I don’t understand what the big deal is…

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• You actually have to be a lot more sensitive than that. There are a lot of people out there who don't believe in New Year's Day, and they can get pretty touchy.

• Except that kind of offense has never been the issue. It has never been about some hypothetical person who will be offended by you saying "Merry Christmas" to them. That's the straw person so beloved by conservative talk radio hosts. But they don't exist. Or if they do, they can be safely ignored.

  The scenario was that businesses wanted to be more inclusive and celebrate all the holidays people are celebrating this time of year, without excluding any group of people who are willing to give them their money, so they decided to start saying "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas".

  To then extrapolate from that capitalistic pro-you-giving-your-money-to-me business decision to "they are refusing to say Merry Christmas because they hate Christianity or because someone was offended and complained" was a pure invention of those who need to feel persecuted.

  I have no problem with people saying whatever they want to me, as part of their personal celebrations. I also think that it's laudable that companies that provide goods and services be more inclusive of all of the belief systems their clients and potential customers have, regardless of whether that inclusivity is born out of a true compassionate desire to treat everyone the same or because they think it will drive more sales.

  The question as raised by the professional outrage generators isn't whether you personally care what another individual chooses to say to you as a greeting. It's whether you should be offended because an employee said "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas" because War on Christianity reasons.