I'm more than a little tired of the annual griping from the right about "the War on Christmas." Telling people about the War on Christmas is like telling your kids that Santa gives toys to only good children. It's a great tactic for getting people to do what you want them to do, but it's also a tactic that is based entirely on manipulating a belief on something that simply doesn't exist.

In case Republicans who constantly fear a War on Christmas haven't noticed -- and the only way you could possibly not notice is if you're blind, deaf, and imprisoned somewhere under a rock -- Christmas is everywhere. Every year, it's everywhere. Christmas songs play on the radio and over loudspeakers in malls, Christmas decorations are in every direction you look, and you can't have three consecutive conversations in a row without someone wishing you either a Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays.

Now, some Republicans would point to that last bit and say, "see, they said 'Happy Holidays' instead of 'Merry Christmas,' THE WAR ON CHRISTMAS CONTINUES !!!"

Give me a break. A mild re-wording of holiday cheer is going to threaten your way of life? Really? How vulnerable are your traditions if that's enough to make you feel threatened?

First off, yes, 'Happy Holidays' is a more generic term, okay, I'll admit that. I'll even admit that some people specifically use the phrase to be intentionally more inclusive of similarly timed holidays like Hannukah. Only the most paranoid right-wingers can (deliberately choose to?) misinterpret inclusiveness towards others as an attack on their own beliefs. And let's be realistic here, even when you take into account the more inclusive wording of "happy holidays," be honest, how many people use it to evoke Hannukah or Qwanza (spelling?)? 99 times out of a hundred it's used as an alternative way to say "Merry Christmas." And at the risk of repeating myself, even if you choose to interpret use of the alternative as some sort of attack -- in other words, if you choose to be paranoid -- I ask again, how, exactly, is such a re-wording actually threatening your sacred traditions?

Some people point to statistics as alleged proof of a war on Christmas. Like the latest Pew Research poll which indicates a drop of an apparently terrifying four percentage points in how many Americans say they'll celebrate Christmas as a religious holiday this year. It went from 59% to 55%. In other words, terrified right-wingers, even if there was a war on Christmas, YOU'D STILL BE WINNING IT !

Let me tell you, this myth of a war on Christmas is nothing new. I remember when I transferred from Westhill High School -- a public school -- to Trinity Catholic. This was in the 90s. Around Christmas time, our religion studies teacher -- a likable, warm-hearted, well-intentioned man named Father Bob -- told us all about how the public schools don't allow faculty and students to say "Merry Christmas" to each other. I watched as my classmates shook their heads in sorrow at this injustice. As the only person in that room with recent experience in public schools, I couldn't help myself. I raised my hand and informed the shocked priest that, just last year, I attended a public school where, come Christmas season, we hung Christmas decorations, sang Christmas carols, and routinely wished each other "Merry Christmas" in the days before Christmas vacation -- which, by the way, it was still called. Not some awkwardly generic phrasing like "holiday vacation." At the public schools, at least at that time, it was still called "Christmas vacation."

"Yeah, psh!, the nineties, but what about today?!?" some people might object. Well, just last week -- that's right, in the year 2017 -- I was doing administrative work in a public school. While there, I met someone from the administrative office was dressed in a Christmas hat, walking around playing Christmas carols on her iPhone. She was telling all of her co-workers "Merry Christmas." Kids in the band were playing Christmas carols. Yet on my drive home from work that day, a guy on the radio was complaining about the War on Christmas -- and, as usual with such complaints, not citing any evidence whatsoever. In other words, not much had changed over the years since I'd been a high school student. The War on Chistmas was still nowhere to be seen. And paranoid right-wingers were still complaining about it.