Bugger Christmas

They’re closing down Woolworths in Jarrow, indeed all over the country; sacking in excess of some 30,000 workers. The company has gone into administration, with debts of £385 million. Saturday gone, the Jarrow branch had a sale on – 50% off everything, so naturally the place was choc-a-block, with queues stretching all the way back to the River Tyne (I know, I exaggerate, but you get the picture). People stood in the queue with their arms full, looking impatient and frustrated. Christmas only weeks away and these poor workers here looked sick of their lives, all of them hoping they can get through this period of unfettered, wallet-emptying consumerism with their sanity in tact.

The usual thing round here, bar the credit cards and the loan from the DWP social fund (that is if you’re on income support, otherwise you can fuck off and apply for a crisis loan, in which case they’ll tell you ever louder to “fuck off”) is the Provident loan. They give their loans to anyone, no questions asked and the interest rate is a staggering 68%. I know parents who have taken out a loan from the social fund as well as the “provi” loan. The former is interest-free and is deducted from your benefits at source. The two together amount to a hefty millstone when you’re struggling to survive on benefits.

So, if you’re on state benefits, it’s like your whole year centres on Xmas day, if not preparing for it then paying for it and having to do without essentials just to meet the loan agreements. You get your loans out just before Xmas and 50 weeks later you’re still paying them off and doing without other essentials throughout that period. I jest not – for many families, Jesus Christ, or rather what takes place in his name, has them skint year in, year out. I know parents who quite literally dread this time of year, who curse its approach. Do they know it’s Christmas? as Bob Geldof and friends once sang? Too fucking right they do – they pay for it every day of their adult lives.

And how this wonderful consumer society serves the poor; forever exposing the emptiness of our lives and kindly providing the means by which our lives can be enriched, proving that we too can enjoy happiness over Christmas, just like the well-to-dos. As the Citizen Advice Bureau has found, interest on this ‘happiness’ can rise to as much as 1800 per cent a year – a happiness that’s cheap at half the price…eh?

And just where the fuck would we be without the advertising industry who continually alert us to needs we never even knew we had and who constantly remind us that our lives are really less satisfactory than we had hitherto imagined? I looked through an electrical store recently and was amazed to find items I honestly never even knew existed. Jeez, where’ve I been this last year? Thank God for PSPs, Nintendos, ipods, male face creams and the myriad gadgets we have amazingly managed to live without for 2 million years. Just how the fuck did our species survive without them? Sheesh! Consider this - according to the Worldwatch Institute, we have used more goods and services since 1960 than in all the rest of human history! Have all of these pleasure-inducing goods contributed to a general human happiness? No, over the same period, 25-year-olds in Britain have become ten times more likely to be afflicted by depression. The WHO recently estimated that by the end of the decade depression will be the second commonest disease in the developed world.

The unrelenting onslaught of advertising exerts constant pressure on parents in particular who, fearful their kids will be labelled, belittled and humiliated if their pressies are not up to scratch when they compare notes in the school yard, are more than ready to satisfy the most outlandish wants and bugger the cost and inconvenience for the next 52 weeks. To hell if that present you’ve just paid £250 for will end up in a cupboard after a few weeks, the novelty having worn off – to be sold for £50 on ebay in a few months time – you just can’t let the neighbours know your hard up.

And the sad thing is, we all know Christmas marketing is just one big profit-oriented scam, benefiting manufacturers, stores, and huge corporations, while driving individuals into debt. We all know it’s a game of winners and losers. You don’t need a degree in ethics to realise that the Chrimbo "wish lists" and "gift exchanges", the giving in que demeans the real concept of giving. We know this annual orgy of consumption – 40% of what we buy is binned, unused – is detrimental to the environment, filling landfills with useless packaging and discarded gifts. We know Christmas means misery for millions of families, depression for hundreds of thousands – the Samaritans say they receive an 8% increase in calls between Christmas day and New Year. Yet still we tag along with the damned charade, still we passively acquiesce in the madness. Even socialists take it seriously, for fuck’s sake. I know SPGB members, my comrades, who actually send out the conventional Christmas cards.

Seems the workers just need this annual fix, this distraction from the rat race, even if they do know its all bollocks

Me, as ever I’m pissed off with the unified bleatings of friends, family and associates, who mockingly call me "Scrooge" when I fail to fully endorse their ritual orgy of consumption or utter the hackneyed “are you set for Christmas yet?” type of remark. For I’m one of those dole wallahs with kids and grandkids, a single-parent to boot, who can say “Jesus Christ has got me skint.” And being a devout atheist, a Marxist, it smarts just that little bit more when you know you have to fucking conform – and phone up the ‘provi woman’ - just to save your kin humiliation.

So forgive me if you hear me say “Fuck Christmas! Stick yer Christmas tree up yer arse and put a match to that wee straw-filled manger.” To be sure, the class war is not suspended at Christmas as the religiously devout and profit mongers would have us believe. Indeed, the shameless robbery of our class is only accentuated when there are profits to be had.

If you’re looking for that anti-Xmas card, make your own like I do and use these pics below, courtesy of class warfare. Click to enlarge. Happy solstice :-)

Fuck Christmas (2)

Shopping in Morrisons for vegetables with my son John on Saturday, I asked him to point out anyone in the supermartket he saw smiling or who looked happy – I wanted to reinforce my arguments that for the majority of people Christmas is not a time of cheerfulness. The place was packed, thrice the usual Saturday crowd, and most shoppers had trolleys that were overflowing, full of produce meant to make them happy. The queues at the till were predictably long and it was staggering to see just how much yer average shopper was spending. The couple in front of me spent £230.00 and looking at what they packed their bags with you just knew that most of that would be binned – unless they were intending on feeding the street. Neither did they look joyous or in festive mood.

Needless to say, we saw no smiling customers; not even the staff on the tills who looked quite pissed off with their lot and were no doubt wishing they were elsewhere. We went from there to South Shields and, walking up King Street towards the market, I again asked him to point out any smiling shoppers. But again we saw none, just shoppers looking anxious, frustrated and I assume wishing they were elsewhere.

“Nobody looks happy,” he said, at last.

I looked at him and smiled. We both agreed it was one huge wallet-emptying charade with the only ones really smiling, bar the wee bairns opening the presents on Xmas day, being the profit mongers who were clearly raking it in.

**********

Just came across these facts and figures. They’re a bit dated – scven years old – but they say much about the festive (or should that be ‘fetid’) season.

* In the seven days running up to Christmas, Asda estimates it will have sold 750,000 tonnes of Christmas pudding (1) - that’s equivalent to the weight of 1,875 jumbo jets (2).

* Marks & Spencer estimates it will sell more than 500 tonnes of sprouts over the Christmas period (3), that’s as heavy as 125 double decker buses.

* In preparation for the festive rush Tesco stores have stocked up with 2.25 million fresh and frozen turkeys, 72 million mince pies and 16 million Christmas crackers (4). If all these Christmas crackers were laid end to end, they would stretch for 3,082 miles – that’s the length of the entire UK coastline.

* Between 20% and 30% more glass jars and bottles are collected over the Christmas period (5).

* During the Christmas period, we’ll cook 6,711 tonnes of fresh whole turkeys and 12,472 tonnes of frozen whole turkeys (6).

* This Christmas the UK will consume almost 5.5 million jars of mincemeat, 12 million jars of pickles and 6.5 million jars of cranberry sauce all packaged in glass, but only a small percentage will get recycled (7). The weight of all these jars is equivalent to the weight of 59,500 Santa’s, weighing an average 18 stone each. And if all these glass jars were recycled, it would save enough energy to boil water for 60 million cups of tea (8).

* Royal Mail delivers around 150 million cards and packets during the pre-Christmas period. It is estimated that up to 1 billion Christmas cards (17 for every man, woman and child) could end up afterwards in bins across the UK (9). If all the Christmas cards were laid end to end they would span from London to Sydney and back more than five times!

* Over six million trees were bought last Christmas in the UK, most of which were thrown out after December (10) creating over 9,000 tonnes of additional rubbish, almost five times the weight of the London Eye (11).

* It is estimated that over Christmas as much as 83 sq km of wrapping paper will end up in UK rubbish bins, enough to cover an area larger than Guernsey (12) or enough to cover Hyde Park 33 times (13).

* The waste created in Britain over Christmas is equivalent to 400,000 double decker buses, stretching all the way from London to New York City! And even though half of this waste could easily be recycled, almost 90% will actually end up in the dustbin. Parties and presents account for a 30% increase in the number of bottles and cans binned, not to mention the Christmas trees, extra packaging, paper and card thrown out across the capital (14).

* Around 125,000 tonnes of plastic packaging are thrown away over Christmas - that's the equivalent weight of more than 50,000 festive polar bears!!! When buying gifts, try to avoid items that are excessively packaged (15).

* Around 4,200 tonnes of aluminium foil gets thrown away in the UK each Christmas (16).

Source (like I said, these stats are a bit dated, but I doubt there's been much improvement):

1 Guardian Unlimited, 24/12/02

2 Research Machines plc and based on an average jumbo jet take-off weight of approx 400 tonnes,i.e. 1875 jumbo jets

3 Guardian Unlimited 24/12/02

4 Guardian Unlimited 24/12/02

5 Waste Watch

6 British Turkey

7 British Glass

8 Waste Watch

9 Waste Watch

10 Durham County Council

11 BuyImage.co.uk

12 Waste Watch

13 Friends of the Earth

14 Recycle For Cheshire - http://www.crewe-nantwich.gov.uk/main.asp?page=1704

15 Durham County Council

16 Durham County Council

And…

The Downside of Christmas

Christmas pressures mean divorce in January

A study has shown that January 8th is the busiest day of the year for divorce lawyers when up to one in five couples will enquire about divorce after the pressures of Christmas. The enforced intimacy of Christmas, coupled with the start of a new year is thought to be the main trigger. The other peak in the year is after the summer holidays. Adultery, lack of sex, abuse and boredom were the main causes of divorce enquiries. Studies show that fewer than 40% of those who divorce will be happier.
Reported in the Daily Telegraph 8 January 2007

The cost of Christmas

The average Briton spends around £600 on presents alone at Christmas, much of that going on a credit card or loan. Around 10,000 people were predicted to end up bankrupt and insolvent in the three months following Christmas due to their spending over Christmas and the New Year. Recently, record levels of debt and those in serious financial trouble have been registered with 110,000 falling into insolvency in 2006, the first time the figure has topped 100,000.
Reported in the Daily Mail 3 January 2007

Fuck Christmas

There is a memorable scene in the film Liam, set against the backdrop of the 1930s depression in Liverpool, when Pa Sullivan, played by Ian Hart, rises to his feet during his son’s first Holy Communion and launches into the priest who is praising the assembled communicants.

Says the priest: “I'd like to say how nice the children look. The girls in their frocks..the boys in their lovely white shirts. You've done them proud.”

To the shock of the catholic congregation, Pa Sullivan rises at the back of the church and screams: “Wanna know how we paid for it? Jesus Christ has got us all skint, Father. You kit them out for Christmas, and you finish paying by Easter. You do it for Easter, and you're finished for Whit. You do it for Whit and it's Christmas again before you know it. And you're getting deeper and deeper. And Jesus Christ is a millstone round your neck...And tomorrow morning, all these clothes are going in the pawnshop.”

If I’m guilty of nicking and over-using one line from a film it has to be “Jesus Christ has got us all skint”. I uttered it the other day whilst talking to a group of local single parents, who were comparing their notes on the Christmas experience and how they’re all “up to their eyes” in debt accommodating their kids’ whims or Christmas; debt that will take a year at least to pay off, that’s if you don’t miss a payment.

The usual thing round here, bar the loan from the DWP social fund, is the Provident loan. They give their loans to anyone, no questions asked and the interest rate is a staggering 68%. I know parents who have taken out a loan from the social fund as well as the “provi” loan. The former is interest-free and is deducted from your benefits at source. The two together amount to a hefty milestone when you’re struggling to survive on benefits.

So, if you’re on state benefits, it’s like your whole year centres on Xmas day, if not preparing for it then paying for it and having to do without essentials just to meet the loan agreements. I jest not – for many families Jesus Christ, or rather what takes place in his name, has them skint year in, year out. I know parents who quite literally dread this time of year, who curse its approach. Do they know it’s Christmas? as Bob Geldof and co once sang. Too fucking right they do – they pay for it every day of their adult lives.

And how this wonderful consumer society serves the poor, forever exposing the emptiness of their lives and kindly providing the means by which their lives can be enriched and how they too can enjoy happiness over Christmas, just like the well-to-dos. As the Citizen Advice Bureau has found, interest on this ‘happiness’ can rise to as much as 1800 per cent a year.

Just where the fuck would we be without the advertising industry who continually alert us to needs we never even knew we had and who constantly remind us that our lives are really less satisfactory than we had hitherto imagined. Thank God for Nintendo 3, ipods, male face creams and the myriad gadgets we have amazingly managed to live without for 2 million years – just how the fuck did our species survive without them. Sheesh!

The unremitting onslaught of advertising exerts constant pressure on parents in particular who, fearful their kids will be labelled, belittled and humiliated if their pressies are not up to scratch when they compare notes in the school yard, are more than ready to satisfy the most outlandish want and bugger the cost and inconvenience for the next 52 weeks.

And the sad thing is, we all know Christmas marketing is just one big profit-oriented scam, benefiting manufacturers, stores, and huge corporations, while driving individuals into debt. You don’t need a degree in ethics to realise that the Chrimbo "wish lists" and "gift exchanges" demeans the concept of giving. We know this annual orgy of consumption – 40% of what we buy is binned, unused – is detrimental to the environment, filling landfills with useless packaging and discarded gifts. We know Christmas means misery for millions of families, depression for hundreds of thousands – the Samaritans say they receive an 8% increase in calls between Christmas day and New Year. Yet still we tag along with the damned charade, still we passively acquiesce in the madness. Even socialists take it seriously, for fuck’s sake. I know SPGB members, my comrades, who actually send out the conventional Christmas cards.

Seems the workers just need this annual fix, this distraction from the rat race, even if they do know its all bollocks

Me, I’m fed up with the unified bleatings of friends and associates, who mockingly call me "Scrooge" when I fail to fully endorse their ritual orgy of consumption or utter the hackneyed “are you set for xmas yet?” type of remark. For I’m one of those dole wallahs with kids and grandkids who can say “Jesus Christ has got me skint.” And being a convinced atheist, a Marxist, it smarts just that little bit more.

For more anti-Chrimbo musings from yours truly click here

Chrimbo Musings

The Christmas season nowadays starts round about early November, just after we have finished celebrating the barbaric execution of Guy Fawkes and his co-conspirators. That’s about the time the seasonal ads start appearing on your TV set, reminding you that within seven weeks you will be obliged to empty what little hard-earned money you have in your savings account and to spend the same on presents, the recipients of which, in 999 out of 1000 cases, never really need.

Christmas is undoubtedly a secular festival these days, all religious claims to it having long been conceded to the master class who use it as a midwinter morale booster for their exhausted workers, and a money- spinner. And how the masses warm to the event, numbing the pain of their alienation in an orgy of over-spending, over-eating and over-drinking!

The truth is the whole dammed thing is an expensive ritual - a wallet-emptying convention devoid of any real and spontaneous show of affection - that many, if asked, would rather do without. Just look how embarrassed people feel upon receiving an unexpected card or gift and having none to give in return – a situation that reinforces one of the basic tenets of capitalism: ‘you get nowt for nowt’. How many people feel uncomfortable about writing out Christmas cards to send/give them to people they think they are bound receive one from, people they are acquainted with only on a superficial level, fearing that such an unreciprocated act will signify meanness?

I do not mean to imply that humans are greedy and selfish and uncaring. Far from it! I am a socialist because I think exactly the opposite - that humans are innately good, that they work best when faced with the worst, that they will go to any lengths to alleviate the misery of others and that they have the ability to fashion a world in their own interests. But Christmas is all about giving on cue, about affection on demand, about a “season of goodwill to all men”. And I really do not think humans need to be reminded to give on cue, to have their affection synchronised to the Gregorian calendar, to show goodwill to all people. We have developed the advanced technological society we enjoy now exactly because we give and share and care without being asked to, or being reminded to, or having the open show of affection ritualised – indeed, our very survival as a species has always depended on it.

I believe capitalist society suppresses our emotions, stultifies just what it is to be really human and goes a long way to create a society of atomised individuals, pursuing their own selfish interests. In such an anti-human climate Christmas seems a bloody miracle!

Granted, kids love it – it’s all about magic, about a fat, unshaven, jolly geriatric in a red suit who, with his band of trustee, anal retentive, reindeer, can cover the earth’s surface area of 196,940,400 square miles within 12 hours whilst showering presents on the deserving. And, granted, the heartily religious love it – it’s a time for remembering when, 2,000 years ago, a 13 year old Palestinian lassie had a virgin birth, having been impregnated by a God (nowadays that gets you on the sex offenders register, as does entering the bedrooms of youngsters in a silly red disguise to leave presents).

But do we need Christmas? I can only conclude that until we have abolished capitalists from the earth and gods from the skies the answer has to be yes. If it was not Christmas, then another event which necessitates the suspending of the normal functioning of the rat-race, demanding the proverbial letting down of one’s hair and the partaking in an orgy of consumption, would take its place. It’s sad, but the exploited masses just need that fix. Religion has sod all to do with it.