would you cancel Christmas if you could?

[ffsfindmeausername]

It always surprises me each year when engaging in conversation with people about Christmas at how many people say they really dislike Christmas, myself included if I'm honest. Everyone seems to say the same things that it's so stressful,expensive, pressure to make everything magical etc. Lots seem to say they wish Christmas didn't exist! I also feel this way and I actually dread Christmas coming around each year and feel huge relief once January comes around.
How many actually feel this way and if there was a national vote to cancel Christmas then would you vote yes?

I believe Christ was God incarnate and his birth was part of God’s plan for our salvation so absolutely not! Could do without the roast though it always makes me feel very lethargic.

Not cancel it completely, but during lockdown we scaled it right back and we loved it. We’ve never gone back. It’s no longer a massive stress. I don’t throw away tonnes of uneaten food on January 2nd. I don’t get worked up about table decorations, or finding 12 types of cheese. We still have presents (though not all the extra tat), a lovely meal, laughs and games with the family, and a few drinks. It feels very liberating.

Yes. (Or just keep it as a day of religious observation for those who actually believe. Nothing else).

I feel like saying Yes, because to me it's just work, expense and obligation, but as someone said upthread, all societies have a winter celebration, and perhaps life would feel a bit flat without it ... and maybe it's a good thing to have to buy presents for one's nearest and dearest every so often and give them a show of love.

Yes
I give it my emotional and financial all but only for my children

I find it all too much tbh. Would like to just do gifts for kids and scrap adult presents altogether. With kids and ageing parents - when you end up being the one responsible for all the shopping, cooking, hosting, gift choosing, buying, wrapping etc etc etc it’s a real pain!

Used to love Christmas, but our parents have all died now and the children/step children are scattered. Plus, being a blended family - DH has a domineering ex wife - difficulties arise now there are grandchildren on his side, she always wants Christmas with them. We don't want to cause any problems for his DC so try to step back to take the pressure off them.

I feel sad that we'll not have another Christmas with our whole family, and uncomplicated time with all the children. So I'd cancel Christmas in our house, it feels like going through the motions for the sake of it now. Completely understand why others love it though.

I love it, all my friends do to. I’ve put my tree up to date and quite a few of my girlfriends have this weekend as well! Boyfriend enjoys some of the Christmas socialising but isn’t huge on it. We dont have kids so can do what we want. Enjoy the markets, festive meals out with friends, cosy Christmas film nights, going carolling at the local park. For Christmas Day, my mum hosts but I help with a lot of the potatoes/veg and bake something for desert. It’s all just nice and simple which is maybe why I like it- nothing about it stresses me out.

No.
I love Christmas and time with family.
Even more so now that dcs are at Uni.

I used to love Christmas.. Love buying people presents they would like, putting thought into homemade gifts etc and decorating the house lovely.. Cooking multiple meals for people so they had a lovely Christmas, chilled stress free time and felt loved and appreciated....

Then I realised that nobody was doing that for me... and suddenly Christmas was never the same again.

We now go away for Christmas (me, hubby and kids) and we don't entertain any family over the festive period, I don't buy or make gifts for anybody other than my hubby and kids anymore and we just either eat out or have a buffet tea depending on where we go.

I really want to love Christmas again but unfortunately the stress of other people's crap has ruined it for me

You already can skip it, it's not compulsory!

We had to cancel it because my ASD DS saw a Christmas advert once and is now phobic. The amount of time and stress it saves is unbelievable. It's like I have four whole months extra in the year.

I used to especially loath Christmas fairs at school, which are basically super-spreader events and now DS is home schooling we don't have to weather those either. It's quite good really.

DS says his absolute favourite is rain and he wishes there was more of that. He says it is very peaceful.

It starts too early. I soukdn't cancel it but l would rather it wasn't rammed down our throats from October

I think the problem is that everybody feels they have to do it, including all the supermarkets and the adverts on tv and the schools and all those nativity plays and fairs and Gawd knows all what. It's just so tiring.

No. People can control how much they spend and enjoy themselves etc, no one is having stress forced on them. It’s a warm, colourful and friendly distraction from the long, grey and cold winters in the UK! Trust me, you’d all be miserable if it got cancelled.

I'd cancel the Christmas dinner! Everything else I love. I don't like Christmas dinner much and I don't like that I always end up cooking it.

I'd def get rid of new year Hogmanay celebrations instead! It's just so over rated! I really dislike it and on the occasions I've tried to do something special it turns out pretty crap. One yr we had a ticketed event and hotel booked in city centre and the event was cancelled at 6pm on the night due an incoming storm. I had no partywear with me as was going to be outside and we had nowhere to go. Ended up in some rubbish pub. Another time went to Edinburgh and again it was just a bit of a letdown and rather expensive. Weather didn't help, was raining all night and very cold.

I would. I used to love it when my son was at Santa age etc. it makes me sad that I used to love it so much. My personal circumstances don’t help but that aside, advent calendars start before Halloween, I’m not a die hard traditionalist but when I see advent calendars that have nothing to do with. Christmas in any way it’s really depressing. And don’t even start me on these Christmas Eve boxes! Now we need pre-present presents? There’s the same crap competition for ‘the best’ Christmas advert and everyone will find offensive for one reason or another at them all. The shops are shut for 24 hours max if that, it never fucking snows, Christmas crackers are shit now with the ‘tasteful metal crap’ in them ( you don’t even get a fucking surprise because there’s pictures on the back of the box of what’s in them in case anyone feels let down or short changed) and someone will moan about the bang upsetting their Guinea pig to the point that it needed sedatives, there’s no Top Of The Pops proper Christmas number 1, the Queen isn’t even alive anymore and I’m not even a royalist, but ffs, and fairy lights for Christmas trees are shitty LED hateful souless gumph (even the ‘warm’ ones) and even though I love my airfryer I also hate it because I feel like I miss my oven. And I don’t even watch actual telly anymore so there’s no need for a Radio Times or the big pull out from the paper I dont get now either. It’s just crap now!

Yes - NYE is usually a disappointment (in the UK with our weather, anyway)

I wouldn't cancel it but I wish it was more chilled. I never feel like I'm doing it right. I don't know if it's a social media thing but it just seems like so much pressure. When I was a child, our tree and trimmings went up around 10th December and that's when Christmas started. Now there seems to be this thing where it starts on 1st November and there's this pressure to get the tree up and unless you're having the best time ever (!) with Christmas Eve boxes, matching PJs and handmade ornaments then you're not doing it right.

Have you ever tried saying "no" to Xmas? It's pretty near impossible unless you can use shift work as an excuse.

I personally hate it, but I understand why it's there. It serves a useful function. So even if I don't like Christmas, I still acknowledge that my winter as a whole would be worse without it.

Without Christmas winter would seem really long and there would be nothing to break it up. Christmas allows us all to focus on Christmas for all of December, skimming through the worst of the cold and darkness. It's literally a celebration to light up the darkness. Once it's over you only have 60 days or so until spring is on the horizon, much more manageable, and every day the darkness creeps back a little later.

Also, it's the only time of the year where everyone in our culture accepts that if at all possible, no work gets done.

For extended family, yes.
I wish it was just something our household could enjoy together without the pressures of keeping parents, grandparents, uncles, etc happy.

Every year I think "never again" yet every year I get excited all over again.

But for us Christmas involves travelling abroad to see family so with two small kids and anxiety that gets mostly triggered by being away from home, it's always very hard going for me.

But I still love Christmas, especially the lead up to it. Christmas songs, decorations, nativity at school, just joy in the air. Winter would be depressing without it.

Then I realised that nobody was doing that for me... and suddenly Christmas was never the same again.

Christmas is just another way to exploit women's unpaid labour in the home. Don't believe me? Who organises all the food buying, the cooking, the presents from "John, Jane, and the kids" to aunts/cousins/etc, the present wrapping, and whips the kids into writing thank you notes afterwards?

Yes. I am only going through the motions because it’s expected of me to do it all but I don’t enjoy any of it. I’d much rather not have to be thinking of presents etc for what is essentially a fake day.