It's that time again!Follow

While it's technically both, it's definitely more about not offending atheist more than other religions. Maybe I should clarify with "major religions".



Not that it isn't happening, but I don't hear too much uproar about Santa, the Easter Bunny, Rudolph, Snowmen and Halloween decorations.

The Christians claim the holiday as it is supposedly the birth day of their savior and all. The culture has usurped it though. It's the only religious holiday that is recognized by the government as a national holiday.

It's all about stuff. Decorations are over the top. The flashing, blinking super-sized blow up lawn ornaments make the white tailed deer cry.

Correct. However, if a publicly funded platform is being provided for forms of speech, religious forms should not be excluded purely on the grounds that they are religious. A platform should neither be provided nor denied simply because of the religious nature of the speech. But that's exactly what we're doing when we allow Santa displays on public land, but not a nativity scene.



Same with Santa displays. We're not talking about what can be put on your own property, but whether the religious nature of some form of speech can be used to exclude its presence on public land even when other forms of speech are allowed.



And I disagree with that consideration. I mean, if we all agreed, there's be no point in arguing (well, not much of one anyway ).



Again, we're always free to put a Santa display on our front yards as well, but we don't argue that since we can do that, it's ok to prohibit them from public spaces, do we?



I disagree with this though. So try making an argument that doesn't rest on the assumption that your position must be correct (ie: circular).




Again, I disagree. There's no evil here at all. If cities want to have displays for Christmas (or whatever), they cannot make religion a criteria for acceptance of any given display. That's what the 1st amendment actually says. That it has been interpreted and manipulated over time and precedent until we apply it in the exact opposite manner is precisely what I'm arguing about and against.

You wouldn't justify limiting other forms of speech to just property people own, so why this one? By doing that, we're singling out just religious speech for additional restriction. Which would seem to be in direct violation of the 1st amendment. We should be treating religious speech exactly the same as any other form of speech. Why is it so hard to simply disregard the religious nature of something when making a decision? Is it offensive? A baby in a manger? I'd assume not. Is it something associated with the holiday being celebrated? Yes. Then allow it. Why is that hard?

We grossly over complicate this issue IMO.

Given the fact that many decorations include three wise men and baby Jesus and that Christmas, along with Easter, are the two biggest church attendance days, I will counter to say that your claim is BS that atheists like to say in order to make them feel better for being in the minority.

Of course there are many people who celebrate Christmas iconoclastic, but to argue that the majority has "usurped" it is misleading.