Santas Ho Ho Ho to be Banned

[ILL Tonkso 1,239]

From the Daily Telegraph (Australia)]

<q>

By Janet Fife-Yeomans and Amanda Grant

November 15, 2007 12:00am

HE is an unlikely revolutionary but this Christmas, Santa is a rebel with a claus.

He is having the last laugh on political correctness - and it's a great big fat belly laugh.

Santas across Sydney are rebelling against attempts to ban their traditional greeting of "ho, ho, ho" in favour of "ha, ha, ha".

Recruitment firm Westaff - which supplies hundreds of Santas across the country - has told its trainees that the "ho ho ho" phrase could frighten children and could even be derogatory to women.

Two Santa hopefuls reportedly quit the course because of the hullabaloo of the ho, ho, ho.

One would-be Santa has told The Daily Telegraph he was taught not to use "ho, ho, ho" because it was too close to the American slang for prostitute. He also quit.

"Gimme a break," Julie Gale, who runs the campaign against sexualising children called Kids Free 2B Kids, said.

"We are talking about little kids who do not understand that "ho, ho, ho" has any other connotation and nor should they.

"Leave Santa alone."

Australian Childhood Foundation chief executive officer Dr Joe Tucci said it was the latest example of political correctness gone mad.

"There is no stronger tradition for children than Santa's ho, ho, ho," Dr Tucci said.

Yesterday department stores David Jones and Myers and the Westfield shopping centre chain moved to reassure children, and their parents, that Santa and his customary greeting was part of Christmas's present as well as Christmas's past.

A David Jones spokeswoman said they had discussed the situation with Westaff and their Santas would not be silenced.

"Senior management have assured us that Santas provided to David Jones have not been censored in any way," the spokeswoma said.

At Myer, where Westaff also train the fat men in red suit, Santa could not stop laughing about the suggestion.

"Myer has not directed our Santas to refrain from using 'ho, ho, ho' and believe the expression is an important Christmas tradition," a spokesman for Myer said.

Westfield's Santas are recruited and trained by RegProm Marketing and they will be "ho, ho, ho-ing" a Westfield spokeswoman said.

"Westfield Santas are known for their friendly and welcoming nature and know how to deliver a real festive 'ho, ho, ho'.

Sydney mother Maybel Lopez said she wanted her daughter Andria, 5, to grow up hearing Santa's "ho, ho, ho" just like she had and she did not realise it had other connotations.

"It's what Santa has been saying his whole life - my whole life. It is just a normal thing really for him to say 'ho, ho, ho'," Ms Lopez said.

Westaff's national Santa co-ordinator Sari Hegarty wrote to stores explaining the company's position.

"Westaff has been a provider of quality caring Santas for over forty years," Ms Hegarty wrote in an email.

"Part of our advice to our Santas is that they should be mindful of children having their first Santa experience.

"We ask our Santas to try techniques such as lowering their tone of voice and using 'ha, ha, ha' to encourage the children to come forward and meet Santa. We wish you and your family a very merry Christmas."

Westaff national operations manager Greg Jansz said it was "misleading" to say the company had banned Santa's traditional greeting and it was being left up to the discretion of Santa himself.<q\>

[BurroDiablo 222]

Ho Ho Ho is supposed to be Jolly... Jolly ol' St.Nick...

A fat guy shouting 'HA HA HA!' at Children is just mockingly frightning...

[DuskTrooper 316]

ZOMGAZASTRIP! You forgot to Censor the word Christmas out!!11111111

[belfastuniguy 18]

If someone is offended by a Santa dressed in a Santa costume saying HO HO HO they need to get and get their head examined.

[Glenni 1,447]

Why not just replace Santa all together, with a fat militant feminist who resemble a guy more and shouts "Pig, Pig, swine pig, all men are pigs, Jesus Christ was a woman!!"

[hamsterTK 93]

LOL!

But you know, I read once though that in reality many small children are actually more frightened by mall santas than amused. I know I was.Maybe they are finally catching on lol.

[belfastuniguy 18]

Originally posted by: Glenni Why not just replace Santa all together, with a fat militant feminist who resemble a guy more and shouts "Pig, Pig, swine pig, all men are pigs, Jesus Christ was a woman!!"quote>

I'd be f******* terrified if that came down my chimney, LOL

[tonkawom 1]

Wierd Al addressed this in his song "Christmas at ground zero"....

"You might hear reindeer on your rooftop, or Jack Frost on your windowsill, but if someone's climbing down your chimney, you better load your gun and shoot to kill..."

[your_adress_here 11]

This is simply retarded.

[screamingman12 30]

Why would anyone be stupid enough to do this?

[GingerBlokey 30]

Its another thing "gone mad"

Fed up with the right wing press making a mountian out of a mole hill, this will make the front page of the Daily Mail tomorrow.

Its probably not as bad as they make out.

[Micah 16]

This sounds like a freedom of speech issue to me. Not only does it appear these people are trying to take away tradition, but they are trying to prevert the minds of young children who, at that age, don't know anything about prostitution until about 8 or 9 years old which isn't the usual age for kids coming up to Santa.

And if someone were to say, "Traditions are meant to be broken!", then I would reply, "Isn't the tradition of breaking traditions meant to be broken?"

[kawan 6]

This is as stupid as what is in the Sesame Street thread here. It's one of those things that you just cannot change.

[Barbarossa 51]

.

  Edited September 7, 2012 by Barbarossa  

[storms991 0]

Ho is a bad word, they should definitely ban it.

Just joking..

[Edited for content] Marc

[DuskTrooper 316]

This also reminds me of that Futurama episode, where the planet Uranus was renamed to Urectum.

[___idiotbox 0]

Originally posted by: DuskTrooper This also reminds me of that Futurama episode, where the planet Uranus was renamed to Urectum. quote>

Hahaha!!

Like that lady said in the article, little kids do not know the negative connotation of this word yet. Of course as they get older their belief of Santa goes down the drain and they soon understand what the other meaning of that word means. I know when I was in middle school we would all giggle about it, but it's not like my parents were running around going "she knows what it means!! We need to change it to 'ha ha ha' !!!!"

Oh and Santa is jolly, not evil

-Ellie

[krbe 193]

Originally posted by: hamsterTK LOL!

But you know, I read once though that in reality many small children are actually more frightened by mall santas than amused. I know I was.Maybe they are finally catching on lol.quote>

 

Everyone fears the unknow. If you're 4 years old and meeting a large man with a white beard a couple of times a year, you should be scared. I have never met a bear in my life, but if I do, I'm not jumping into them and telling them that I want a castle, golf course and whisky distillery.

[Eastwinn 6]

I will support this banning if I meet a child who learned the bad meaning of the word "Ho" before (s)he learned that that was how santa laughed.

[Duke87 1,070]

It's not the little kids you have to worry about, they know nothing of prostitution or even sex. It's the young preteens-early teens that are more of a concern. You know, the ones who go "Huh huh. Santa says 'ho'. huh huh" all Beavis and Butthead like.

But see, this is the problem- tradition falls victim to words grabbing new connotations. Santa has been saying "ho ho ho" since long before the word had anything to do with prostitution. It's like how all those old works of literature use "gay" to mean happy, and nobody does that anymore since the word has been corrupted to mean something completely different. Still, we don't go retconning all those old works to say "happy" instead, we let them be. Were Santa a brand new character being created today, him saying "ho ho ho" would definitely be objectionable. But he's old enough that it's obvious the sexual connotation is completely unintended.

...as a kid, I never actually associated "ho ho ho" as being an onomatopoeia for laughter. I always though it was just something Santa said, that meant absolutely nothing.

But yeah, this is nuts. Next thing you know we'll be renaming him "Santa Hands", since "Claus" sounds like "claws", and that could frighten little kids.

[The_Dalai_Llama 15]

What's next? Shrinking Santa's waistline because it promotes childhood obesity?

Oh wait... that's happening, too.

[A Nonny Moose 8,263]

This has finally gone too far.  I am sick to death of politically correct fools, and will no longer suffer them at all, let alone gladly.

There are many things about English related to Christmas that are politically incorrect, and I stand up for all of them.

Ho Ho Ho!  Canada post accepts letters addressed to S. Claus, North Pole, H0H 0H0.  They all seem to get answered.

"Don we now our gay apparel" - from Deck the Halls with Boughs of Holly.  Damn right.  If I want to put on a red suit, try and stop me.

And let's put The Christ back into Christmas!  Happy name day, Jesus.

P.S. We should all know that Christmas could not have been His birthday because it doesn't fit with the Bible's seasons and the timing of the Immaculate Conception.  Christmas coincides with the Roman feast of Saturn, and was co-opted by the early Church to help suppress Roman paganism.

[JanYpe 17]

We should all know that Christmas could not have been His birthday because it doesn't fit with the Bible's seasons and the timing of the Immaculate Conception. quote>

I say we move Christmas to July 12th and start reflecting the facts.

[Duke87 1,070]

Originally posted by: N_O_BodyP.S. We should all know that Christmas could not have been His birthday because it doesn't fit with the Bible's seasons and the timing of the Immaculate Conception.  Christmas coincides with the Roman feast of Saturn, and was co-opted by the early Church to help suppress Roman paganism.quote>

The Immaculate Conception day is celebrating the immaculate conception of virgin Mary, not Jesus.

There are reasons historians believe Jesus was most likely born in the summer, but that's not one of them. They mostly come from other, non-biblical sources.

[Meg 368]

Originally posted by: JanYpe

We should all know that Christmas could not have been His birthday because it doesn't fit with the Bible's seasons and the timing of the Immaculate Conception. quote>

I say we move Christmas to July 12th and start reflecting the facts. quote>

And, since the star of Bethlehem was the convergence of several planets and it happened in 2 B.C., let's renumber the calendar and skip ahead to 2010. 

or maybe it was a comet in 5 B.C. so it should be 2013 soon.  In which case, we can skip 2012, when the Mayans thought the world will end.

Most single-digit-age people don't know what "ho" means.   As for double-digit-aged people, most of them don't take Santa Claus seriously.  

[Tropod 144]

*steps up, dressed in red, sack in hand, belly sticking out, beard all long*

HA HA HA

Yeah, I saw this on the news about a week ago. Quite stupid really.

[Glenni 1,447]

We should also ban the word "garden hoe", because that is also offensive!

[SpecialEddie 3]

This is just like censoring "c0ck" on ST. It's meant to do good, but ends up drawing more attention to the word itself.

[The_Dalai_Llama 15]

Originally posted by: Glenni We should also ban the word "garden hoe", because that is also offensive!quote>

 

And "garden hose" which is the plural form, I believe?

[Garek Maxwell 1]

Originally posted by: Daily Telegraph and could even be derogatory to women.quote>

I'm offended!

Men can be hos too!

In fact, men can ho as good as any woman! Santa is proof of this! Why else would he come down the chimney carrying packages for people? ...Sometimes very lonely people. He's being very generous this time of year.

(Hey, I could have gone with "Santa is a pedophile". Be glad I didn't if you don't like the mental imagery.  )