Muslim Christmas Advert

[IHATEPeppaPig]

Apparently people are outraged by the Tesco Christmas advert featuring Muslim women exchanging gifts and it’s causing daily mail readers to implode.

It literally is 2 seconds of the advert and is women in hijabs handing over a Tesco’s bag - Tesco’s tag line is #everyonewelcome

I’m not a person of faith and I celebrate Christmas why is it seemingly unacceptable for others to celebrate it? AIBU to be annoyed at the outrage and think most of the people who are livid about it are probably hypocrites who won’t go to church on Christmas anyway?

So when I worked somewhere with Muslim colleagues who always loved joining in with secret Santa....should we have excluded them?!

The greatest part of British culture imo, is the massive melting pot of different cultures we have. We have school children of all backgrounds making tealight holders for Diwali. Fireworks all over at Chinese new year. Gift exchanging at Christmas.

It's amazing that we can all share and enjoy each others cultures! I wish we made a bigger thing in this country of more festivals and holidays. It's beautiful to come together and learn about things that are important to our neighbours and friends.

The day that ALL people stop believing in their imaginary leader(s) and trying to please them by wearing certain clothes, jewellery or adopting meaningless practices would be the best one ever.

So fuck the Daily Mail readers.

Nadiya Hussain got a lot of hate for daring to talk about Christmas, didn't she?

Again, fuck em. If my DM's partner is a good example of one, they just don't have anything much else to worry about.

As people here are saying, Christmas for a lot of people is more about family/friends than tied to any particular religion anyway.

CuppaSarah yes. DSs school learnt about the Hindu festival of colours (sorry the name has escaped me) .

He had an absolute blast.

Christmas for me is a time for family. If you don't belong to a faith in the UK, then there aren't many national festivals - whereas some countries have Thanksgiving, Independence days etc. Christmas is one time of year I can look forward to as someone who does not have a faith but would like that community spirit and a feeling of festivity.

I have family in Turkey. Ds is Christian, ddil is Muslim and dgd will be whatever she chooses as an adult. They have a tree and stockings and presents delivered by Noel Baba. They watch a carol service and have a Nativity set.

Re halal turkeys, I thought most meat sold in UK supermarkets was actually halal? That's what I read on here. I mean not ham, obviously, but the non-pig stuff. Because abbatoirs have the prayer track playing in the background and most UK slaughtering techniques would comply with halal requirements anyway.

Not that I would know. I've never been to an abbatoir. But people have said it on MN before.

OnionShite, many mince pies are halal, as they are not usually made with real suet (or other meat products) any more and a lot don't have any alcohol.

Thinking of it, I have once seen a Muslim colleague eat one. I don't think she was that strict though.

Head, wall. Why? What’s the outrage? What’s wrong with some people?

The Daily Mail seems to use any excuse, however slight, to criticise anybody who has not got 100% pure British genes and hasn't had their entire family here since the dawn of time.

I haven't seen the advert but I can't imagine any decent person having a problem with it.

Ha, and what are 100% pure British genes anyway? A bit of roman? A bit of Viking? Lots of celt?!

it infuriates me when people moan about "them" banning the nativity etc because that's not my experience at all

That's what I've found Council.

In my experience the people who want to ban Christmas (and other Christian celebrations) are predominantly white atheists who take up the cudgels on behalf of other groups who "might" be offended by traditional Christian celebrations.

I have lived and worked among Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs and (two) Buddhists - and probably others whose faith or lack of it was unknown to me. None of them objected. Most of them really enjoyed the atmosphere and the celebrations

It's amazing that we can all share and enjoy each others cultures! I wish we made a bigger thing in this country of more festivals and holidays. It's beautiful to come together and learn about things that are important to our neighbours and friends

My sentiments exactly!

Saw a recent docco on roman Britain the other day. Apparently in the cities and towns, 20% of the skeletons were of non ethnic origin ;)

I DO think there are a set of British cultural values though. These would be a sense of fair play, moderation, slight cynicism, a dislike of too much authority, a stiff upper lip and an ability to not take oneself too seriously. There a set of British cultural values - moving away from the UK has shown me this to be true! But they sure as hell aren’t the ones the DM thinks they are ;)

In my experience the people who want to ban Christmas (and other Christian celebrations) are predominantly white atheists who take up the cudgels on behalf of other groups who "might" be offended by traditional Christian celebrations.

Woah there! White atheist here who is totally up for a bit of Diwali/Nowruz/Xmas/Beltane.

I don’t think it’s the atheists banning stuff - we generally just like the day off and the cake, my friends! It’s the culture of non offence, mixed with scaremongering from DM types that ‘our culture’ is under threat.

Atheists are generally kind of chilled about festivals. As long as no one is trying to restrict my rights or freedoms, or those of my other belief/ non belief system, you can crack on with your festivals just fine.

I don’t think it’s the atheists banning stuff - we generally just like the day off and the cake

A pragmatic attitude - I respect that!

It's not every white atheist, I agree, and I think the cake-loving faction is by far the dominant one. However, I think if you put all the "Christmas is totally offensive" twats into Wembley Stadium, most of them would turn out to be a) white, b) atheist, c) middle-class (forgot that in my previous post - sorry ), and d) role models for "Clare in the Community.

However, if I have offended or in any way upset you, I apologise unreservedly. And I would like offer you some by way of making amends.

I think the not taking ourselves seriously stuff that you mentioned in your penultimate post, is by far the most important quality anyone can have.

Schaden, I think there would also be a lot of 'nominally C of E' drippy secularists, who are just so concerned about not offending anyone.

I don't see why the lack of halal turky makes Christmas less exclusive? You can eat anything you want for Christmas. Many people like a nice ham too at Christmas but clearly you'll have a job finding a halal one of them. Likewise a job finding a vegan or vegetarian Turkey. Christmas food is not all about Turkey (to be fair trukey is a fairly new tradition). I wouldn't get offended if somewhere didn't have one or two items meeting the dietary requirements of a small part of the population. The enjoyment of Christmas has little to do with if you can find a turkey that meets your dietary requirment.

Sorry I know this is totally off topic but do CofE ring bells on guy fawkes night? I swear I heard the bells ringing on 5th November in the evening...not sure I’ve ever heard them at that time before on a Sunday. They normally ring them around 9-10am.

Rebeccaslicker well if we look back we used to identify more in terms of regional kingdoms that made up what is now Britian. Ask me 100s of years ago I would say I'm Mercian and no doubt I would say my values were Mercian (what ever they are).

saga, I meant we celebrate more things, not combine them 😀
So, Diwali is a festival of light. Easy, it’s light. Ramadan?? We could do all those dry-January, stop-smoking months then?? A huge month of fundraising?

I’m just brainstorming really. Belief in the nativity is becoming scarce, but Christmas is as popular as ever. We could bring our unique secular love of celebration to lots of religious events!

Because most British people eat turkey 1DAD2KIDS and if tescos want to show Muslims in their Christmas advert it seems odd that Tesco's wouldnt ensure that they would be able to actually eat the most popular Christmas meal.