A FOX Christmas

From CHARLIE REINA, former Fox News Channel producer:12-14-05 --


As with many conflicts, particularly the manufactured kind, dishonesty, greed and ignorance are the culprits behind Fox News Channel's so-called “War on Christmas.” But their enabler, as Dr. Phil might call it, is that well-intended but wholly misguided scourge of society -- political correctness. Rather than promoting tolerance, inclusion and understanding, as advertised, p/c has had the opposite effect. It has made us not a freer society, but one of timid, tongue-tied slaves to convention who substitute glib code words for the more difficult task of actually treating each other with respect. It’s the kind of shortcut that sooner or later circles back to bite you.But first let’s look at what political correctness is, and is not, in this context. Wishing your customers or co-workers, “Happy holidays,” isn’t p/c; it’s common sense. Try saying, “Merry Christmas, happy Hannukah, a joyous Kwanzaa and a prosperous New Year” every time you leave the office, and before long they won’t let you back in. But taking something that’s recognized everywhere – by people of all religious beliefs -- as a Christmas tree and renaming it a “holiday tree” is political correctness, pure and simple.It adds nothing, reaches out to no one. It’s as offensive as it would be to call a Menorah a “festive candelabra,” or Santa Claus “Jolly old Good-guy Nick.” Granted, as a cause for war, this holiday p/c is no Pearl Harbor. But in its own naïve way, it provides the warmongers with just the ammunition they want.It’s no surprise, of course, that this phony call to arms, this “Christmas (ergo, Christians) Under Attack” hysteria, emanates from the bowels of Fox News Channel. The network is, after all, ground zero in the culture wars that polarize so much of America these days. Make no mistake about it: Fox is on a mission. Its slogans say, “Fair and Balanced” and “We Report, You Decide