxed hangout with family thing and not have store bought presents like on TV in a small town. If you don't live in a small town, assume almost no Christmas stuff from TV will be possible.
Also most families only have 1 or 2 important Christmas traditions, there's just such a wide variety of them that for movies to "appeal" to a wider audience they have to do a bunch of stuff to hopefully hit upon a tradition that matters to as much of the audience as possible.
Also most families only have 1 or 2 important Christmas traditions, there's just such a wide variety of them that for movies to "appeal" to a wider audience they have to do a bunch of stuff to hopefully hit upon a tradition that matters to as much of the audience as possible.
I never thought about that last part, but it's so true. Movies try to check of every single holiday box, but most of us only do a few of those things. Like, I can't remember the last time I went to a tree lighting. Maybe as a kid. But every Hallmark movie features the whole community in Town Square gathered for it like every single town stops what they're doing to all just gather around a tree across the world.
In other countries, Japan for example, gift giving is almost automated in their society to the point of being able to pick up simple gifts nearly anywhere, fancy fruit or what have you. When you get the easy gifts out of the way you can focus on those 1-4 people that are significant to you. But that wouldn't work in the West, gotta buy all the expensive stuff to take that red into black.
I wish I could convince my family to drop the presents altogether. We're all adults now, no grandchildren, and all we do is trade money between most of us with gift cards, but still have to find presents for my mother, father, grandma. Kinda stressful when most of them get themselves what they want when they want it.
Once we all became adults, we implemented a secret Santa with a money range. We pick a different theme every year. It is way less stressful to buy for a single adult than to try to find gifts for 12!
We do this in my family as well, with the exception that we all buy stocking stuffers to fill whoever’s stockings we want. Everyone in my family enjoys finding little treats or fun small gifts to put in everyone’s stockings and it’s great to see what everyone comes up with
I tried, but you just get shamed back into the game. Fuck Christmas.
My family did white elephant for a bit. It's easier to get a novel gift for the game than it is to try and figure out what each relative wants.
Secret Santa or donations to charities of choice maybe? Idk. Presents stress me the hell out because most of the people in my life are impossible to please lol
We started doing that a few years back. Just pool our gift budgets and pick some charities to give to. So much easier and honestly a lot more fun than shopping. We usually still do some stocking stuffers but that's just small things, little snacks and things.
Marketing is a major component of what’s wrong with everything, not just the holidays, but I agree wholeheartedly that any of the positive aspects the November and December holidays bring are completely overridden by the stress of them. Which is the opposite of what they are supposed to be for
I'd like Christmas more if I didn't have to buy gifts for everyone all at once. I don't mind giving gifts and I do it through the year just when I see things someone would want. It is just it all has to happen all one day business
What annoys me is I'm the only single one at our family gathering so I get fucked over. I have to buy for 3 families worth of individuals (12 total) and in return I get 3 gifts because they go as a team.. It's not even getting less stuff that's the problem, it's just a giant pain in the ass to buy for that many people. If it was up to me we'd just get shit for the kids and be done with it.
If they go as a group to get something expensive then I don't see the problem.
Ex: let's say the amount is $20 per person but six people go together to get you a $120 gift then there isn't a problem to me. If they go together to get you a gift and the gift cost $20 total then yeah then there's a problem.
That's why I only give gifts privately and to my little brothers and mom, nobody else gets anything. I also don't attend family get together so there's that.
If you love the people around you, you’ll buy all the shit we sell and give it to them. You do love them, don’t you?
Yep I'm a looser, I am expected at a Christmas gathering, I am expected to bring some food, gifts for 7-9 childrens that aren't mine, a gift for the host, a costume etc... I'm so broke I don't eat every mealtime and I have to buy all that shit that will be thrown in the garbage bin a few days later. And if I don't show up I'm an asshole who doesn't care about my friends and family. I love puting up decorations and having a good meal but what if I can't afford it, take out another loan that will come back to haunt me later on ?
"I couldn't afford to buy anyone gifts this year", is a complete sentence.
It comes with a feeling of failure that's hard to deal with. Even if I know it's all a capitalist construct made to make me feel that way.
A part of me finds it strange when it comes to the holidays how we are in many ways time warping back to idealized 40s or 50s Christmas every year with the decorations, music, and themes. It's nice in ways to enjoy that nostalgia but for many of us that idea was just that an idea of what things were going to be like.
For many it was a grittier experience. Just think about those that dare to mention politics let alone some old family trauma. I get why some are like nah let's stay home. In a lot of ways that how it really was when things were "great" back then with the alcoholism and deadbeat family members.
In the end it's a testament to what a great job Coke did with those Christmas ads years ago now.
It’s out of hand, the extent to which the 40s and 50s have been romanticized. People back then had all the same problems as everyone has had since then.
And to think of the problems from the war dear old dad or mom was dealing with.
I watched a Yogi Berra documentary the other day. This fellow was pretty happy go lucky. It touched on his time during the war in the navy and his role of fishing out swollen dead bodies from after the D-day landings.
My first thought was my western 80s equivalent or today's avocado toast generations have no idea about those horrors first hand and they needed to carry on their lives without the mental health support many today are afforded. They were probably affected in cases by their WW1 effected family members too.
Can you imagine if we were to take off the rose colored glasses what we would really see with adult eyes looking back?
All these people dealing with such massive losses of loved ones and family members etc. Fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, etc. Then between those 2 wars the Depression.
In that sense I can see why it was so important to be thankful for what's left and what you have.
I just hope we all don't need to revisit the reasons why those times were good in that sense.
Truth: I have seen no ads “with the hugging families around winter.”
It’s not the holidays that are causing angst. It’s the ads.
And they are easy to opt out of:
Choose platforms, legal or otherwise, that do not expose you to ads.
Yes — we have family coming and I was up at 5am cleaning — but I’m glad I’ve done that. Extrinsic motivation is what it takes to get me to do unpleasant tasks — so I agree with you about the stress piece.
But perhaps not seeing all the schmaltzy advertising makes the holidays more bearable?
"if it wasn't for thanksgiving, the house would never get cleaned."
-my mom, every other year (when we 'hosted' the dinner.. for her folks and her siblings' families).
I don't watch TV & internet ads are blackholed on my network.
It's not the ads. It's all of it.
Yeah — a lot of expectations… all that adulting…
For me, it’s not the ads, my husband and I cut out most exposure to those a while back and are still stressed. It’s the sheer amount of obligation, the lack of time to rest. Between thanksgiving and new years, between both our families, we have 6 birthdays and 4 major holidays. It’s exhausting. I don’t even want to celebrate my own birthday this year, I’m moving it to spring lol
This isn't an unpopular opinion, a lot of people feel stressed during the holidays. However, to be fair, what are the stores and ad companies supposed to do? Of course they're going to portray the holidays as a happy time, it would be strange and against their objective if they didn't. Heads would roll at Ye Olde Major Ad Corp!
That's not an unpopular opinion. It's even a plot device for a lot of holiday movies.
This year I started Holiday shopping about 6 months ago. I am 99% done, just have to wrap them. Cut way down on my stress levels. 10/10 would recommend.
Don't let others dictate how you feel around the Holidays. Need some days off for you? Take em. Don't want to drive/fly across the country? Don't. There will be a next year. Focus on the now and how you feel.
this post was submitted on 22 Nov 2023
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Unpopular Opinion
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