EDITORIAL – Banning the words ‘Merry Christmas,’ ‘chief’ and other bad ideas

An ArmchairMayor.ca editorial by Mel Rothenburger.

THE ONE GOOD THING about Halloween — which has become as commercialized as any other milestone on the calendar — is that it temporarily stems the tide of Christmas advertising.

Mercifully, stores have to wait until November to start flogging toys and gift wrap.

Donald Trump never was one to wait — he has declared that it’s OK to say “Merry Christmas” again.

People are getting slaughtered at music concerts, we may be on the brink of a nuclear war, the environment is being ruined, hurricanes are destroying entire islands — which, he has reminded us, are surrounded by water, lots of water — and the NAFTA negotiations are in trouble.

Never mind all that, Donald Trump is going to fix this “Merry Christmas” political correctness thing, “believe me, believe me.”

Seriously, Mr. President? The rest of us have already decided there’s nothing wrong with saying “Merry Christmas.” It was a bit of an issue for a while but we in Canada have moved on to banning other things, like statues of the wrong people, and renaming our mountains and such.

And now, the Toronto District School Board is going to ban the word “chief” from job titles. There will be no more “chief executive officers” for example. It’s about respect, the board says.

If Kamloops followed Toronto, our public bodies would have no more “chief administrative officers.” We could call them “big bosses” instead.

But nobody, including First Nations, is asking for it. Toronto school trustees seem to have dreamed it up all on their own.

How banning the word “chief” from the education-system work place will in any way help our indigenous Canadians is anybody’s guess, but the Toronto school board somehow believes this birdbrained idea will do just that.

Donald Trump — who recently claimed to have invented the term “fake news” — will, I’m sure, catch on, and defiantly come out against banning the word “chief” long after everybody else has moved on to something else.

I’m Mel Rothenburger, the Armchair Mayor.

Mel Rothenburger’s Armchair Mayor editorials appear twice daily Mondays through Thursdays on CFJC- TV. His Armchair Mayor column is published Saturdays on ArmchairMayor.ca and CFJC Today. Contact him at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.