The Media That Stole Christmakuh

CC Wikimedia Commons
CC Wikimedia Commons

I don’t know if any of you have noticed or not, but the holidays are here! Tonight is the first night Hannukah and I will be attending a Hannukah dinner. In about two weeks, it will be Christmas. It will most likely be a white Christmas judging from this brutal onslaught of cold weather we are, appropriately, experiencing.

Everything’s the way it’s supposed to be around this time of year. My apartment’s supply of hot chocolate is constantly being re-filled, and Christmas music has been playing on the radio since Thanksgiving. The formula is almost complete. The only thing missing?

Christmas cheer.

C’mon, America! I know times are bad, but are we really that jaded that we can’t appreciate some good, old-fashioned holiday warmth? Where’s that fuzzy feeling you get when you see Christmas ads?

Oh. Well there’s the problem.

I’m not sure how much TV you guys watch, but I’ve been watching a LOT of television lately to procrastinate my work by pretending I’m really into shows that I just HAVE to watch, like Man vs. Food or House Hunters. Quality television.

In any case, throughout my nights of watching a fat man scarf down an ungodly amount of food, I have also been watching all the commercials because, yes, I actually do enjoy commercials thank you very much. And I’ve noticed that most companies are actually rejecting the whole “Christmas/holiday season” theme this year. The latest BMW-spot, for example, is a flat-out rebuff of holiday spirit.

Okay, so big red bows are frivolous, wrapping paper is just another way we harm the environment, and snowmen melt. These are all facts of life. But it’s just for this one time of year! I think this whole country would feel just a little bit better if they felt that warm and fuzzy feeling inside. Not to mention, have we thought about the children?

One of the higher-ups at my internship sent an e-mail out to the entire company today with a photo his wife sent him of their daughter seeing Santa for the first time this year at the mall. The look on this adorable little girl’s face was one of the most heart-warming things I have ever seen. If it wasn’t a breach of their privacy, or if I was a little more unethical, I would show the photo to all of you. But the fact of the matter is, the look on this little girl’s face captured everything the holidays meant to me when I was a child.

So to the media, to advertisers: Yes, we’re going through some really rough times. But doom and gloom isn’t really the way to get us. Doom and gloom pretty much define a lot of people’s lives. The holidays are all about celebrating. Maybe the traditional holiday cheer is a little over-the-top in times like these, but can’t we just celebrate the fact that we made it? Because yeah, 2009 was a pretty tough year. But we’re still here, we still love those close to us, and they still love us (hopefully). Can’t we just feel good about that for a hot minute?

About Melody Tran

Melody Tran (COM '10) writes "Ad Avenue," an advertising column, for the Quad.

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