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All the sudden it’s Dec 1! So Merry Christmas my skeptical friends, and since it’s that time of year, since most atheists and skeptics are like everyone else and we do like the holidays, and best of all since I’m yet again between shitty, no benefit contracts in the dismal field of technical support, I would appreciate any holiday donations you can offer up this month. I used to only bug readers once a year, in December, but lately it’s been a lot more common and I don’t know where I’d be without you.

Christmas is a tough time for the struggling. And on top of that we atheists can count on being smacked around on a regular basis in media of all kinds. Here’s some typical atheist War on Christmas fare in this weekend’s opinion pages:

NJ.com — At this time of year, the Christmas message is their target. The message is that God entered the timeline of history, put on an earth suit like ours, lived the perfect life we couldn’t, kept the rules He made that we break, and then laid down that perfect life on our behalf in order to satisfy His own order of justice. In this we find forgiveness and divine pardon. That is the message that Charlie Brown’s friend, Linus, understood. It’s a message that children comprehend, theologians debate and atheists scoff at.

Hmmm. Well, not sure if I want to take on the Forces of Goodness, let alone Peanuts. My sights are lower: let’s get Claus! He deserves it, too. A fat immortal living in a luxurious estate built and maintained by a small army of unpaid workers trapped in crumbling Arctic ghettos and snow caves. That’s not all! By most accounts, Claus openly, proudly runs a third-world forced labor camp that rivals the worst Stalin era gulag. He runs a 24/7 sweatshop manned by disabled families, all specifically chosen for their diminutive stature and non-aggressive nature, many of whom appear to be cursed with genetic birth defects and are no doubt in desperate need of modern medical attention, and he relies on what sure sounds like a lot magic pagan spells to run the whole operation, to fly at relativistic speeds and be virtually omnipresent.

Claus may not be The God, or even a god, but he’s sure not a mortal. He’s in that strange space set aside in the minds of believers professing faith in The One True God occupied by demons and spirits and various class of angels: the demi-gods and demi-goddesses. Maybe we can join forces with Christmas-hating theists and put this guy and his entire unholy operation out of business for good.

I would like to be able to run around all month telling cute little kids there’s no Santa and enjoying their sweet, salty tears, but I can’t do it without your help. Christmas hating atheist activist doesn’t pay much. Plus the same technology that made me a struggling free-lance writer knocked the market for writing into the gutter. The Internet giveth and the Internet taketh away. Any holiday donation, even single digits, is greatly appreciated. My contact info is on the splash page f anyone needs a snail mail address.