Never really been a huge fan of Christmas. Something has always bugged me about it, but I've never been quite able to figure out what.

I've thought about all the reasons people - especially leftists - don't like Christmas. Like, the consumerism aspect can be annoying. But tbh I don't know anyone who actually is focused on spending money on people. I really only see people I know worry about gift-giving because they want to give something meaningful, myself included. It can be stressful and overall I kinda wish gift-giving wasn't a part of Christmas, but it doesn't really bother me. Stores obviously push you to buy stuff but really, when isn't that the case under capitalism?

There are other aspects of Christmas I really don't like - the music and how long the season drags out in particular. But those are admittedly just "me" things. There are a lot of people who like that part of Christmas, and I'm firmly in the "let people enjoy things" camp. So while these aspects might bug me personally, there is something else - something social - that feels off with Christmas.

But then a couple weeks ago, I was watching another "Christmas special" kids show that emphasized "Christmas is special time with the people we love" message, and I started thinking through something: I think what bothers me about Christmas is that it seems there is this massive social effort to resuscitate a sense of social belonging that capitalism itself has killed.

In order to survive, capitalism has completely and totally obliterated our social fabric and has turned us all into individualistic atoms. It had to do this. The social fabric is what allows us to experience not only common humanity, but common struggle. We are social creatures and we need some sort of social connection. But social connections are a threat to capitalism, so it must be destroyed. We need to be mobile workers who move away from the family and social connections we form. We spend all our time working so we can't form social bonds. The single family residence is considered the only way to live if you have the means. Unionizing or even just viewing our co-workers as group that should collectively act has been demolished.

So capitalism rips apart our social fabric in order to reproduce itself. But... we are social creatures. We all know something is missing. So to help assuage that angst, capitalism has "invented" modern Christmas. Modern Christmas involves telling people that for one day or one season, yes everything is totally fine. Having social connections is good. Of course, we are not actually given anything that helps improve our social connections. But our rulers deem that for a few weeks, we can have the vibes of a functioning social life, as a treat. They take the corpse of a healthy social fabric and prop it up and pretend it's alive, a la Weekend at Bernie's.

That's really the point of the Hallmark movies. That the point of the news highlighting feel-good stories about the holidays. Of every TV show having a "Christmas special" once a season that emphasizes that caring about others is what matters. I mean, of course those things are good. But it's an effort to create something artificial in place of something real.

Christmas is capitalism's social MacGuffin. We supposed to think about our loved ones this one time of year because it's Christmas and that's what Christmas is. But Christmas I think is just what's evolved into our release valve. Put all our energy in making one day matter so we don't think about the other 364 where we are alienated from each other. It's why every time we hear platitudes about "Christmas is a special time of the year" in the media, it rings hollow.