The True Meaning

There's one thing I've not talked about much on this blog, and that's my religious beliefs, because it's quite a personal thing to me. But recent events have made me see the need to stand up and be counted amongst my brethren (and sistren, and undecidedthren).

I am, and have always been, a Santaist. I believe in Santa. I was brought up in a strict Santaist household. When I was eight I asked my mother if Santa really existed. I was given a sound hiding and sent to my room for two weeks. Harsh, but it taught me a not to question Santa's existence.

Like all Santaists at this time of year, I'm forced to suffer the attempted hijacking of the Christmas period (or Santerval as we call it in my household) by other religions trying to lay claim to it.

They do this by manipulating mainstream media and culture. By twisting Santaist beliefs and demeaning the image of Santa. Even institutions like the Royal Mail are guilty of this, witness this year's official stamp of Santa shitting down a chimney:



But it's in popular music that the anti-Santaists do the most damage. Everyone knows the most obvious Santa-bashing song, "Santa Claus is Coming to Town", featuring the lyrics "you'd better watch out, you'd better not cry" and "he sees you when you're sleeping". Suggesting that Santa is an fearsome figure who preys on the weak and lurks in the darkness of children's bedrooms, but there are more subtle examples.

Take Slade's perennial hit, "Merry Christmas Everybody". On the surface a cheerful yuletide anthem, but at it's heart deeply anti-Santaist in nature.

Take the opening lines:

Are you hanging up your stocking on the wall?
It's the time that every Santa has a ball.

Harmless enough, you might think, but look closely at the second line. Every Santa has a ball. Suggesting at the outset that there's more than one Santa. But, as we know from the Good Book:

"There is but one Santa and his name is Claus."*
145:12

The song goes on to say:

Do the fairies keep him sober for a day?

Note again the use of words. Not elves, the stalwart heterosexual helpers that we know actually assist Santa in his work at the north pole, but their effeminate cousins, the "fairies".

We know that Santa enjoys a drink or two, and that things might occasionally descend into light horseplay with the workers, but Holder paints a picture of year-round drink-fuelled homosexualist orgies, only curtailed when Santa is "sobered up" enough to fulfil his annual task.

"And you will be one of those Elves, and sit at my right hand, and help look after the reindeer when I am Not About, and you will be played by Dudley Moore in the film."
4:32

Holder goes on:

What will your Daddy do
When he sees your Mama kissin' Santa Claus?

He is now trying to suggest that, as well as rogering fairies for most the year, Santa is also attempting to break up the family unit by making moves on the mother.

"What will your daddy do?" is the question raised, the unspoken but overtly suggested answer being Daddy should kill Santa.

But Holder leaves the worst to the chorus:

Look to the future now
It's only just begun

On Christmas day, any true believer in Santa will be up to their eyeballs in debt and pissed out of their heads. Christmas isn't about looking to the future, the future is credit card bills and hangovers. It's about living in the hedonistic alcoholic present.

And may it always be so.

May the spirit of Santa be with you all this Santerval.

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*All quotes taken from the 1978 Carry On Christmas Album (Sid James Edition)