On another topic, in Israel (lived there for a year and a half) even the most important major Jewish holidays are not cranked up to the unmanageable level of insanity that Christmas is in the US. Shopping picks up reasonably before holidays like Rosh Ha-Shanah and Passover, and the latter involves some restrictions on what kinds of foods are sold in many stores, but none of this lasts a solid two months the way the Christmas season does these days, and there are no annoying songs repeated ad nauseum. Traffic may shut down on Yom Kippur, but that’s about as potentially inconvenient as it got for me, as a non-Jew, and nothing you’d drive to is open anyway. Hanukkah is a relatively small celebration there, I suspect because no one feels like they are competing with someone else’s winter holiday. Having also lived on the other side of the wall/fence/insert-your-preferred-term-here, I can tell you that Ramadan, despite actually legitimately lasting a month plus involving a strict fast, is relatively easy to ignore, should the non-Muslim visitor wish to do so. (I can live without eating falafel mid-street at mid-day.) And even in flippin’ *Bethlehem* Christmas is a less in-your-face consumer affair than in the US. Possibly it’s because there is somewhat less emphasis on buying shit in these cultures, or less money to buy it with. It’s always readily evident when these holidays and celebrations are occurring and people are ready with polite invites to dinners and parties, but I never felt they were being shoved down my throat or that assumptions were being made about my celebrating or not celebrating. It likely would have been different had I been born in the region, particularly with the two more recruitment-happy monotheisms, but that isn’t something I’m qualified to address.

I’m a fan of this rape-y song BUT also a feminist, therefore the song can’t be rape-y!

My friends have been raped BUT I think talking about music and rape culture is too radical!

I’m no academic, but I seem to recall learning at some point in my education when you have to qualify your statements with such illogical personal protests as “Well, I’m a…but I…” or “some of my best friends are…but I…!” it’s a sign you either don’t have valid argument or don’t know how to make one.

Yours,
SarahMC
Taking feminist radicalism to an extreme since 2009.

And really, do we see a lot of Christians expressing happiness about the commercialization of one of their major holidays? I thought not. Then why would we want to do the same thing to an observance that even the rabbis didn’t want to talk about? Yet again, right-wing Jew fail.

But otherwise, thanks for the apology.

You make a fair point. I was just trying to communicate that this song, while it has been co-opted by Christmas culture, is much more reflective of rape culture, which is fucking us all over equally. I’m sorry if my remarks came across as contentious or offensive.