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| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas |
Blackface is weird in every century, because stupid rich white people think they can get away with it. After all, if you're corrupt and you know it, who better to look down upon than a people notoriously kicked around by an entire culture designed to abuse them? We had to fight our nation's bloodiest war just to protect humans from treating other people like cattle, with a lot less respect than that at times.
Sickness doesn't whack you in the face like a punch delivered expertly in a boxing ring. No, psychoses just creeps up on you, festering in those isolated pockets where such illness traditionally breeds: in the rural back-country, far from the modern civilized world, making it odder still that New Yorkers openly harbor such blatant prejudices against their own neighbors, as they have for generations.
First, it starts out with that one Jewish kid in school envious about the many Christmas gifts the pretty blond shiska girl gets; you know, the one he fetishes over to the extreme, without ever doing her the human courtesy of greeting her properly, with normal eye contact and a wide open smile that says "hello" to you, before you hear it spoken aloud. Dehumanization is a necessary part of any disenfranchisement program, and the seemingly sophisticated provincial that New York breeds is a particularly dangerous kind at that.
The pseudo-intellectual cosmopolitan knows all about local theater (heavy on the musically-inclined Jewish crowd), or the most recent New Yorker op-ed commentaries (heavy on the Jewish liberal afraid of what lies west of the Hudson River, where those scary burly "bridge-and-tunnel" people live), but you'd be surprised that they're most often more afraid of the savvy native living in their midst, with a much wider and well-balanced view of the world that we live in. And so the ball rolls further downhill, away from what they think is their right as a hometown crowd in our fair city. First, the retail stores closed (no shopping), as do our gentile restaurants (no "Chicken Parmesan" on our holiday), and then before you know it, every store will be closed in honor of the birth of one very special Jewish boy.
Because even as cynical Hollywood cranks out nasty movies (hey there, Canadian "Jew-Fro") based on your Jewish attendance during our holy day, they forget that the sole focus of this day is the birth of a humble Jewish boy born destined to create one of the world's greatest faiths. Isn't it ironic that the sneering drunken holiday some Jewish people have created to blaspheme our holiday is the very same one born of their faith? So, the next time you think it's harmless to dress up like a slut and gorge yourself during our religious holy day (ooo, you're so "naughty"), because you mistakenly thought Christmas is about shopping and some big fat guy in a red suit, let me assure, it is not, and we're watching you very carefully.
For more on the real religious traditions tied to our traditional (and modest) forms of gift-giving, I invite you to explore the actual histories tied to our faith. For instance, did you know that the man known throughout Scandinavia as "Saint Nicholas" (taking his name from an earlier saint*, as is our naming tradition) earned his title by giving dowry gifts of money to the poor girls in town, so as to hasten their marriages**? Because that's the truth. I know! Soooo much better than the dumbly-dressed bar slut. OK, then check this one out. The North Star was said to have served as a guide to "The Three Wise Men"*** (who were kings) by guiding them across the winter sky to converge upon Jesus' birthday place in Bethlehem****, then a Jewish city? No?! They brought gifts of gold (gelt), frankincense, and myrrh, and today we still burn incense in church and at home, during certain rituals.
So come on in! Everyone's invited to celebrate this party. You haven't been left out in the cold, at all. You have the whole world at your feet through His Birthday (of Our Savior), through the gift of faith that is our annual message of peace to you. Now, put down that beer, you stupidly-dressed bar slut. Ain't nobody care about yo' ass, ho.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Nicholas
** http://www.stnicholascenter.org/pages/three-impoverished-maidens/
*** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_Magi
**** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bethlehem
