It’s tough these days to say “Merry Christmas” without thinking about the nearly 30 years of culture war baggage loaded on top of that phrase.
Christmas has been a political hot potato ever since disgraced Fox News personality Bill O’Reilly popularized the “War on Christmas” back in the early 2000s. That trend went into grievance hyperdrive with the emergence of Donald Trump and the perpetually victimized MAGA movement. A once noncontroversial holiday has spent decades politicized to within an inch of its life.