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Mulled whine

It may be deader than a Yule log, but the 'PC conspiracy to ban Christmas', it seems, is just too good a story to let go.

I'm a bit reticent about returning to the subject of the PC war on Christmas - not least because of the risk that dwelling on the topic too long might somehow lend credibility to the dunderheads and demagogues who want you to believe that it exists. But since there's been another rash of "Christmas-banning" tales over the weekend, please indulge me briefly one last time.

Claim: "Only 1 in 100 High Street Christmas cards has religious theme." (Daily Mail, December 9)

Reality: The Mail's crack team of secularism-hunters analysed 5,500 cards in several chain stores (pity the poor work-experience people who presumably did all the legwork). Only 67, which the Mail rounds down to "1 in 100", were found to show "traditional Nativity pictures such as angels over a stable, Jesus in his manger and the three wise men", while "hundreds" avoided "any images linked to Christmas at all", and "many" wished recipients only "Season's greetings".

I'm sure the full details of the Mail's survey will be published in a peer-reviewed journal before long. But in the meantime, note the vagueness of the phrasing. Even assuming the story as reported is true, up to 5,300 of the cards could feature Christmas trees, Santa Claus, snowy rustic scenes, or, for that matter, carol-singers, candles, chestnuts roasting over open fires and stockings full of presents - and wish recipients a Happy Christmas - and the Mail's description would still be technically accurate. In which case, the headline could just as easily read: "More than 96 in 100 High Street Christmas cards has a traditional Christmas theme."

Claim: "Gordon Brown last night condemned Labour's own Sure Start playgroups for replacing their Christmas parties with politically-correct 'winter celebrations'" (Daily Mail, December 8)

Reality: There isn't a national Sure Start policy on Christmas. The Mail has found one Sure Start centre in Sheffield that used the word "winter" instead of "Christmas" in its literature, and two in London that say they're having parties that aren't being presented solely as Christmas celebrations. That's 0.3% of the 1,000 Sure Start centres currently in operation, so Brown's grandstanding on the matter (echoing Jack Straw, who also became exercised) will have had immeasurably more impact, in terms of spreading a sense of embattlement among religious people, than the arguably misguided attempts of a handful of childcare workers to be inoffensive. Meanwhile, better keep quiet about this Sure Start Christmas storytime event, this Sure Start Christmas music event, and this Sure Start Christmas party play day.

Claim: "Many primary schools and nursery schools have replaced Nativity plays with something more secular." (Daily Mail, December 9)

Reality: No evidence, of course, is given for the use of the word "many". Eight parents are interviewed about the "alternative" plays their children are involved in. Of the eight cases, two are clearly pantomimes (part of a traditional British Christmas since at least the 19th century, I think), one play actually was "based on the Nativity", and in a fourth case the play seems to be in addition to a Nativity play, since "the headmistress maintains the Nativity story will still be told." In a fifth case, the mother questioned appears unsure as to whether her child's school will have a Nativity play. In two more cases, the parents are clearly thrilled with the plays their kids are taking part in this year, even if they aren't Nativities. That leaves only one case that seems to support the thesis that Nativities are being replaced and that parents are cross about it - at a Church of England school in Preston, which is presumably not run by aggressive secularists.

Claim: "I read reports of local authorities deleting Christmas from their greetings cards and street decorations... [they] should be ashamed of their pathetic spinelessness." (Very Rev Colin Slee, dean of Southwark, Guardian Face to Faith column, December 9) Reality: A particularly wondrous instance of Christmas-banning propaganda here, since Mr Slee not only provides almost no evidence for his claim, but actually begins his article with a long paragraph celebrating the fact that so many British companies do celebrate Christmas. We're finally graced with a factual claim for Christmas-banning in the penultimate sentence - a reference to how the "loveless intellectual desert called secularism" offers us something called "Winterfest" instead of Christmas. Winterfest appears to be some kind of marketing scheme Stoke on Trent council organised in 2004. There are plenty of references to Christmas and Christmas activities on the council's website this year. Unless the dean means WinterFest, which is a rather vociferously evangelical Christian music event held in that awfully loveless desert of secularism, Jerry Falwell's Liberty University in Virginia .

OK. I'll leave it alone now, I promise. Happy holidays, everyone.

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