On last night's televised reality show, "The Great Christmas Light Fight," contestants across the country (who apparently lost their minds years ago decorating their homes for Christmas) were judged, with one entry ultimately crowned the winner. Since I happened upon it while channel surfing during commercials on the news channels I didn't see much, but I saw enough. Too much, in fact, since I came away feeling depressed that four families had squandered many, many thousands of dollars on useless crap to surround their unspectacular, middle-American suburban homes with all the yuletide geegaws one can find in any Walmart, Michael's, Christmas Shoppe, Target and Home Depot. We are not talking designer stuff here.
If they had donated all the money spent, or at least the $50,000 Grand Prize, to homeless shelters or Toys for Tots or area soup kitchens or their local hospital or any damn charity out there, then the original intent of "the Christmas spirit" might have been honored. But instead, the whole show was an ode to capitalism, and a sickening one at that.
There were acres and acres of of lights; one proud homeowner boasted his front-yard tree had 70,000 of them! Every house exhibited the same sad theme: A KITSCHY CHRISTMAS. There were rows and rows of inflated Santas lining specially built cement walkways, and robotic elves that moved up and down and from side to side, grinning that scary-puppet grin. A full complement of reindeer on the roof pulling Santa's sled showed up, as if it were so original. There were full-sized train cars decorated with giant candy canes, garlands of greens and oversized tree ornaments. As for trees, a few reached for the sky. Some were tall enough to require renting a cherry picker to decorate it. (I bet that wasn't cheap.)
On the religious end, lest we forget why we're all here, there were the usual mangers with the Baby Jesus and the Three Wise Men on camels. But mostly it was glitzy, glaring, tacky lighting of cartoonish depictions of everything Christmas. Oddly enough, or maybe not, all the contestant families responsible were without exception obese, which tells you something about their ongoing commitment to overindulgence.
Oh for a nation of ascetics who are all fit and in good health and spend their Christmas money giving to charity. That's my holiday dream, and a reality show I could seriously endorse.
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| Somebody's front lawn. |
If they had donated all the money spent, or at least the $50,000 Grand Prize, to homeless shelters or Toys for Tots or area soup kitchens or their local hospital or any damn charity out there, then the original intent of "the Christmas spirit" might have been honored. But instead, the whole show was an ode to capitalism, and a sickening one at that.
There were acres and acres of of lights; one proud homeowner boasted his front-yard tree had 70,000 of them! Every house exhibited the same sad theme: A KITSCHY CHRISTMAS. There were rows and rows of inflated Santas lining specially built cement walkways, and robotic elves that moved up and down and from side to side, grinning that scary-puppet grin. A full complement of reindeer on the roof pulling Santa's sled showed up, as if it were so original. There were full-sized train cars decorated with giant candy canes, garlands of greens and oversized tree ornaments. As for trees, a few reached for the sky. Some were tall enough to require renting a cherry picker to decorate it. (I bet that wasn't cheap.)
On the religious end, lest we forget why we're all here, there were the usual mangers with the Baby Jesus and the Three Wise Men on camels. But mostly it was glitzy, glaring, tacky lighting of cartoonish depictions of everything Christmas. Oddly enough, or maybe not, all the contestant families responsible were without exception obese, which tells you something about their ongoing commitment to overindulgence.
Oh for a nation of ascetics who are all fit and in good health and spend their Christmas money giving to charity. That's my holiday dream, and a reality show I could seriously endorse.
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