Thursday, January 13, 2011

Cultural perspectives and questionnings

I was randomly chatting with a work colleague this morning. I had left a comment in a game we play on facebook - it said : Bonsoir - Good evening - Jo estét ( which means good evening in Hungarian ) and we were discussing about how during the just past Holidays she never said Merry Christmas because it became politically incorrect as of recent ! I had left plenty of Merry Christmas wishes myself and I couldn't care less about who got offended or not.

Here in Québec we are plagued with something called "accomodements raisonables" - which can roughly be translated into "reasonable accommodations" or the art of being friendly, serviable and politically correct towards everyone, every culture and every nation possible which habits our vast territory, land - country.

I got shocked though.

I cannot say Merry Christmas in my country - free country, modern country, rich country. Canada. Why ? Because it's politically incorrect and it can hurt the feelings of non believers, non practionners and folks of other faiths and religions.

On the other side of the world, in Saudi Arabia, they decorated an 11 million dollar worth in a public place. Why ? Because it's the symbol of the Christmas holidays, it's fashionable and in my opinion - if they have the budget, why not ? They are actually showing an opening towards another culture, towards other habits of a particular time in the year.

Which topic brought us to the next.

It is now allowed by companies for the muslim praticant workers to take of time 5 times per day to pray but it is forbidden for the Christians and for the others to say Merry Christmas during the holidays at the end of the year, to enjoy the cheer, the spirits, the jolly mood as we have known it for centuries.

In the past - about 40 years ago - morning prayer ( christian prayer, catholic prayer ) was a mandatory thing in gatherings, meetings and schools.

Today it is forbidden, because we push the layman angle.

Yet ! the Muslim who practice their faith are granted 5 times per day time off their work to pray, because their faith asks for such devotion and because we are such an open minded country and government and culture - we allow it, we reasonably accommodate and we make new laws and rules to try to please everyone ... at the Very Clear and Destructive Erasing and Extermination of our own !

If anyone travels to countries where culture, faith and religion rule, the traveller is oblived to follow the rules of what ever the tradition asks for : veil, body all covered up, etc., and travellers agree without a protest.

Here, in a free country, agglomerate of all cultures of the world - we have such loose laws and regulations that we do not have a solid basis of our own. We do not have a solid standing rule and law that says : this is allowed, this is forbidden in this country, this is how you you behave if you travel or live here. We allow anything and everything and we are shocked when our own culture fades away, swallowed by the incoming cultures.

I do not blame them, I do not stand against their culture. But there are limits of how friendly and willingly idiots we are, or can be.

I think it's unfair that we bend to every possible rule in other countries and let our own culture, religion and faith just fade away !

I find it completely unfair to be forbidden to have Christmas trees in airports, to say Merry Christmas and to sing Christmas songs because it can politically incorrect towards other cultures.

I ask - so then, how come that Chinese New Year is not offensive to our culture and customs ? How come we do not say nothing against Bar Mitzvah, and pushing it further, we do not even educate our own kids to have their Catechism done ? Are we that ashamed of our Christian faith and religion ? I am aware of the Silent Revolution here in Québec in the 1960's but is that a reason to completely shove off our culture ? How come Muslim faith followers can take off time 5 times a day to follow their religion's rules and we think that a simple Christian prayer is an offense before a meeting ? Since when did an immigrant religion became better than the local indigenous one ?

And this is valid for Christians to try to impose their faiths in villages in Laos, China, Vietnam and all over the world where Missionaries go.

Each culture and country, each gathering of people, should have and be proud of their own faith and traditions, keep it and share it, but not impose it upon other countries, gatherings of people and communities.

We are slowly killing diversity and going back to the eternal fight of "my faith is better than your faith and my god is stronger than your god" and we do wars and conflicts, invoking those gods and kill, torture and harm the innocent.

I say it's all Bullshit !

oh and ...

Merry Christmas and may God bless your New Year !

No comments: