It’s slim pickings out there for the responsible progressive these days. What is he to do for a pastime without fear of becoming a right-winger? Is he allowed to like anything?
To the long list of behaviors that the major media have branded as right-wing, readers of Politico and the Washington Post have been warned that celebrating the birth of Jesus makes them Christian nationalists.
This might not be such a problem if libs and other non-right-wingers were allowed to do anything else. Sadly, the media keeps adding things that make you right-wing, starting with wearing deodorant.
“Hate body odour? You’re more likely to have rightwing views,” the Guardian warned in 2018.
You should not be getting sweaty anyway if you are a good progressive who read “The White Supremacist Origins of Exercise” in Time magazine in 2022. If you ever lifted or ran, hopefully you stopped after a Guardian columnist warned, “Getting fit is great — but it could turn you into a rightwing jerk.”
But as you ditch physical fitness, you had better not turn into a bookworm — there lies fascism. If you are too big a fan of Lord of the Rings, you are in the same boat as Peter Thiel and Vice President JD Vance, MS Now celebrity Rachel Maddow explained, as Vance accepted the Republican nomination for vice president in 2024.
Don’t touch Homer, either. The New York Times made it clear in December that New College Florida is in a right-wing bubble in part because “The Odyssey is required reading.”
Heck, even Harry Potter is right-wing now that author J. K. Rowling has been canceled.
Eating protein, according to the Atlantic, the New Republic, and other liberal outlets, is part of “right-wing politics.”
Even making babies and having a family are now conservative-coded. Sometimes it seems that heterosexual attraction counts as “right-wing.”
The latest addition to this list: Singing “What Child Is This?” is right-wing — at least that’s the implication from a couple of liberal outlets.
“Far-right parties are claiming the festive season as their own, recasting Christmas as a marker of Christian civilization that is under threat,” Politico gasped on Christmas Eve. Imagine that! These people believe the birth of Christ is a marker of Christianity! (And where would they ever get the notion that Christian civilization is under threat?)
Likewise, the Washington Post informed its readers that Trump administration Christmas greetings have “drawn objections” (surely not from the outlet’s editors and reporters, who have no opinions), for being “religious” rather than “secular.”
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Two examples from the Department of Homeland Security: The Christmas social media posts declared “Christ is Born!” and one video displayed religious images, including Jesus, a manger, and crosses.
So do yourself a favor if you don’t want to be labeled a Christian nationalist or a right-winger, and just say “bah humbug.”
