The Christmas Conspiracy

Dear readers, the cold war is not over - far from it! The latest installment, while it has gone unnoticed for some time, is the Russian plot to indoctrinate our children through one of our most beloved and capitalist holidays, Christmas. The communist subversives have somehow managed to turn the greatest of cultural holiday icons, St. Nicholas, into a tool for their dastardly, liberal designs.

I am speaking, of course, of the cultural deification of Karl Marx in the person of Santa Clause. The parallels are obvious and endless: they both have enormous, impractical shaggy beards (just like Darwin! And Daniel Dennett!), they are both fond of the color red, they both employ armies of mindless drones to do their bidding (elves represent the purest form of collectivism), and they are both from the northerly regions of the globe. Most horrifying of all, however, is the practice of giving gifts - FREE gifts! - to children. There is no more grotesque example of communist propaganda than this inculcation of false doctrines in our hard-earned progeny. How are young westerners supposed to learn that they only earn their property through hard work if they are taught year after year that it is their loyalty to some northerly dictator and his principles that earns them their keep? He has Orwellian lists of "naughty" and "nice" (read "subversive" and "loyal to the party") that he keeps handy, and he claims to have divine knowledge of your actions - policing your very thoughts - to decide whether your actions will bring you good gifts or lumps of black coal. He is a worldwide totalitarian dictator, providing a referent for children who grow up in otherwise innocent right-wing homes. When they grow older, their fondness for this falsely generous usurper of parents' good intentions will manifest itself in their political opinions, just like atheist kids who read Phillip Pullman and grow up incapable of thinking for themselves!

Dear reader, this must stop. If our economy is to continue its climb towards competitive perfection, we must cease this nonsense and make our children work for their presents. There is a spectre haunting our chimneys - the spectre of Santa Clause - and the pitter patter of reindeer paws will soon be indistinguishable from the rhythmic stomp of stormtroopers' boots!