To think that Christmas is just a nightmare for a lot of people.

Can I also remind people that labour have only been in power for about six months? Do you realise the damage this country is in under the last 14 years of the Conservative party? It’s going to take absolute years to sort this shit out but people don’t seem to have the patience to understand this.

@Frangywangywoowah
Yes I'd agree with that. It was rare to have fizzy juice in our house.
I wonder if fizzy juice is relatively cheaper than it used to be.

I think the royals have a different kind of dilemma….

Unless you have deeply held religious beliefs there is no requirement to celebrate Christmas. The tax payer certainly shouldn't be funding the need to give Christmas tat to kids.

Just do what the royals do and have small token "joke" presents.

Christmas has become a whole circus, ramped up by advertisers to tug at the heart strings of people to make them think what Christmas should look like.

Growing up as a child born in 1977 with a deceased father and little money, Christmas was a basic affair. My mum would put a couple of quid into a Christmas club each week to pay for food. It was the only time of year I ever had fizzy pop, for example so maybe what's the norm now were treats back then.

I was grateful for whatever presents I received...myself and friends were all pretty much the same. We kind of knew the life situation of each other and were accepting of that.

I remember my first Christmas years ago with my partners family. They were more affluent and I rang my mum up saying 'OMG, their Christmas is all from M and S'! It was another world to me that people would spend what they did on food alone.

I hate waste too
I hate being bought shite just to have a present. I'd rather something practical I need than just frivolous crap that will sit on a shelf until I get rid somehow. I'd rather nothing than a generic gift set. Gosh I sound a right whinger lol

Christmas is stressful. It's a huge consumer drive. Frantic buying of stuff. Just stuff.

I don't get what that symbolises to people.

The family gathering, the wonderful meals, the shining trees, the rest and recuperation for some is all amazing. I love that part.

The frenzied gift buying is peculiar behaviour.

People are ok with the government providing a safety net and a bit of help. But they aren't OK with providing a level of luxury on that safety net.

My line is nobody should be relying on food banks but at the same time people in full-time work shouldn't even be relying on benefits.

And normalising people eating frankenchickens and loss-leading vegetables from supermarkets that shaft farmers for profit.

I know I sound a bit 'freedom for Tooting!' but it's all a bit shit really.

So people are not ok with government giving people a bit of help, but are ok with people relying on food banks?

I work in the voluntary sector and have spent plenty of time volunteering at charitable Christmas activities, some very good. But a few days of donated food and cheer won’t make up for systemic failures of the other 360 odd days of the year.

And the vast majority of people would rather not be taking charity.

It's become an overhyped commercial mess. Try not to buy into the advertising. And despite what pp says, kids don't go on about what they received for Christmas when they get back to school - it's largely forgotten by then.

Unfortunately, poverty is absolutely normal.

The UK is really quite bad at managing it though.

YABU to say the taxpayer should be funding should be giving out Christmas bonuses to people on benefits,

I mean it would be better if benefits provided a reasonable standard of living, including a few Christmas presents for the 4 million children in the UK living in poverty. But we're not getting there any time soon so a bonus seems sensible.

Christmas is what you make it, it's never been a level playing field, presents are not a right they are a luxury.

YABU to say the taxpayer should be funding should be giving out Christmas bonuses to people on benefits, but I agree with you that Christmas is a huge expense every year that I'm sure many people really struggle to afford.

My MP sent out an email yesterday asking for people to donate to the local food bank, because over the past year donations have dropped by 10 tonnes apparently! No doubt because the CoL crisis is biting harder and harder with each passing year and everyone's bills are going up and up with the end of the energy price cap, water bills going up, council tax going up, and wages for most people stuck at the same level they were 10 or 20 years ago.

I agree that the Labour govt has done nothing except make things worse. They're supposed to be the party of the poor, but all they've done is enrich train drivers and shaft everyone else.

Absolutely! As others have said Ireland do and I think pretty much always have, and I'm glad they do.

Bit of a weird post OP. Christmas is hard for lots of people for lots of reasons, but I don't know why you're putting that at Labour's door, they've been in about two minutes.

We have stopped presents for anyone but the 2 young grandchildren.We don't buy presents for each other. We say yes to the group meals we want to attend and no to those we don't. Christmas day will be just the 2 of us. No roast dinner. We have bought lots of treats and cheese and nice things to eat. We'll see the grandchildren on Boxing Day. Absolute bliss. Light the fire ,enjoy Christmas telly. We aren't grinches. We've seen all the different bits of family in the run up to the day. The house is full of twinkly lights and Christmas trees. We take the bits we want . We are living our lives not an Instagram life.

Christmas has become over commercialised I agree. However, it is down to each individual how they chose to deal with it.
I can never understand why the shops are so busy. Lots of people are lucky enough to be invited out for dinner on Christmas Day and Boxing Day, so why are they in the shops buying enough food to feed dozens of people?
I absolutely disagree that benefits of any kind should be increased. No wonder those who work to pay for it all are getting angrier. Why on earth should the tax payer ( who often are hardly any better off) work harder and receive less to pay for those who do not work ( or work minimal hours?)
If you can’t afford it you don’t get it was how I was raised.
We were poor and my mother worked full time all her working life, yet I still had wonderful Christmas’s.
Stop making it about material possessions. Try making it about spending time with those you care about.
I’m tired of people moaning about how they can’t afford this and that, yet they drive whack off gas guzzling new cars. They spend god knows how much on having their nails and eyelashes done, not to mention other treatments. Their kids where expensive designer clothes yet they moan about not having money left for essentials.
Christ, we didn’t even have a flaming house phone when I was a child. My mother worked full time and we didn’t have a phone. Never mind bloody take aways or the latest gadgets.
So what if you work and receive UC.
Doctor seriously think it’s the extremely wealthy who will be penalised to lay for your extra benefits? Get real. It’s the working population who are already squeezed.

I think avoiding social media would make Christmas more enjoyable. Seeing people argue over what they’ve spent is vulgar and takes away from what Christmas is supposed to be out. I have no doubt the same people will take their tree down Boxing Day and move onto the next thing.

It would avoid the pressure too. Just do what you can and ignore everyone else’s way.

Are they?

Agree with this to an extent. I went and did our shop for the week on Thursday and while the meat was relatively expensive the vegetables were ludicrously cheap. We are having:

Mixed roasted veg (potato, carrot, parsnip)
Sprouts
Mashed swede
Broccoli
Red cabbage with shallots & Apple

All above veg were 8p from Aldi/Lidl. Apples were £1.19. I got 2 lots of sprouts, broccoli, swede & parsnip so that’s £2.31 for all the veg for 10 people.

If you needed to keep overall spend low you could get something other than turkey (large chickens I think were £4 or so).

That said it’s not the cost of any one aspect of Christmas but more the cumulative expense of all the things in the run up, the gifts, the special food etc. So any one (or two) people can likely manage ok but not all of them in one go.

It affects lots of folk, many won't readily admit it though.

A lot of people here comfortably normalising poverty….

The thought of children not having presents does make me feel very sad, but I don't think people on UC should get a Xmas bonus. It's a nice thought but unfortunately, I know people who would use the money on a jolly time for the adults instead.

When my children are overcome with excitement about Christmas, I feel extremely grateful that they will have something to be excited for. It breaks my heart knowing others will not and the distress that will cause the parents too.

Did you read the whole post?

I didn't say it isn't happening, I know it is. But on mn, I don't think many of us live like that.
Certainly it doesn't at all reflect any of the women I know.