The intolerant religious right is up to its old silly tricks again this holiday season -- as the news report below indicates.
In response, Earthside presents 'Respect-mas'. With its own separate page, you can check our list of tolerant and respectful retailers ... that will be the upside down version of the Focus on the Family list.
Respect-mas
Link: Focus on the Family Puts Retailers on Christmas Naughty, Nice List | Rocky Mountain News
Focus on the Family wants shoppers to know which retailers are naughty and which ones are nice - at least when it comes to holiday lingo.
On Thursday the Colorado Springs-based ministry's political action arm launched its second-annual holiday campaign by posting an online shoppers guide with three categories: "Christmas-friendly" retailers, "Christmas-negligent" retailers and "Christmas-offensive" retailers.
The "friendly" retailers are so designated because they prominently use "Merry Christmas" and other Christmas-specific references in their catalogs and in-store promotions. Those on the Christmas-offensive list use secular phrases such as "happy holidays" and have "apparently abandoned" the use of the word "Christmas," Focus said. Christmas-negligent companies "marginalize" their message by using "Christmas" in some cases and "holidays" in others.
The ministry - which made its determinations based mostly on an examination of retailers' print and online holiday catalogs - encourages shoppers to patronize the Christmas-friendly stores, but does not tell them to avoid the other retailers.
"It is not a boycott," said Sonja Swiatkiewicz, Focus' director of issues response. "Consumers can do what they wish with the information."
Even so, the online guide includes an electronic petition shoppers can sign that tells retailers "I plan to consult Focus on the Family Action's Shopping Guide ... while making my Christmas purchases this year."
The Focus shopping guide is another weapon in the growing battle against what social conservatives several years ago labeled the "War on Christmas" - the notion that Christmas is being secularized, in part by retailers trying not to offend non-Christians by using terms like "holiday season," "winter season," "shopping season" and "holiday trees."
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