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Christmas Under Attack… Over Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
By Julie | December 12, 2008
Last week Marc posted about Christmas music that isn’t really about Christmas. In his post he gave credit to “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” as being a Christmas song. But, I think it’s a bit of a stretch to call it a religious song.
Unfortunately one mother in North Carolina disagreed. Her daughter is in a public “secular” school. During music class they are learning “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” to be performed for a concert. Participation in the concert is optional; participation in the music class is not. So, the mother complained to the school board, and dragged lawyers into matters. Don’t you just love that our tax money goes into such worthy causes! Why did this mother complain? She felt because “Rudolph” mentioned “Christmas” and “Santa” that is was a Christmas song, and that made it religious.
The school board disagreed that “Rudolph” is a religious song and “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” is still allowed to be in the upcoming concert. I can’t imagine how someone could possibly claim Santa Claus is religious; in fact, many religious people are offended by Santa. And, the past few years our culture has gone out of it’s way to claim even “Christmas” is not religious. Many non-religious people celebrate the holiday as a cultural event, not a tribute to the birth of their savior.
So, what did this mother hope to accomplish by her complaints? She is Jewish, and decided if a Christian song was going to be a part of the concert, a song about Hanukkah should be included too. Also, she did not want her daughter to hear the words “Santa” or “Christmas” and be confused. Something tells me not allowing her to sing “Rudolph” is going to keep her daughter from hearing those words, but I wish her luck with that. Here’s a video about the story…
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