“Jesus is the reason for the Season,” an aphorism I heard from CBC’s on/off-again Shawn Greene (former teacher at Garrison Secondary once again tackling Sports) about Christmas’ true definition.

Barbados Free Press also recently had a lot of piffle over the company Simon Cowell kept during this time of year – saying what adultery as he spends it with a married woman, then why did they get upset when in some Islamic/Arabic territory they were going to bury a woman in sand up to her neck then drive some “big-able” “rock-stones” in she features?

But I am sure many were shocked when I pointed out how if Jesus is descended from David – then that well-known King Of Israel started his lineage by lusting after OPP… In fact, technically, Jesus Himself is the result of adultery! Joseph the REAL descendant of David was not too happy at first at Mary bearing another’s love-child despite Divinity, and if you doubt me, then why did Jose Feliciano have a song on that topic?

Where is all of this going? Many areas but on one subject – Xmas! Free Press started it all really – they had another piece of drivel about Barbados Underground’s banner being Politically Correct as opposed to recognising Barbados’ Christian majority… For me, rather than worry if someone says Happy Eid Al-Adha, Divali, Kwansaa or Christmas (based on the Roman/pagan Saturnalia), why not see if stores observed Independence or the yuletide at the end of November? All of these gnat-strainings made me review my own skewed reaction to this time of year…

One of the most popular icons for this time of year – more than the Nativity or the Christ child – is Sinter Klaas, Pere Noel, Father Christmas or Santa Claus.

I mean there are tons of songs either referring to the alleged elf, and as for the movies on “him“?? Wow! Check the links to searches yourself…

What does it take to be a Santa? How does it affect you? For some, the idea of assured income can lead to protest action, like in Virginia when USA Today spoke of how a Department Store cancelled their Santa a tad too late –

Tyson’s Corner Center and Michael Graham, the man who has played their Santa Claus … for 18 years, said … they reached an “agreement in principle” for the 51-year-old carpenter from Tennessee to return to the job this holiday season.

In a joint statement, the parties said they hoped to have a final agreement to announce in the coming days, and Graham canceled a planned news conference.

The mall recently informed Graham that he wouldn’t be coming back, but it was too late for him to find another gig. Graham hired a lawyer to demand his job back and a down payment that was [overdue].

The mall said it canceled its contract with Graham because it decided to work with a new photography company that wanted a different Santa.

LOL, a Press Conference? Holy Reindeer-guano! The planned change was narrowly averted from becoming a parent-led boycott, and there were the claims that the dispute was not over money but pleasing children, sure! What will kids think of by themselves despite what they’re instructed – they do have minds of their own and are capable (right/wrong/indifferent) of forming their own opinions…

This is why when I had the chance of trying such a gig, I really wondered for the future of Barbados, this is a little item I did last year for SunGoddess about such a ticklish topic –

Sweat.

Dripping into your eye and splashing onto your specs, because the red & white suit was designed for a cold New York or a semi-frigid Toronto ? not an air-conditioned tropical Bridgetown, and yet you still maintain eye-contact with the little child as you have no wish to shatter its dream, as the parent screams, ?Wait, so you is Ian Bourne??

Or?

?All you givin? away is candy? Nuh cell-phone nor a 100-dollar bill? Santa you is a cheap bitch!?

Or?

?Doan tek one candy, tek all ? wait, so all you giving my child is just three piece of candy, what kind of Santa you is at all, d?oh??

What I really want to do is say, ?How about tell me thank you, and take little and live long, you greedy f***ers!? But then my gig would stop before it starts, and I need the money ? car, mortgage, medical? Something usually finds a way to pop up at this time so I just can?t refuse being the proverbially Jolly Old St Nick for one last time.

I seethe when I see how innocent children are TAUGHT to be craven and expect a handout rather than try to make their own way.

What is even sadder is when a child themselves is no longer enchanted by Santa or Christmas and they holler at you how you are ?mock.?

I have seen myself in the mirror, and I must say for once my chubbiness has a purpose to make folks think I am really Santa, the beard and wig I use now are very form-fitting.

By the way, it?s rather ironic how I get concerned that children?s view of Christmas is not destroyed, as mine was vandalised years ago by my own father?

I was nine years old, and earlier that year he told me all about the old US newspaper item which had the famous quote ? ?Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.?

He made me to understand that even if Santa Claus was not THERE at that moment, then parents or any grown up had the right to be Santa on his behalf, like when a teacher got sick and another came over to class!

The same Christmas that year, I had lots of toys from overseas which I knew had to be expensive even by Santa’s standards of the North Pole ? so I was quite naturally gloating, then the same dear man who read about Virginia snarled at me ? ?You think I don?t where you got this stuff from? You ever asked yourself how I will pay for it??

Man, I won?t lie, I ran into my room bawling, and I overheard my father snarling again, this time at my mother, if I have to get on like a girl. Well, wrong thing to say to she, she lashed his arse with words ? why tell me about Virginia if he is going to be so mean, can?t you see Ian loves the gifts?

Nice try, Momma, but way too late my love for Christmas got its first serious crack ? as more Christmasses went by I?d learn to hate how I must pause and pose for my father to snap a picture (a kid wants LOOT then and is not interested in photo-opportunities), by the time I was 12, Christmas and birthday were virtually the same ? a time for free gear and just thank everybody.

Years later, I am approached for my portly yet jovial attitude to be the very representative in a franchise I was rather disenchanted with! H’mmm, maybe if I can?t love Xmas than I can help kids appreciate what was taken away from me?

Yeah, right!

Now, most kids are shocked to learn that not only you are supposed to tell Santa what you want for Christmas but even amazed that you can write him in the North Pole, I wonder if they know the real reason behind it ? a decreed birthday of a Man who tried to bring Order for the human Soul?

Is it any wonder that a concept of an evil version of the Xmas icon abounds, not only in horror or comedies, but even down to a club for such characters, I wish to thank one of my most regular contributors –

anta broke out the sour mash at 10 a.m. Christmas was coming. Why not have a drink?

He raised his glass to another Santa, who was sucking back some Colt 45.

“Pace yourself,” the second Santa said. “I started with beer this year, not Jim Beam like last year.”

Santa got drunk yesterday. He cursed. He smoked. He took off his clothes in public. It was Santacon, an annual gathering of nasty Santas, in which some 500 naughty Clauses marched through the city, shouting, drinking, raising gentle mayhem.

Santacon began 10 years ago in San Francisco, where 30 friends, disheartened by the happiness of Christmas, got together in their Santa suits and set out to have some fun. They crashed a dinner dance and stole people’s drinks. Went to a strip club. Drank themselves silly. Some made it home. Others slept in the streets.

This year, Santacon was – or will be – celebrated from New York to Tokyo and places in between. Its schedule and history can be found online at www.santarchy.com.

The brains behind Santacon are something of a mystery, its organizers remaining underground. A reporter in the crowd set out yesterday to find the Claus-in-Charge but was told there was no main Claus, only subordinate Clauses.

There are four cardinal rules at Santacon. Don’t mess with the police. Don’t mess with kids. Don’t mess with store security. And don’t mess with Santa. These rules were printed on the backs of vomit bags. The bags were passed among the crowd.

New York’s Santacon began with dim sum at the Triple 8 Palace, a Chinese joint on East Broadway under the Manhattan Bridge.

“In the North Pole, we don’t get a chance to eat often Chinese very often,” one Santa said. “So when we come to the city, we like to hit the Asian places.”

This Santa, like most, asked to use his working name for reasons of professional privacy. So, Santa it was – all around.

“Santa’s hungry!” Santa called out to the waiter.

“Santa’s taking his pants off!” Santa hollered in the Triple 8. And he did. At the dim sum cart.

After fueling up, Santa headed for the F train. “Have you been nice or naughty?” one lovely Santa in a pair of fishnet stockings asked a police officer.

The officer said he’d been naughty.

“Well, you get two candy canes for being naughty,” lovely Santa said.

When the F train started, 200 Santas lurched and shouted, “Ho!“

It was a sea of hats and beards and bellies. There were so many Santas, one began to wonder how they got the day off. It was, after all, the holidays – Santa’s busiest time of year.

“Wal-Mart took my job,” said Santa Lamar.

Santa Kevin had a different answer. “Santa got outsourced to India,” he said.

In the West 34th Street station, Santa broke the escalator. “Ho! Ho! Ho!” the crowd of Santas yelled.

Then Santa stopped in Herald Square to sing some variations on carols – “Frosty the Cokehead” and “Chipmunks Roasting on an Open Fire.”

It was on to the New York Public Library, where several hundred Santas gathered on the front steps shouting: “Santa wants a beer! Santa wants a beer!”

One woman turned to her husband with a frown. “This,” she said, “is really going to mess up the kids.”

There was a dicey moment when two traffic officers gave Santa Claus the eye as he and 300 pals crossed 42nd Street at the Avenue of the Americas. A Santa in the vanguard told the officers a few more Santas would be coming in their wake.

“Whose streets?” one Claus chanted. “Santa’s streets!” the crowd called back.

Now Santa headed for that beer. “Belly up to the bar!” one Santa shouted as Santas, by the hundreds, wandered into an Italian place on West 44th Street.

They ordered drinks and staged a belching competition. It was 2 p.m. The day was young.

While I sympathise with those Santas who’ve been disillusioned, to the point I have decided to hang up Ye Olde Red & White for an inordinate period – yet I also understand why that woman in that item was annoyed too, and it ties back to what happens here in Barbados…

When you go and display greed, lust and whatever other sins apply – how can you expect a new generation to come along and override those primal urges and suddenly exhibit humanity’s finer side and far less remember the original reason for the festival, even if we mix religions?