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I would prefer not to be wished a Merry Christmas and when I lived in Lincoln, Nebraska I would often politely tell people I don't celebrate Christmas (but that, of course, has changed since I married a Christian). However, I don't think anyone has yet tried to indicate why someone might bristle at the greeting. What is the feeling or the experience behind it? Speaking for myself alone, and speaking hyperbolically, my preference not to be wished a Merry Christmas can perhaps be captured by a feeling at the moment (a brief moment to be sure) of being at least partially invisible to the Christmas greeter. I suppose it's similar to the way women might feel in a class, say, where they are a minority when the instructor greets the class with "Gentlemen."
I don't think encouraging or discouraging bristling gets to the heart of the matter. I doubt that there is a perfectly neutral greeting or that if there is one that it would be desirable to urge everyone to adopt it. I do think, however, that this is just an example--a very minor one to be sure but of a kind with more egregious, damaging ones--of people not reflecting on the quite general issue of how their conduct affects others, especially how it affects minorities. If Islam should one day become a supermajority religion in the United States, I do not think Christians would welcome being greeted by Muslims with whatever the appropriate holiday greeting is in Islam. As a Jew I wistfully wish that Christians would not wish me a Merry Christian nor Muslims in my hypothetical wish me an enjoyable Muslim holiday. But I would not now express this to either the Christian or the Muslim who did so.
I remember a discussion with Michael Perry once who insisted that "Merry Christmas" has become a secular greeting, if I remember his claim correctly. My short reply was: "Not to me."
Bobby
(Without my bad ole unreliable but familiar computer)
Robert Justin Lipkin
Professor of Law
Widener University School of Law
Delaware
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