WTW27: The War On Christmas

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:42 Thomas: Hello, and welcome to Where There's Woke. I'm Thomas. That's Lydia. How you doing?

0:00:45 Lydia: I am feeling very merry.

0:00:47 Thomas: Well, you just got shot by a progressive sniper because the Woke are stealing Christmas as usual.

0:00:54 Lydia: Yep. Every year.

0:00:56 Thomas: Happy War on Christmast. I want to celebrate. This is where there's woke's first annual war on christmas I assassination of france santa ferdinand 19th whatever the war on christmas yeah

0:00:57 Lydia: Yeah. What do you know about the war on Christmas? Because oh yeah Okay, but let's get into it. Because the war on Christmas is something that has been, you very big in Fox News and the right wing media for quite a long time, but it's not just there, The right? War on Christmas has been happening for, some say up to a century ago.

0:01:21 Thomas: 10,000

0:01:31 Lydia: Well, yeah.

0:01:31 Thomas: Years oh no okay that doesn't make sense.

0:01:34 Lydia: There was a document that Henry Ford put together back in 1921, titled The International Jew, The World's Foremost Problem.

0:01:37 Thomas: Oh, yikes. Now, how is that related to the war on Christmas?

0:01:44 Lydia: Yeah. Well, because he said it was too hard to find Christmas cards that talked about Jesus. And it's because Christmas is seen as anti-Semitic in the United States, is what he was implying. Then I went into researching Xmas. And I don't know if I ever told you this story. I've always been an atheist. But when certain people found out, I got this one question that was like, well, if you're an atheist, does that mean that you celebrate Xmas and not Christmas? Yeah. And I was like what? What does that even mean? But Xmas is really interesting. Back in 1957, the Church League of America published this piece in News and Views, and it was titled X Equals the Unknown Quantity. And an anti-Semite.

0:02:20 Thomas: Yeah. Huh. That's so interesting.

0:02:37 Lydia: A few years later, Gerald L.K. Smith, wrote which that was a blasphemous omission of the name of Christ to title things Xmas and that Jews introduced Santa Claus to to suppress the New Testament accounts of Jesus.

0:02:52 Thomas: Okay. I love that. That I love. If we have the Jews to thank for Santa Claus, then yeah.

0:02:58 Lydia: Santa Claus, yeah.

0:02:59 Thomas: Now I'm even more of a fan. Did I didn't know this about Xmas. I have just literally never thought about that. I think think as a kid I figured like, oh, the X is just to shorten it, you know. Yeah, is it actually is

0:03:04 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah, that's exactly what I thought. So it's actually the letter Chi, and there's a well-documented history that it has been used to abbreviate Christ, and some say it's eigentlich the symbol of the cross. And so, like, if you look at a lot of, like the Orthodox Christian imagery, they'll use the X a lot.

0:03:27 Thomas: His name actually Keist. That'd be funny. It's actually Jesus Keist, and you've had it wrong this whole time. Yeah.

0:03:28 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So Xmas was interesting, right? So, now it has evolved, as where now it's about political correctness and the left and atheists and the secular progressives, and that we've all gone too far. And so I thought it'd be fun to kind of walk through what some of those claims are over history and and how we get to today.

0:03:53 Thomas: And we're also going to bring on a professional killer of Christmas for some parts of this. Can't wait for that. His name's Tom Curry, by the way, just throwing that in there, now Yeah.

0:03:56 Lydia: Yes. Just in case you forget to introduce

0:04:04 Thomas: I don't know why I'm saying that. We haven't gotten to it yet, but just keep that in your front pocket. From what you're saying, it was mainly framed from the anti-Semitic standpoint early on. Like these Jews are bringing Santa there. I wish I could summon Eli Bosnick to do a Jewish Santa impersonation. We can't.

0:04:04 Lydia: Him later. You never know.

0:04:24 Thomas: That would be that, of course, not be proper. But maybe that's next on my list. I'll write it down. Maybe I'll have him do it.

0:04:16 Lydia: Yeah yeah no yeah so we started that 1921 we moved through the 50s and the 60s And largely, I didn't really see a lot of hubbub beyond that until 2002, which is pretty interesting, where this actually kind of stemmed out of New York City public schools banning the display of nativity scenes at public schools.

0:04:44 Thomas: Yeah. Oh, OK. Okay. Well, it's also, I mean, I think the main thing going on here is the rise of the 24 hour news cycle, Fox news still being pretty young then, like what was Fox news in the late nineties or something that started, but it, but even when it started, you know, it took a while to evolve to what it became and obviously Bush era, Iraq war, nine 11, all that. You got to fill the airwaves, especially like when, you Know, there's like some more crimes that happen. Fox news had to to find other things to put there.

0:04:59 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah. Hmm. Right. Right, exactly. Exactly. Well, it's like literally the year after 9-11. Like, I can't imagine that people were really talking about anything related to, you know, Christians versus Jewish people and Muslim people or anything. 2001.

0:05:21 Thomas: Oh yeah. You didn't watch Fox news back then. You weren't, yeah.

0:05:32 Lydia: No, no.

0:05:33 Thomas: Our household was all Fox news. And so nine 11, what Fox news was the nine 11 channel for a good, I'm not even joking. Good. Like seven years. Like it was, it was solidly through. Yeah. It wasn't, it wasn't. Through the whole entire Bush administration. They were just like the nine 11 channel, but then, you know, I am sure they had to find another thing. So like, oh, they are banning the whatevers. Do what was Baby it? Jesus stuff in the...

0:05:42 Lydia: Jeez. Yeah, yeah. Just nativity scenes. But they were allowing Christmas trees, Hanukkah menorahs and Muslim star and crescent imagery.

0:06:01 Thomas: Now, is this a real thing or this is they complained about it and it's not...

0:06:03 Lydia: This was real. And it was a policy that was implemented, like I said, 2002 for the New York City public school system. They were actually sued and they went to court and they won in 2006. So four years later. Yeah, they were able to defend their policy. There was nothing that indicated that they were discriminating based on religion with the policy.

0:06:04 Thomas: Okay. Hmm. They did. Oh, wow. I don't know that that would go the same way today. So I'm count down until when we see that.

0:06:27 Lydia: I don't know if it would. Yeah. Yeah, maybe I shouldn't remind people about it because they're going to, like, take it up.

0:06:31 Thomas: Yeah, no. Hey, Roberts, stop turning up. Pause the show. Pause the show, Chief Justice Roberts. Don't listen right now. Okay, that'll work.

0:06:40 Lydia: Yep. Media Yep. Matters, specifically in 2011, they call out, you through their tracking of the war on Christmas. That he actually spent more airtime talking about the war on Christmas than he talked about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

0:06:52 Thomas: Ah, so that's the key. Once they became less popular, I was going to guess that like as the, yeah, as the popularity drops down, they are like, you never mind all that. Let's talk about, you now what's even worse than terrorism, people saying happy holidays.

0:06:55 Lydia: Can start shifting.

0:07:07 Thomas: And then that's like, I'm not even exaggerating because you're saying in 2011, he literally spent more. Keep in mind, Christmas is usually just covered like for a certain part of the year. It's not like you cover the war on Christmas all year. That would be weird. So the, Yeah, most, so like the fact that he was able to squeeze in more War on Christmas in 2011 than the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. That's impressive. That is very impressive.

0:07:07 Lydia: Yeah, I know. Maybe two months.

0:07:31 Lydia: Yeah, so crazy. So we kind of start with his war on Christmast beginnings in 2004. So even though we have that early 2002 instance at Fox News, in particular, the war on Christmas started in 2004, December 3rd, 2004. And his show, The O'Reilly Factor, debuted a segment called Christmas Under Siege. Their first story that they covered was that a Washington grade school banned a production of A Christmas Carol.

0:07:31 Thomas: Ah.

0:07:59 Thomas: See, I, think I see why there's some, this happens with major historical events, hun, don't don't worry about it, because what happened was, first we laid siege to Christmas, and there's, you know, historians argue was that officially the first act of war or not, you know, it's like, do you start it when there's the first dead body over the War on Christmas, like when we killed the first elf or whatever, or do you, you start it when we laid siege to the concept of Christmas and cut off, you know, water supply, power supply, food.

0:08:08 Lydia: Yes, of course.

0:08:24 Thomas: So that's why it's a little confusing. But so somewhere between depends on which historian you're talking about, you know, which institution they work at. There's different schools of thought. But OK, so we've taken out. So in 2004, we the royal, we those proud few. You yeah, is that Henry the Fifth or whatever it is that was we can't, yeah.

0:08:31 Lydia: You know that there's. Yeah, exactly.

0:08:43 Lydia: I'll say that once again. And yeah

0:08:45 Thomas: What is it yeah that whole soliloquy it's so anyway, that's the year that we, we the proud few fighting the war on Christmas, what did we do, we banned, we killed a guy we no no we banned. Okay. Did we, though?

0:08:46 Lydia: I we need Eli again I know production of a Christmas Carol, so it was one performance of the play, a it was a high school in Washington, they canceled one, one performance of the play, because the private theater company was going to charge admission. And that's a violation of the school's policy.

0:09:03 Thomas: Okay.

0:09:15 Thomas: Wow. That doesn't at all sound like A War on Christmas. Because even going into this, I'm like, well, Christmas Carol, first off, that's not in the Bible, by the way. I don't know if Christians know this. That does not come from the Book of Scrooge, like there's not that, I mean it's just it's yeah, I, I'm trying to remember, like specifically the book itself, I don't know how Jesusy it is, I don't know that it is though, like I mean, yeah, Christmas is Christmas, but like I'm just saying, again, we all know this is nonsense except the Fox News viewers, but like at least get your nonsense straight, why would we want the, the, I said the Muppets Christmas, the Muppers Christmas Carol is my favorite fucking movie like ever, the Christmas Carol is a universally beloved amazing story, there's no fucking way that some like atheist antichrist got into a position of power at the school district and was like step one, banning one performance of a Christmas

0:09:22 Lydia: Yeah, exactly. We should write that.

0:09:46 Lydia: Yep. Yep, yep,

0:10:11 Thomas: Carol, wow.

0:10:11 Lydia: Yep. So it was O'Reilly and his guest, Anthony R. Piccarello, Jr., who were talking about this. And Piccarello at the time, and I'm not sure if he still is, president of the Beckett Fund for Religious Liberty. And the reason he talked about this was because Piccarelli said that the Beckitt Fund would be awarding their annual Ebenezer Award to the school, the person or group responsible for the most ridiculous affront to the Christmas and Hanukkah holidays.

0:10:35 Thomas: And was this a kid's performance, are you saying oh

0:10:43 Lydia: It was a private theater company, so I'm imagining, But

0:10:46 Thomas: Oh I thought you said it was a school, did I get it wrong?

0:10:47 Lydia: They were to perform. Sorry, the school was to visit the performance. It was the high school. I

0:10:51 Thomas: Oh, okay. Oh, so it was, how the, talk about obscure. Like how do they even find this? Some conservative nut job parent complaint.

0:10:57 Lydia: Don't know. Yeah.

0:11:00 Thomas: So it was so a school was going to do like a field trip to a performance. Is that what it is? And then they canceled that because they didn't want to pay for it or something.

0:11:05 Lydia: Yeah, yeah. Because their policy is that they will not admission for the performance?

0:11:13 Thomas: Now. Oh okay. So who's, who is doing the war on Christmas is what I want to know. Is it the theater company that wouldn't let them see it for free? Or is it the school? Like who in their mind is the, who needs the medal of honor is what I'm asking.

0:11:27 Lydia: I don' t know. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the school is getting it, apparently.

0:11:30 Thomas: Is the school who got the Ebenezer award?

0:11:32 Lydia: The school got the Ebenezer Award.

0:11:33 Thomas: Oh, okay. Cause I was, gonna anticipate a really funny scene when they, whoever's doing that production finds out guys, we won the Ebonezer award. Holy shit. That must, Hey, Jerry, you won the the Ebeneezer award for playing. No, that's not what this is. They're saying you've ruined Christmas. What? Yeah. It has nothing to do with acting. It's just a stupid Fox. Oh, nevermind.

0:11:45 Lydia: Yeah, yep, So that's how we start the war on Christmas, is this incredibly flimsy claim that was out of nowhere, where and, like you said, like, where did they even find this story? In particular, like, this tiny I mean, I don't know if it's... time well, I guess Kirkland, Washington, big enough town, but like a random high school, that how did this happen?

0:12:04 Thomas: Incredible. Yeah. And ever since then, it's only been getting less and less relevant.

0:12:11 Lydia: Yeah. Yep. Still in 2004, another big story for War on Christmas was that Target had banned the Salvation Army from its doors?

0:12:23 Thomas: Good, they Did really well.

0:12:24 Lydia: Yeah. Well, yeah. But reason why is, do you have any guesses?

0:12:30 Thomas: I was gonna get so if you told me, so we're imagining that Bill O'Reilly, the O'Reilly Factor, "Welcome, everybody, tonight Target kicked out the entire Salvation Army from all their stores," and then, you Lydia, star reporter from where, there's local research, it from 2000 whatever, and it'll be like one like, manager of a Target didn't like the one person who was doing the ringing the bell outside for the Salvation Army or whatever it is. And then that would be what happened. Like, that would, that'd be my guess, if I were to say. It would be some personal dispute. Oh, okay, great.

0:12:39 Lydia: Yeah, it's even better. They have a no solicitation policy. Yeah. And so they weren't enforcing it against the Salvation Army, I guess, in years past. And then they reviewed it and they're like, oh, this looks really unfair across the board. We have to make sure we're following policy. They notified the Salvation Army in January 2004. And then, you know, they had almost a year to figure out how to partner with Target otherwise, because Target put that offer out there. They said, you Know, as long as it follows policy, we'd be happy to support your efforts. We'd be Happy to partner With you in a project if you have something in mind and Salvation army never got back to them.

0:13:01 Thomas: Oh, yeah, okay.

0:13:32 Thomas: Wow. Just a reminder, the Salvation Army fucking sucks.

0:13:35 Lydia: Yeah, don't put any money in their red buckets, please.

0:13:37 Thomas: No, not at all. They're terrible. So that's good.

0:13:41 Lydia: Is homophobic. Yeah. Pat Robertson chimed in on this.

0:13:42 Thomas: Yeah. Here we go.

0:13:45 Lydia: May he rest in hell. "I think Walmart is a great store that sells things at a low price, and they can match Target on almost everything. So why should you stop at a store that is banning the wonderful work of the Salvation Army, with those kettles that raise money to feed the poor and the needy? They do great work, and they've never had one breath of scandal in all the time they've been around. They are a tremendous, tremendous organization, and this is going to cost them something in the neighborhood of $9 or $10 million. So maybe you could take that out of Target's hide and give it to Walmart. Walmart allows the Salvation Army to put out those kettles. So keep that in mind when you do your Christmas shopping, please."

0:13:47 Thomas: It hey you everybody you know how you love getting fucking bothered while you're trying to do something else while you'RE TRYING TO SHOP FOR CHRISTMAS PRESENTS WHILE YOU YOURSELF DON'T HAVE ENOUGH MONEY TO BUY ALL OF THEM UM YOU BETTER GO TO of Walmart to buy worse quality stuff and get harassed more by those people, okay? I wonder if that worked. I kind of doubt it, but yeah.

0:14:24 Lydia: Yeah, yeah, yeah I don't know. So that was 2004. Those Those were the big stories. Christmas Carol was banned and Target hates the Salvation Army and targeting them. But Right. I'm pumped. 2005. you know, I have a video of this one. Let me see let if I can send this on over to you. I've had to do some really weird searches to try and find things that have been scrubbed like otherwise.

0:14:49 Thomas: Ooh, it'd be good to get some video.

0:14:58 Thomas: Yeah. It's not that easy to find this stuff. That's one thing that surprised surprised me about doing this show. I always think like, well, surely every Fox News episode of everything ever should be somewhere. But it is, we haven't found it. So if you know where we can find like every episode of O'Reilly ever, let me know.

0:15:03 Lydia: Yeah. All right.

0:15:13 Thomas: Here we go. 12-15-05. I'm a sophomore in college. Those were the days.

0:15:14 Lydia: So, man, that was my senior year of high school. Yeah. So what happened here? Bill O'Reilly talks to some Catholic leaders about the war on Christmas.

0:15:22 Thomas: Wow. Flashback, everybody. We're probably killing, you thousands of innocent people in the Middle East per day. But, you Know, let's focus on what the real tragedy is.

0:15:38 Clip: We had almost the exact same discussion, Father McBrien, about the priest pedophilia scandal. I

0:15:44 Thomas: Father McBride is a character I would come up with if I was like, okay, you got to make a fake O'Reilly segment. All right. They probably have like a Father McBrien or something because they've

0:15:53 Lydia: Yep

0:15:56 Clip: Just said, look, we can't get one card or one archbishop to come on the program and say anything. And now, here we are again, the same thing except for Sheehan. What's going on? Well, first of all, Bill, this is a very different sort of issue. I mean, the pedophila crisis and scandal and what was associated with it was enormously significant. In fact, I think the most important crisis the Catholic Church in America has ever faced. This controversy over a Christmas celebration, whether to say Happy Holidays or Merry Christmas, or to allow Nativity scenes, crushes, and so forth, or to call Christmas trees Christmas trees rather than holiday trees, is a very minor issue in comparison. Got 65

0:16:03 Thomas: Been too busy molesting kids.

0:16:05 Lydia: Yeah

0:16:42 Thomas: What? So he just, so someone came on and just was like hey dummy. Me? Wow, there's

0:16:43 Lydia: Yeah O'Reilly yeah so O' Reilly invites these Catholic leaders to say hey you know you guys were silent on pedophila for a long time is this what's happening again you're silent on the the war on Christmas. What?

0:17:01 Clip: Million American Catholics, okay? And they don't hear a word from any Catholic leadership on the subject at all. The Protestants have at least a half-dozen.

0:17:12 Clip: Falwell, Wildman, they're going to be on next week. We've got campaigns that the Protestants have organized to say to retailers, hey, listen, if you disrespect the

0:17:24 Thomas: Is his Frost Nixon moment? Like this is Bill O'Reilly being like, "We got him, come here, I'm gonna ask you why you haven't come on here" and talk to the talk to the American people about holiday trees. Yeah.

0:17:32 Lydia: I'm going to win awards for this. Making like a spotlight, but but with this, that

0:17:41 Thomas: Yeah.

0:17:42 Clip: "Holiday of Christmas, we're going ot let our people know." All of this is in play on the Protestant side. Zippo on the Catholic side. It's it's only, it's a certain segment of the Protestant side, and I'm not, I don't intend to diminish them or to put them down, but mainstream Protestants generally are in the same boat, as it were, as mainstream Catholics. And their bishops, look, for decades, Catholics and mainstream Protestans have bemoaned the commercialization of Christmas, the using the religious aspects of the feast to to sell products. And what's happened, two things have happened. One is that this this nation has changed. In 1955, Will Herbert, a very famous social scientist, wrote a book called "Protestant, Catholic, Jew." In 1955, that was the religious landscape of this country. The only real non-Christians in this country were Jews, and they were a small minority. Today, today, there are many, many millions of non-Christians beyond the Jewish community. And so, you know, business is business. It's out to make a profit,

0:18:10 Thomas: Yeah. This

0:18:17 Lydia: Uh-huh.

0:18:21 Thomas: Guy rules. Well, he's probably also a child molester but yeah

0:18:51 Clip: And it doesn't want to alienate potential customers. Yeah, but now you know that. So it don't be, well, father, because... And we also have a very provocative segment.

0:18:52 Thomas: What what what is they cut to a different thing why

0:19:00 Clip: Why aren't the prelates of the Catholic Church in America, the cardinals and the archbishops, standing up for Christmas? Why? There's only one who will talk to us, That's Sheehan out in New Mexico, Archbishop Sheehand.

0:19:01 Lydia: Oh, yeah.

0:19:08 Thomas: Cut to his radio show or something, the fuck is this

0:19:12 Clip: Where are the others? Where are they? If you don't stick up for the baby Jesus, who are you going to stick up? Now they were MIA in the priest pedophilia scandals. Now they're MIA and the Christmas controversy. A

0:19:14 Lydia: Yeah.

0:19:25 Lydia: Isn't that amazing? Yeah.

0:19:25 Thomas: Those are very different things there

0:19:28 Lydia: Very different things.

0:19:28 Thomas: Are. For MIA in the mass slaughter of men, women, and child. And also, I stubbed my toe the other day. They aren't talking about it at all. Two they need to talk about. That is amazing. It's amazing how serious he is. Like, Bill O'Reilly had a sense of humor, kind of, He had and more of a sense OF humor than fucking? The last guy to get banned. Tucker Carlson. Tucker Carlson is just a psychopath. O'Reilly, you could almost think of him as like, that's a human, even though, you know, he sucks.

0:19:37 Lydia: So crazy. Yeah, yeah, Tucker.

0:19:58 Lydia: Yeah Yeah.

0:19:58 Thomas: But he's dead fucking serious here. Like there's no, there's No Tongue Cheek. There's not, this is him five seconds away from saying, fuck it, we'll do it live. Like, he's like, That's his demeanor right now. And he's like, "If you don't stick up for the baby Jesus, but you know that's dopey," he says. Imagine wait, O'Reilly is Catholic, right?

0:20:08 Lydia: Yeah.

0:20:17 Lydia: That's dopey. I think so.

0:20:21 Thomas: Pretty sure he is. It's pretty amazing to have like a father of your fucking faith on or whatever, and he's like, yeah, you know, I this is dumb for the following really well thought out reasons. For one, it's capitalism, man. Don't we care? Aren't you a Fox News right-wing capitalism guy? You would think like that's a good appeal to him, yeah, they're just, just appealing to the citizenry.

0:20:38 Lydia: Yeah, it's business. Yeah corporations.

0:20:42 Thomas: And he says, yeah, but that's dopey. What?

0:20:45 Lydia: I know. So that was 2005. Very exciting year, um, for that. So we're gonna step into 2006, um, we have some stuff from his radio show for this, about what's going on there.

0:20:47 Thomas: Oh man.

0:21:00 Thomas: Let's see how the war has escalated, how many dead, how many injured, missing, a lot of people missing, never to be seen again, from the war on Christmas. What?

0:21:02 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah.

0:21:07 Clip: It's a bunch of people who are running around and they're angry, but they've got no direction for the anger, and there's

0:21:18 Thomas: Does he know he's, his, does he knows Mike is on, just that, Bill, we're live, oh, sorry, yeah, no, he's talking about the audience. Oh.

0:21:19 Clip: So many insane things that every day I come into work and I say to myself, how can this be happening? I have to tell you that I did not want to do Christmas controversy stories this year. You know, we did last year, we won the war.

0:21:41 Thomas: They won, oh, okay, oh.

0:21:43 Clip: Walmart and Macy's and all the big stores are saying Merry Christmas and they've stopped ordering their employees not to say it, most of them. Buy

0:21:47 Thomas: They want okay Is that anything, were they actually ordering their employees not to say Merry Christmas?

0:21:54 Lydia: No.

0:21:54 Thomas: Which, yeah

0:21:55 Lydia: Everything I've seen for any store involved with these things is that they, know, they expect customer service and friendly demeanor. And there is no policy forbidding employees from saying Merry Christmas or Yarmulke.

0:22:04 Thomas: Yeah It'd be pretty weird to be like, if you see a guy coming in wearing a yarmuleke, you'd better yell Merry Christmas in his face, like because we're a business, and that's, are what, you talking about? I place where it's most appropriate to have a rule that you say happy holidays would be something like a public facing business that welcomes literally anyone off the street in to shop there.

0:22:16 Lydia: Yeah. Yep.

0:22:32 Thomas: That would be a place where you wouldn't want to like offend anybody, you maybe people are going to come spend their money to buy Hanukkah presents or something, be like, happy holidays, it's totally fine, that's not a war on Christmas, asshole, but I love, I, love, this is cool to have this on the record, I think, you realize, like, fuck, that was a little short-sighted to do the war on Christmas for one year and then declare victory, that was, I don't know what I was thinking, I, I forgot that we need constant grievance forever like our channel is the grievance channel, we can't just be like, hey, we won this one, everybody relax, no, you got to be constantly aggrieved all the time, and so he's like, yeah, no, because we, we did win, but like, it's like one of those movies where, like, the body at the last minute, opened its eye, and then credits, and then you're like, shit, the sequel.

0:22:44 Lydia: Yep, it's Yup.

0:23:14 Clip: Crate and Barrel are two that still are ordering their people not to say Merry Christmas, which is the worst kind of fascism you could possibly have. They have right to do it, but it's just stupid. But anyway, this season I said to myself, you know, with all the trouble we have overseas in a war in town, I really don't want to get into the Christmas thing again. We won it. It was a worthy campaign, but do we have to do it again? And then I'm confronted with this stuff. So that is the end of the game. Now, you get back to Crate and Barrel and Best Buy who are ordering their employees, if you say Merry Christmas, we will fire you. Now, this is insane.

0:23:19 Thomas: Oh.

0:23:46 Thomas: I think that skipped or something. Yeah Okay.

0:23:47 Lydia: Yeah, that they compiled the clips.

0:23:58 Thomas: Uh, did you look that up or anything?

0:23:59 Lydia: Yeah. So it's not true.

0:24:00 Thomas: No. Yeah.

0:24:03 Lydia: Yeah. So apparently there was article that was published that a Crate and Barrel spokesperson had said we would definitely not say Merry Christmas. But when they reached out to her, you know, kind of investigating group Think Progress had reached out to her. And she said her quote was misconstrued. They have no policy encouraging or discouraging store employees from saying Merry Christmas or any other greeting. Best Buy does not forbid its employees to say Merry Christmas. And they said that they can greet customers however you like, including Merry Christmas, but their promotional efforts as a company are going to be happy Happy Holidays, to your point, because it's as inclusive as possible and encouraging folks of all religions and backgrounds and whatever they might celebrate to come and shop at your store.

0:24:26 Thomas: Yeah, I the cartoon world these idiots live in, where it's like, what happens is, you're fucking where would that order come from, your minimum wage middle management, Best Buy employees, like, huddle up, everyone just heard someone say, and I'm not going to repeat the language because frankly it's, it's obscene, marry to customer. If I find out who that was, you're going to be out on your ass so fat. Like, who cares?

0:25:03 Lydia: Yep. Yep.

0:25:19 Thomas: Nobody would ever do that. It's a stupid, especially during the holidays when you could definitely spare a bunch of employees during the holidays. If you're a retail store, you'll be fine. You're up to your ass in extra employees. Hey, you didn't tie your shoe. You're fired. You said Merry Christmas. You're fire.

0:25:29 Lydia: Yep. Yeah. You'll figure Black Friday out. That's fine. Yeah,

0:25:34 Thomas: Oh, where is everybody? Everybody back

0:25:35 Lydia: Can you imagine Best Buy losing employees around the holidays? That would be rough. When people actually shopped in person, Yeah, that

0:25:40 Thomas: When people shopped and yeah, even now it's still pretty busy, but like, yeah, it's, it'S the cartoon idiot land. These people inhabit.

0:25:45 Lydia: Would have been insane.

0:25:50 Clip: Okay, it is to me an affront, so I don't shop at those places. I don t want to give them my business because they annoy me, nothing more, nothing more. It's annoying. I don't want to do business with those people, my right now, it is their right to tell their employees what they can and cannot say.

0:25:56 Lydia: Hey, that's your right.

0:26:01 Thomas: Yeah. Whoa.

0:26:12 Clip: Unfortunately, private companies can do that. It's

0:26:14 Thomas: Sorry.

0:26:15 Lydia: Unfortunately. Yeah.

0:26:16 Thomas: Unfortunately, I love that. They just don't ever have to care at all about consistency in their positions ever. It's never matters to this day. Doesn't matter. Oh, censorship, free speech. Beach, hey, you need to tell people not to say happy holidays or they'll be killed. Like it's just whatever is the argument of convenience at the time. I was going to do a gotcha of his whole thing, but he gotcha'd himself. He's already admitting.

0:26:17 Lydia: Yeah, yeah. I know. It's nonsense.

0:26:40 Thomas: I miss O'Reilly now that I hear him more because he like had this weird, somewhat self-awareness where he would state the obvious counter argument, but then still be like, yeah, but still like you just say like, Like, yeah, it's their right, but, you know, fucking, I don't like it.

0:26:40 Lydia: I know.

0:26:57 Clip: Their right, so it's basically my right. I'm not going to buy your little barrel or a crate, and I'm not going best buy. I'm going to go someplace that says, Merry Christmas, because it's the Christmas season. That's why you get gifts. You give gifts because it's Christmas time.

0:27:04 Lydia: Stupid.

0:27:12 Clip: The spirit of giving, that's tradition.

0:27:12 Thomas: Oh, yeah. Unless, you Know, you celebrate a different holiday. Yeah.

0:27:15 Lydia: Yeah yeah. Eight days of gift giving for Hanukkah.

0:27:18 Clip: Don't acknowledge a tradition, I ain't going to, I'm not going pay, not going do it.

0:27:23 Lydia: So we're going to skip forward a little bit in our little journey here.

0:27:23 Thomas: Is Amazing. I said I don'T want your crate. Good day. I already have plenty of barrels at home.

0:27:33 Lydia: We're going to step away from O'Reilly for a second because, it wasn't just O'Riley at Fox News that was talking about this. And I'll get into that a little bit later, but we're gonna swing on over to Fox and Friends for a story in 2010. 10.

0:27:47 Thomas: Well, what year is that? Oh, okay. Because, I mean, O'Reilly was, like, the flagship for a long time. I remember the other shows were, like. Even my Fox News parents didn't bother with the other people. It was mainly like, wait for O'Reilly factor. And then they saw a little bit of Hannity and Combs and were like, I fucking hate this. Even them. But they probably hated it because Hannity & Combs, idea was they had like, Combs was supposed to be like a liberal or something. And so they just got more and more tired of having anyone express any other beliefs on their shows.

0:27:52 Lydia: Yeah.

0:28:15 Lydia: Yeah, we'll get back to O'Reilly. Don't worry, but we're going to do a little detour.

0:28:16 Thomas: Oh, okay. Yeah. All right. Here we go.

0:28:20 Clip: Ho, ho, ho. Well, how about No, No, An elementary school in Central Florida banning

0:28:23 Thomas: I already love it. 10, 11 Out of 10. A no notes perfect introduction. Ho ho ho, more like no, no, no.

0:28:32 Clip: All things Christmas this holiday season. Teachers, it's not funny, teachers even eliminating traditional Christmas colors like red and green. What?

0:28:32 Thomas: Wow.

0:28:33 Lydia: Yep.

0:28:41 Thomas: They eliminate?

0:28:42 Clip: This is

0:28:44 Thomas: Listen here, you little shits, no red this year. This

0:28:45 Lydia: Yep.

0:28:49 Clip: So crazy I can't even read the story. They're not going to let red and green in the classroom. Yeah, right. Heathrow Elementary says it's abiding by school board policy,

0:28:59 Thomas: Is one of my favorite things about covering these idiots, is that, time we've had this with everything, we had it with uh the fucking uh Lost teacher asshole, where he's like, you have to just ask yourself, is, is, can this be real? Yeah, Kilborn.

0:29:09 Lydia: Oh, Kilborn. Mm hmm.

0:29:11 Thomas: Can this be right? Wow, this sounds insane. You're just asking yourself, like, can this possibly be? And the answer is no, it's not. They have this thing where, like they accidentally realize, like oh, this must be bullshit. And they're like, oh, there's no way they're banning Redding. I can't even read this story. But it's definitely real. It's definitely really real, everybody. For sure, real.

0:29:18 Lydia: Yeah? Yep.

0:29:32 Clip: Which requires employees to be neutral when it comes to religion. I DON'T THINK JESUS WORE RED OR GREEN, BUT SOME PARENTS SAY THIS GOES JUST A LITTLE TOO FAR. HOW DO YOU EQUATE RED AND GREEN WITH JESUS? I DONT GET IT. BRIAN?

0:29:45 Lydia: I know.

0:29:45 Clip: DO YOU FIGURE IT OUT? I CAN'T FIGUR-

0:29:45 Thomas: Does

0:29:46 Lydia: So War on Christmas is not about about Christianity now? What?

0:29:50 Thomas: She have, Like another personality striving to get out that was, like, counter wow, that was incredible, that was like she was counter-argumenting herself during the second. I actually want to okay, let's re-listen to this 30 seconds imagining that there's someone within her trying to get out, like a liberal or something and

0:30:00 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah. The playback.

0:30:09 Clip: WELL, HOW ABOUT NO, NO, AN ELEMENTARY SCHOOL IN CENTRAL FLORIDA BANNING ALL THINGS CHRISTMAS THIS HOLIDAY SEASON. TEACHERS, IT'S NOT FUNNY, TEACHER'S EVEN ELIMINATING TRADITIONAL CHRISTMASS COLORS LIKE RED AND GREEN FROM- WHAT? THIS IS SO CRAZY I CANNOT EVEN READ THE STORY. They're not going to let red and green in the classroom. Yeah, right. Heathrow Elementary says it's abiding by school board policy, which requires employees to be neutral when it comes to religion. I don't think Jesus wore red or green. But some parents say this goes just a little too far. How do you equate red and Green with Jesus? I don't get it. Brian? Do you figure it out?

0:30:44 Thomas: Bride kill me is so confused

0:30:46 Clip: I can't figure it ou. It's so crazy. I need at least a commercial. I mean, take away the nativity scene, and now you're going to take away red and Greene? That's crazy. It's crazy. It's so crazy. You read the next story. Okay.

0:30:46 Thomas: That

0:30:59 Lydia: Yeah. So this story, I have no idea where they came up with enough words to fill out that segment, because this story is literally from one article that says one parent said classrooms can't show Santa Claus or use traditional Christmas colors. "You can't use red and green," a parent said. "It's ridiculous." That was it. That's the origination of this story.

0:31:21 Thomas: Like, what, what media was that, like, what was that an oh, a local newspaper god

0:31:26 Lydia: Local newspaper. Yeah. And And Media Matters covered this at the time, and they reached out to the school district, and the school districts response was, there is not a ban on the colors red and green at Heathrow Elementary. That's just not true. That's not True at all. And it was one parent is your source. Yeah.

0:31:29 Thomas: God What Now we're seeing this pattern where they have to reach out. We found the parking lot attendant who works in the parking garage by the Hilton, who allegedly said happy holidays and said we located him and we asked him for a statement. And through a spokesperson, the parkinglot attendant said that didn't happen. And you're like, what? What is any fucking are you kidding me?

0:31:57 Lydia: Yep. Yep.

0:32:10 Thomas: And what It needs to be is, oh, what we did is we located the fuck you, this is stupid, no we didn't, because who cares here.

0:32:11 Lydia: Yep. So now we're just going to go forward a year, 2011, the year that O'Reilly talked about this stuff a lot. And Man, okay, so um, couple little quick ones.

0:32:25 Thomas: We go well First off, can you give us an update on, like, the how the numbers are doing, how many dead, how many who's who is perceived by historians to be winning at this point in history, you know, it's it's a slug fest

0:32:37 Lydia: We're still fighting. Yeah, we're still going at it. I think we're winning. I Think we're winning. Because otherwise, why would they have to keep doing this every single year?

0:32:42 Thomas: Okay yeah which makes the tragedy of imagining Christmas thinking it won that first year. You know, that's kind of, that is a cool story. It's like, oh, we got this. We're good. Remember, it's all over and done. No, it'S not. That was 2005 or something, 18 years later. You're still losing.

0:32:51 Lydia: Mm hmm.

0:33:01 Lydia: Still going. So some of the stories that they covered was, uh, Obama's have too many Christmas decorations in the White House. There's too many, they over decorated.

0:33:08 Thomas: Oh, God. Too many. What?

0:33:13 Lydia: That's, yeah. It's very confusing. I don't

0:33:15 Thomas: So now, how does that fit with the rest of the, I don't understand.

0:33:20 Lydia: Know, but they're, but it was the Obamas, so like,

0:33:22 Thomas: I'm like, ah, you don't know what I'm It's the Trojan horse of the war on Christmas, see? They let the Christmas trees in there and then little men crawl out of the Christmas trees and attack Christmas while it's sleeping. That's why that's bad.

0:33:22 Lydia: Yep. Yep. Yep. Yeah. And then there was a big whole thing about there was a Christmas tree tax and Obama was pandering to Muslims and showing contempt for Christianity because he implemented this Christmas tree text. But that was actually an industry led program under the Bush administration.

0:33:49 Thomas: I'm going to go ahead and say there is no fucking chance that Barack Obama implemented a Christmas tree tax. That's not a sentence that can even happen, actually, because Congress would have to pass something and then the president could sign it, I guess you could. But like I don't remember Barack Obama campaigning on a Christmas tree tax because that's fucking insane so

0:33:55 Lydia: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

0:34:11 Lydia: And the reason there was a Christmas tree tax, they used that money to help establish a marketing campaign promoting the sale of fresh Christmas trees. So it was the industry wanted it. Bush administration said, OK.

0:34:27 Thomas: They took this Bush era thing that is like designed to help big Christmas tree. And they're like, look at this. He's taxing. Jesus Christ. You know what? This is a good holiday episode. In addition to obviously being the one on Christmas. This also serves as a reminder of why, if you're visiting, you know, your boomer family this holiday season, why their brains are mush.

0:34:33 Lydia: Yep.

0:34:50 Lydia: Mush.

0:34:51 Thomas: Why their Brains Are literal oatmeal coming out of their ears because it's been two decades of this fucking nonsense. Oh,

0:34:52 Lydia: Yeah, yep. Know, they're used to the news telling them the facts and the truth. And so they're not going to go independently verify anything. And, doesn't has not taken me that long. I mean, when you compile all the stories together, yeah, it's a lot. But story by story, like debunking.

0:35:12 Thomas: No, they are not. Fox News is not worried about their audience Fact Checking. Yeah.

0:35:15 Lydia: Yeah, yeah. But they just kind of take it at face value. Yeah. And so then we're going to go to a little video right here about how important the war on Christmas is that,

0:35:27 Thomas: Oh

0:35:28 Clip: A second time, we expect Obama bashing, as I said, on economic questions that dominated I did that tonight, the debate tonight, but cultural problems should also come up. So what should the candidates be asked in that area? You know, the lawyers themselves, Margaret, who offered the big new book, American Individualism, and Fox & Friends co-host, Gretchen Carlson, our Carlson. If you were moderating tonight, and you had an opportunity to ask a cultural question, what would the first question be? As president, how important would it be for you to address the political correctness in our society? Many argue is totally out of control, from the war on Christmas to leaving the word God out of the Pledge of Allegiance, to not calling the alleged Fort Hood shooter what

0:35:40 Thomas: God. Yeah.

0:36:07 Lydia: Yeah,

0:36:03 Thomas: I'm Sorry. I'm You mean the thing that's still in the Pledge of Allegiance that should be fucking out of it? What are you talking Talking about? The idiot Supreme Court, I don't remember what year that was, but that's upheld. We can't, I would love to get rid of that stupid shit, but we can't. So what do you mean that we're not saying, whatever.

0:36:14 Lydia: Yeah. I know.

0:36:26 Clip: To not call him the alleged fort hood shooter what is, a home grown Muslim terrorist. How is that harmfull? Moving forward for our nation. I like that question. But it might be a little bit too open-ended, like, oh, it's terrible, and we should be honest, and da-da-da.

0:36:41 Thomas: Is this a meeting to discuss the, thanks

0:36:43 Lydia: I know he's

0:36:43 Clip: But in PC, I think it is absolutely. I think I might start with, you know, is PC harming the country? And if you believe that, how? And the second part of my question is, what message does it send to our next generation of kids that we're sort of taking away all of these things that we used to have in our society? Why? Because we don't want to offend one person. You know, I don't believe there's difference in stuff. That's not the reason. The reason is they don't like God. They don't want a white, traditional America.

0:36:46 Lydia: Not her boss.

0:36:52 Thomas: For the the note, Bill.

0:36:53 Lydia: Yeah isn't that crazy?

0:37:12 Clip: Can

0:37:13 Lydia: Yeah. Can you imagine? I mean, I mean, oh, I know it's so bad. It's like she's giving him like a pitch like they're in the writer's room. Right.

0:37:14 Thomas: How uncomfortable is that segment? Jesus. Yeah. Well, did she

0:37:22 Lydia: And he's like, no, no. He said, if you were going to moderate the debate, what would the question be that you'd ask?

0:37:23 Thomas: Moderate that debate? Wow. So, and he's like, all right, let's tighten up the language here. And it was shut up, dude. You're doing a segment. It doesn't matter. What?

0:37:30 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah. And also, can you imagine? Yeah, the debate stage for presidential candidates. What are you going to do about the war on Christmas?

0:37:39 Thomas: God. Yeah, this is to that. Yeah so this is Mitt Romney. Gosh, who else was a candidate? But no, this was the primary.

0:37:46 Lydia: Romney and Obama oh sorry this is the primary

0:37:49 Thomas: So it's like you probably was some of the usual we suspects saw in '16 as well, I think, think what's his name, whose brain melted out of his ear, who just declared bank. Yeah, Rudy Giuliani was probably involved at some point, man it's been too long what a different world

0:37:50 Lydia: Yeah yeah oh let's Rudy Giuliani yeah uh oh yeah so the yeah seriously it's a Rick Santorum Mitt Romney Ron Paul Paul and Newt Gingrich. That's what it says. The that's

0:38:05 Thomas: Oh yeah, okay, yeah okay Newt Gingrich. Wait you're telling me that was a debate I want to watch that, that was like the final four of that's a sparse field of candidates, okay, which

0:38:22 Lydia: Yeah, it sure was. So that was 2011. And yeah. All right, here's the first big debunk

0:38:28 Thomas: Oh, I'm excited for a big debunk because up till now, every story about the war on Christmas has been dead on accurate. These of all, there was no, you tried to debunk and you're like, damn, they crossed their T's and dotted their I's over when they talked to the fucking Christmas tree lot. And they're like hey, is there a tax on, yeah, solid, 100%.

0:38:30 Lydia: 2012 I'm well they've yeah this one's a, this one's a fun One, yeah.

0:38:47 Thomas: Here we go.

0:38:48 Clip: Be political actors too far replacing Merry Christmas with Happy Holidays across our entire American culture. We better ask Santa

0:38:56 Thomas: Across our entire American, I already, hey, I'll help you with the debunk hunt. I know this was yours. That's wrong. The source is me. So this is like exactly a year later, just about. So December, 2012. Okay.

0:39:02 Lydia: Yeah. Yep.

0:39:10 Clip: Claus 365 days a year. That's right. Sal Richard is the author of Being Santa Claus, where I learned about the true meaning of Christmas. That is the name of the book. So, Santa, if you will, I understand you don't like to say happy holidays. Why?

0:39:16 Thomas: What?

0:39:28 Clip: Well, you know, actually, I wish people always had happy holidays, but I tend to be a little bit more specific. I can't find any reference where Santa's ever said anything other than Merry Christmas.

0:39:40 Lydia: Well, duh.

0:39:41 Clip: So, I like to wish people a Merry Christmas And what's the response to all the hundreds and thousands of kids that you've come across in all these years that you're been Santa's helper?

0:39:41 Thomas: Yeah.

0:39:51 Thomas: What?

0:39:53 Clip: Well, what can I say? Children are wonderful.

0:39:55 Thomas: Sorry.

0:39:55 Clip: Merry

0:39:56 Thomas: What? I just listened to the language. This person, you know what? I feel bad for her because everything she says probably gets notes from Bill O'Reilly. Because this is one of the same ladies that was on that one. So maybe she just doesn't even know how to function anymore.

0:40:03 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah, Gretchen Carlson. Yeah?

0:40:08 Clip: Christmas.

0:40:08 Thomas: Listen to this sentence.

0:40:09 Clip: And what's the response to all the hundreds and thousands of kids that you've come across in all these years that you have been Santa's helper?

0:40:11 Thomas: It's the response to what?

0:40:16 Lydia: From? From. It must be from.

0:40:16 Thomas: What's the respond to? Oh, okay. From the kids all at the years that you, so she's asking, when you say Merry Christmas, are they like, "fuck you, it's happy holidays" and then they kick him in the nuts? And he's like, Oh, I mean, fucking Santa can't even say happy holidays. Yeah.

0:40:25 Lydia: Yeah. Fuck you, Santa.

0:40:35 Clip: What can I say? Children are wonderful. I've always had pleasant responses from them, and parents too. I like to think that I'm a Santa for boys and girls of all ages. Indeed. And I know that you, you know, people will see you on the street. And throughout the year, they'll refer to you as Santa. Your car says the Santa-mobile. And you have got the biggest belt buckle I've ever seen, Santa.

0:40:37 Lydia: Yeah.

0:40:41 Thomas: You

0:41:02 Clip: I like to say that the elves got the idea from Elvis.

0:41:02 Thomas: Know what they say about the size of a man's belt buckle you

0:41:07 Clip: Or a prize fighter. So what do you make of the, you've been around for a long time doing this. What do you make of the political correctness part of our culture?

0:41:17 Lydia: Yeah, they have to get something,

0:41:19 Clip: Have you seen it change over time? I have. You know, I

0:41:19 Lydia: Right?

0:41:25 Thomas: Know. I always do go to Santa Claus. We've got a guy who cosplays. This is a fictional creature character thing to answer our tough, hard-hitting political questions.

0:41:29 Lydia: Isn't that crazy? Who better to ask about the war on Christmas than Santa?

0:41:42 Clip: Never had a problem being Santa Claus. But there was a time a few years back when suddenly I started showing up at Christmas parties and was told that they were having holiday parties, and so therefore they didn't need a Santa anymore.

0:41:52 Thomas: Get the fuck out of here. You weren't invited. Oh. Why

0:41:56 Clip: More and

0:41:56 Thomas: Did you show up to the...

0:41:57 Clip: Uh

0:41:57 Lydia: Yep. Well, he'd be hired, but yeah.

0:42:00 Thomas: Yeah, no, he's hired and they're like, hey, get the fuck outta here. You hired me. Yeah, I hired you so that I could say, fuck you. What?

0:42:07 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah, so I

0:42:09 Clip: About that time. That was the time when, I think, the Surgeon General said that Santa should lay off the cookies and start picking up more, uh, carrots and broccoli and I heard that, uh,

0:42:16 Thomas: Oh, there you go. There's another one. I actually remember that one.

0:42:19 Lydia: Do too.

0:42:19 Clip: Santa's in Australia had to say "ha ha ha" so as not to offend certain gals and uh that Sanna's England had

0:42:19 Thomas: Yeah. What? Okay. Hold on. Okay.

0:42:22 Lydia: Right, so Pause. There. Pause. There. Yeah, Santa's in Australia had to say "ha ha ha" so they wouldn't offend certain gals. Um, okay.

0:42:34 Thomas: Yeah. The hoes of Australia got together. We, the spokesperson.

0:42:38 Lydia: Yeah. The host from these area codes. So this

0:42:46 Thomas: Yeah. Lest you think it's just local hoes.

0:42:50 Lydia: Claim is from 2007.

0:42:55 Thomas: Oh my God. And by the way, we're in 2012. So this is the kind of stuff they have to like keep recycling over and over because they have fucking nothing, obviously.

0:42:57 Lydia: We're in 2012. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Well, he's like digging like deep in his memory because Gretchen Carlson was like, tell us about some anti-PC stuff.

0:43:04 Thomas: Yeah, I know. And sorry to interrupt you, but like, I wanted to say that about this very conceit. I love how they, they constantly cross cross up their own purposes because they're like, you know, here's who we're going to have on to say how much people don't want Christmas anymore. A guy who's a, checks notes, professional Santa Claus. So they're goingto have the guy who apparently makes his living being hired to be Santa Claus and, in their idiot minds, whatever producer, whoever's charge of this, they're like, yeah, he'll get on. He'll have a black eye, bloody nose. He'll be poor.

0:43:30 Lydia: Yep.

0:43:39 Thomas: Like he won't have.

0:43:39 Lydia: He'll be poor.

0:43:40 Thomas: Yeah. It was like his arm in a sling. And it'll be like, I haven't gotten a job in 20 years. I am still wearing the outfit, but can't I do this anymore. Nobody wants it. They all get beaten up on site.

0:43:40 Lydia: Exactly. Yeah. Disheveled. Yeah, yeah. He has shell shock.

0:43:50 Thomas: What do you know? He's going to be like. Well, no, literally all I do is say, ho, ho. Merry Christmas. And it's joy the whole time. There's still lines at every mall in America to meet Santa Claus. You idiots. Okay, sorry. Now the debunker.

0:43:58 Lydia: Yep. Yep. Yeah. So, um, so back in 2007 in Australia, that is true. There. Yes. That That time existed in Australia.

0:44:09 Thomas: 2007 in Australia. That part's true. Okay. So they had a 2007.

0:44:14 Lydia: Yes, there were Santas in Australia In 2007, um, there was a Santa training, and the Santa training was geared towards being more attentive to kids' needs, because some kids, if they hear "ho, ho, ho" in a booming deep voice, that can be jarring. That can, I mean, some kids are just scared by the sight of Santa, and then now you're going to add in a really deep, intense voice, they don't know what the heck is happening. So the training was really geared to, like, how to spot when kids need a different approach. And it could be that you're changing the tone of your, your voice. It could be that you are starting with a joke instead of saying "ho, ho, ho" right away. We're using another phrase, "Merry Christmas," out the gate, right? Rather than saying "ho, ho, ho." There was literally nothing, nothing. They asked this company over and over and over, multiple different outlets asked them, the company that was doing the Santa trainings and dispersing Santas across Australia.

0:44:16 Thomas: Okay, sure. Yeah. Oh, for sure. Yeah.

0:45:10 Thomas: Jesus fucking Christ. No, mate. No.

0:45:15 Lydia: Yeah. And they said, no, no, it was really just being attentive to kids' needs and knowing that every kid's different and giving them kind of tips and tricks on how to change their approach.

0:45:25 Thomas: Oh, weird. Do you mean it was a totally reasonable thing that a business was probably doing to be a better business and

0:45:28 Lydia: Yeah, yeah, yep. One Santa came out of the woodwork through this and said, you know, I was fired for saying ho, ho, hoe. And then the company was like, no, we fired you because you have a bad attitude and you sucked. And so they had to say that to the newspaper. You know, it's like, man, if you like didn't go there, dude, like. Now your name is associated with having a terrible attitude being Santa Claus.

0:45:43 Thomas: You killed a kid yeah well trying to make you're uh well what is it 10 50 yeah you're 15 minutes of fame yeah I couldn't remember the number, that doesn't, that phrase doesn't really exist anymore because of I feel like yeah like online stuff, your viral moment, you just say your viral moment now yeah god wow, I'm having an existential crisis right right now. There's been a war on the phrase 15 minutes of fame. We don't say it anymore. That's amazing.

0:45:58 Lydia: Yeah. Because of TikTok. Yeah. Your viral moment. Yeah.

0:46:15 Lydia: Yeah.

0:46:15 Thomas: I thought you were going to tell the story, by the way, us of taking several like fucking years to get Phoebe to visit a mall Santa.

0:46:22 Lydia: Oh, yeah, we did it once, but never again.

0:46:24 Thomas: Oh, Oh, I think so. We tried to get close the second time.

0:46:25 Lydia: We tried to get close, and she made it to the fence. And then she was like, I'm not doing that.

0:46:30 Thomas: Yeah, no, too scared. So yeah, any, any parent who's had a kid that gets scared at all knows that you can't just go like, right in their ear, some of them are gonna literally shit their fucking pit. They'll be so scared they'll be shaking like, that's just how some kids are and

0:46:37 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Yep,

0:46:44 Clip: Uh, Sanna in Engeland weren't allowed to have children on their laps anymore, so as not to create an image of everybody. I do

0:46:52 Thomas: I agree with that one actually

0:46:53 Lydia: So, yeah, This is something that, yes, in England schools, there were volunteer Santas, other random parents that previously they used to have to pass a criminal records bureau check, and then they removed that requirement. So the schools decided, hey, without that in place, we're just going to have a policy default that kids don't sit on the lap unless they want to and the parents want them to. So there was still an opportunity for that to happen.

0:46:54 Thomas: Boy that sure is exactly what I would want the policy to be. That's yeah, a stranger

0:47:25 Lydia: Exactly. I think it's weird to to have children sit on Santa's lap. Yeah. Like you don't know. And I don't recall if he says it in this interview. That's kind of where the interview ends there so we can stop the video. But does mention, I think, in another interview I was reading with him elsewhere that kids aren't really sitting in Santa's lap anymore. Like, usually the people who are sitting in my laps are at office parties.

0:47:28 Thomas: Yeah yeah oh

0:47:49 Lydia: Yeah, I know.

0:47:51 Thomas: Man, I wish we had a clip of that. Oh

0:47:53 Lydia: No, I mean, it was just a written interview. Yeah.

0:47:54 Thomas: Damn that's awesome, Santa gets really freaky in the interview. Like, okay, all right

0:47:55 Lydia: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And I have one more video to wrap us up in 2012. It's Ben Stein talking about how, as, oh

0:48:00 Thomas: Uh oh man, I love it the hell happened to Bent? Did he die?

0:48:10 Lydia: He hasn't been around for a long time. I don't know.

0:48:12 Thomas: What the I am just realizing, where the fuck is Ben Stein? I wonder if he was, yeah, is he like, oh, Trump is so stupid that he can't do it or no? Because, yeah. When's the last time you heard about Ben Stein doing anything? Okay. Ben Stein at the Nixon library. Sure. That makes sense. Never. Didn't he work in the Nixon administration? I think he did. I'm pretty sure. Yeah, I'm just looking. Ben Stine News. Know this is the topic of the show, but just because I was worried about the man, you know, we want to know as of February 2023. So, you Know, it's getting on a year ago, but Stein, this is from the New York Post headline. I miss when, quote, a large African-American woman was on Aunt Jemima's syrup. Rip.

0:48:14 Lydia: You looking it up? Oh, really? Sure. Oh, my God.

0:48:52 Thomas: So he's still, you know, he's still, uh, still active. We're getting sidetracked but this is worth it. This is fucking, I got to watch this.

0:48:54 Lydia: You know, Oh God.

0:48:59 Thomas: Oh, he looks horrible. Okay. So, he is pretty old.

0:48:59 Clip: I breakfast for dinner, Aunt Jemima yummy pancake syrup. Now this used to show a large African-American woman chef, but because of the inherent racism of America's corporate culture, they decided to make it a white person, or maybe no person at all. But I prefer it when it's a black person showing their incredible skill at making pancakes. So God bless you all, and have a good evening.

0:49:32 Thomas: Holy crap. I wonder if had a stroke. Like, I mean that in a serious sense. Well, he looked really bad too. So maybe that's why we haven't heard from him. I, how optimistic I am. I was like, oh, maybe he's like a never Trump. No, okay.

0:49:34 Lydia: Yeah. He sounds really bad. Wow. Oh yeah. No, it says that he, He voted for Trump. So, yeah.

0:49:45 Thomas: Well, fuck you. That's, so that's where he is. Okay. So, That's uh, Ben Stein now.

0:49:46 Lydia: Yeah. Not. So Yep, Yeah.

0:49:51 Thomas: Is this one back when he was in his prime?

0:49:55 Lydia: Yeah. Prime, quote unquote. 2012.

0:49:57 Thomas: Oh, wow. Yeah. He has really gone downhill.

0:49:59 Clip: Us now from Los Angeles, Ben Stein. Jewish guy thinks the whole war on Christmas is insane, and you've said it sometime

0:50:07 Thomas: I love, I like to think that, yeah, Bill O'Reilly just screams the, the race or ethnic group or religious group of whatever. Oh, we're having this guy on Muslim. And it's just like, it's like a Tourette's that he has.

0:50:07 Lydia: Jewish guy.

0:50:17 Lydia: Yeah.

0:50:18 Clip: Mr. Stein, right. I have, I've been saying it for a long time, I'm Jewish, all of my ancestors are Jewish, my son is Jewish, I don't mind people saying Merry Christmas to me, I like calling it a Christmas tree, it's a Christmas holiday, it's a Christian holiday, it is not a holiday holiday, it isn't an atheist holiday.

0:50:38 Clip: It an Christian holiday, but it is a holiday that atheists can celebrate certainly under the banner

0:50:39 Lydia: Yeah, it's not a holiday holiday, because

0:50:38 Thomas: It's not a holiday. What? You've said holiday a hundred times and you're saying it's not a holiday?

0:50:44 Clip: Absolutely and Jews can celebrate, everybody can have a good time, everybody can a have a great time, it the Holiday marking the birth of a man or a son we will call him the son of God who said peace on earth and on earth good goodwill to men, and what can possibly be wrong with celebrating the ideas of a person who said something like that? Well, let me just take it one step further, and then I'm going to ask you the why on it. Jesus of Nazareth was the most influential human being who has ever lived. That's beyond any doubt, right? I don't doubt it. Okay. So, of course, you would honor a person like that because what Jesus stood for was peace. Turn the other cheek, all of that. Forgiveness, forgiveness. Yeah. Okay.

0:50:50 Lydia: It's holiday, holiday.

0:51:12 Thomas: Jesus, yeah.

0:51:34 Thomas: All the stuff

0:51:35 Clip: So it's all good. As

0:51:35 Thomas: That we don't actually do or believe in, ever spouse. Anyway. Huh.

0:51:38 Lydia: Yeah. Yep.

0:51:39 Clip: They say in California, it's All Good. It's All good. But it isn't all good because now we have the secular progressives trying to remove Christmas, the word, the displays. Ways, even the federal holiday, they'd love to have it rescinded, from the public arena. Why? Why? Well, Bob Dylan said it best. There are a lot of people that have knives and forks, they have nothing on their plate, and they've got to cut something. There are

0:51:43 Thomas: No. Yeah.

0:51:43 Lydia: Do you say that, hon?

0:51:51 Thomas: Yep. Mm-hmm. Boy. He

0:52:21 Clip: God bless them. But there's nothing wrong with celebrating Merry Christmas. There's nothing right with having this be the predominant holiday in a predominantly Christian country. There's anything at all wrong with admiring the precepts Jesus Christ. There's something at all right with Christmas trees. There's definitely nothing wrong about having crushes. Nobody's being forced to bow down or

0:52:42 Thomas: Stopped even for, there's nothing wrong, yeah, by

0:52:42 Lydia: Yeah.

0:52:46 Clip: Worship anybody. Nobody's been forced to do anything against his will. If you drive by a crush, how are you possibly harmed by that? I mean, how can you possibly be harmed by that?

0:52:57 Thomas: The way, what, the imagery that was showing during, that was Christmas tree in the the White House, so yeah. In the place where the king of America lives, that's where we also have a Christmas tree even when it's a democratic president, so like what the fuck are you talking about. Anyway, seeing how bad he sounded 11 years ago makes me think, uh, he's actually, now, now I think about the Aunt Jemima video, he looks better than I would think. I

0:53:02 Lydia: Yeah. In a country full of Christians, you know.

0:53:26 Lydia: And then here we come to our last video from 2012. It's O'Reilly again, of course.

0:53:33 Clip: Is very, very real, and if you ask me, in addition to some grouchy, misanthropic, heathen atheists, it has to do with, at the root of it, it has do with two things. Abortion and the gay rights agenda, because Christianity is against those things, and it's subtle, but that's why it's so pronounced in recent years. In my, 100% agree. I absolutely agree 100% that it's the diminishment of Christianity is the target, and Christmas is the vehicle, because the secularists know their opposition to their agenda.

0:53:40 Thomas: Oh.

0:53:55 Thomas: Yeah, yeah, that's very subtle. Yeah, then

0:54:12 Lydia: Yeah

0:54:12 Clip: Legalized drugs is in that as well. It comes primarily from the Judeo-Christian traditionalist people. It's not so much a church, it's a mindset.

0:54:21 Thomas: Why isn't there a war on, like, Easter, you know? Weird. Or do they do that? Maybe they do, I don't know, God, this, these people.

0:54:23 Lydia: Yeah nothing I've heard about do

0:54:29 Clip: Do you agree with that, Godfellow, or is this way over your head?

0:54:31 Lydia: Did

0:54:32 Thomas: There's Guffo. Oh, that's a perfect comedic cut, yeah. Think we're going to have to call it there for the first part of our Hardcore History on the the War on Christmas, the ups, the downs, the battles, the, yeah, the Kenbury, yeah, Kenbury. We've covered up into the year 2012 in the war. And as you know, are a great many casualties to come. Some of the darkest moments bloodiest battles of the war, yeah.

0:54:35 Lydia: Yeah do on Christmas. It's the Ken Burns, you know.

0:54:57 Lydia: We've recolorized the footage.

0:55:01 Thomas: War on Christmas in color, but not red and green, because those were fucking banned, and, if I see you using red or green, yeah.

0:55:07 Lydia: They were banned. Oh my gosh. No-cos. This is the world for the no-cos! Dear old dad's crossover. Over yeah

0:55:14 Thomas: Oh wow. Wait, we are so dedicated to the war on Christmas that we had a son who can't really see red and green. Okay, that's how, so ask yourselves, yourselves, wokists. Are you as dedicated as we are? Maybe.

0:55:23 Lydia: That's why we were made Colonel yeah yeah we share a position

0:55:29 Thomas: Yep. Yeah, exactly. Us together. We're Colonel Smith. Yeah. Hi, we're Colonel. So we've got some great stuff for you. Not only do we have a second part in which we're going to discuss the latter years up until the present of some of the best War on Christmas segments.

0:55:47 Lydia: Current affairs, yeah.

0:55:49 Thomas: Yeah? We also had a guest comedian come on, an expert, whose name is Tom Curry, for even more hilarious O'Reilly and others bashing. Another Or O'Reilly video that explains what he thinks the mentality of us War on Christmas soldiers is. So that is a tremendous amount of fun. We had a great time. You know, it sort of like gallows humor when we're in the trenches of the war. Like we're just laughing it up. It's some of the darkest times when you can laugh the most on the War of Christmas. No, that was a ton of fun! That'll be on patreon.com/wherethereswoke and

0:56:04 Lydia: Yep yep we also got one of the most ridiculous War on Christmas stories with Tom too, um.

0:56:24 Thomas: Teaser, oh. It's the best, it's

0:56:28 Lydia: Yeah, so fun.

0:56:28 Thomas: So good. So that's what you have to look forward to next time on Where There Is Woke, the second half of the war. I'm, or we need, like, the, who's the normal, uh, Ken Burns voice is normally like a deep, like, male voice, actually.

0:56:41 Lydia: Yeah also like, can we get Laura Lenny for this, because I would be like into that, yeah.

0:56:41 Thomas: Oh yeah I'm Laura Linney, and this is the war of Christmas fuck Santa Claus, yeah, see you then.

0:56:47 Lydia: Yeah and this is the war on Christmas