Rant on Christmas

 For most Canadians - the annual ritual/gluttony of too much food and too many presents is - thankfully - just about over for another year. Millions of Canadians have spent the last few days visiting friends and relatives, or being visited by them - eating enough food to feed twice perhaps three times as many people and opening truck loads of presents - mostly made up of items they didn’t need. Thousands and thousands of Canadians will be paying off the debt generated by this spurge in spending for months. All of this done in a futile attempt to somehow recreate an image of Christmas that, in fact for most of us, never existed.

The actual amounts of how much people spent this year on Christmas presents will take some months to be tabulate.  However Statistics Canada has published the results from 2014.

• $416.3 million — The value of toys, games and hobby supplies, including electronic games purchased at large retailers in Canada in December 2014, up 185.9% from average monthly sales of $145.6 million for this category in 2014 and up 51.2% from November 2014.
• $364.3 million — The value of computer hardware and software purchased at large retailers in Canada in December 2014, up 80.4% from average monthly sales of $202.0 million for this category in 2014 and up 36.9% from November 2014.
• $255.1 million — The value of small electrical appliances purchased at large retailers in Canada in December 2014, up 91.7% from average monthly sales of $133.1 million for this category in 2014 and up 51.6% from November 2014.
• $166.2 million — The value of cosmetics and fragrances purchased at large retailers in Canada in December 2014, up 78.2% from average monthly sales of $93.3 million for this category in 2014 and up 58.2% from November 2014.
• $192.8 million — The value of sporting goods purchased at large retailers in Canada in December 2014, up 32.7% from average monthly sales of $145.3 million for this category in 2014 and up 81.4% from November 2014.
• $122.8 million — The value of jewellery and watches purchased at large retailers in Canada in December 2014, up 139.7% from average monthly sales of $51.2 million for this category in 2014 and up 113.8% from November 2014.
• $71.1 million — The value of cameras (still and digital) and related photographic equipment and supplies purchased at large retailers in Canada in December 2014, up 122.7% from average monthly sales of $31.9 million for this category in 2014 and up 77.5% from November 2014

While it is of course impossible to know how many of these purchases would have been made even if was not the Christmas season, it is clear that millions of dollars are spent in the month of December on Christmas type presents. The absurdity of spending so much money - money that we may not have should be self evident. Should be …. but clearly it is not.

I struggle with the very thought of Christmas for a number of reasons, but the gluttony, the sheer excesses of food and presents disturbs me the most. We, on social media, publicly grieve for the suffering in Syria or a second destruction of infrastructure through natural causes and human ineptitude in Haiti; but we are comfortable in blaming someone else for these unfortunate events or at the least expecting someone else to fix them. We are comfortable from the safety of our living rooms to bemoan the state of the world - but we are prepared to do little to make the needed changes in our lifestyles that could start to address some of the fundamental questions of inequity that drive some of the wars that cause such destruction.

While a massive infusion of cash could not solve all or even some of the world’s problems, surely the near billion dollars spent in Canada on Christmas related presents would go a long way. If all of the western world did the same thing - who knows what would happen?